Page:Georges Sorel, Reflections On Violence (1915).djvu/144

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REFLECTIONS ON VIOLENCE

and that, as the result of continually deceiving their readers, they have finally lost all sense of honest discussion. In the Aurore of September 4, 1905, Clemenceau accuses Jaurès of muddling the minds of his partisans "with metaphysical subtleties into which they are incapable of following him" there is nothing to object to in this accusation, save the use of the word metaphysical; Jaurès is no more a metaphysician than he is a lawyer or an astronomer. In the number of October 26 Clemenceau proves that his opponent possesses "the art of falsifying his texts," and he ends by saying, "It seemed to me instructive to expose certain polemical practices which we wrongly supposed to be monopoly of the Jesuits."

Against this noisy, garrulous, and lying Socialism, which is exploited by ambitious people of every description, which amuses a few buffoons, and which is admired by decadents—revolutionary Syndicalism takes its stand, and endeavours, on the contrary, to leave nothing in a state of indecision; its ideas are honestly expressed, without trickery and without mental reservations; no attempt is made to dilute doctrines by a stream of confused commentaries. Syndicalism endeavours to employ methods of expression which throw a full light on things, which put them exactly in the place assigned to them by their nature, and which bring out the whole value of the forces in play. Oppositions, instead of being glozed over, must be thrown into sharp relief if we desire to obtain a clear idea of the Syndicalist movement; the groups which are struggling one against the other must be shown as separate and as compact as possible; in short, the movements of the revolted masses must be represented in such a way that the soul of the revolutionaries may receive a deep and lasting impression.

These results could not be produced in any very certain manner by the use of ordinary language; use must be made of a body of images which, by intuition alone, and