Individualism, a Factor of Progress

INDIVIDUALISM IS A FACTOR OF PROGRESS, AS LONG AS WE TAKE IT TO BE AN improvement for man to obtain new fields of activity that will allow him to identify and diversify his activity. Wherever individual autonomy has assumed its legitimate place there can no longer be stability in institutions: ancient theocracies’ dream of social immobility soon loses all its prestige. If there was need of it, history could provide us with a multitude of examples that demonstrate this assertion. In the Egypt of the Pharaohs art reached its apex with the decline of the ancient empire, when tradition had not yet mummified it. And it was in pantheist Greece, broken up into a multitude of barely federated small cities, that the human spirit took wing. The century of Augustus in Rome, which would better be called that of Horace, Virgil, and Lucretius, was a century of dissolution and error, so much so that the wise Imperator had to appeal for the assistance of poets and legislators in order to attempt to give the people-king some of the virtues that had created its unity and political power.

Do I need to demonstrate that art is a realm exclusively the province of the individual, but which he can only fully enjoy when freed of routine? The work of art doesn’t interest us as a copy of nature, but through the human interpretation of the universe it transmits to us. It is a form of language, a supremely nuanced and personal form of expression. It gives us the profound emotion of the artist, his effort to interpret his life in accordance with his personality. “Art,” Zola somewhere said, “is nature viewed through a temperament.” That the artist wants to take the easy way out by bending to sometimes arbitrary rules, that he must conform to the facts derived from knowledge, in no way diminishes the part of fantasy and individual sentiment in all artistic creation.

The artist uses knowledge, he isn’t used by it, or if so, only incidentally. It assists him in expressing himself without ruling his talent. In the same way, he is the master of the rules he chooses to conform to, particularly because they are in harmony with his individual sensibility. Whenever this isn’t the case the work, when it ceases to be strictly individual, loses its value. Sometimes the exaggerated respect for the rule reduces it to a conventional, hieratic signification; sometimes its impersonal exactitude turns it into a nearly scientific document condemned to leaving us indifferent.

But, taking into consideration the impersonal character of science, (“The principle of communicating vases is the same for a physicist at the Institut and for a candidate for the high school leaving exam. The most illustrious geometrician can’t explain the equivalence of triangles any differently from a high school freshman” —P. Bourget), it would be wrong to fail to recognize the importance of intellectual speculation and imagination in scientific research. It is here that the role of the talent of the individual scientist begins, and often the results he obtains will depend on his boldness and the freedom of his mind. Most great scientific discoveries are born of the verification of hypotheses that are frequently erroneous, which is why for a long time man’s science was more chimerical than positive. And in the elaboration of philosophical concepts, even if they are only the synthetic coordination of sciences, which diminishes them greatly, one must always leave room for metaphysical speculation, where the individual proceeds according to his particular character. From which flows the many differing points of view among thinkers operating with the same knowledge. We can’t but consider this useful, since there is no better stimulant to the continuous pursuit of truth.

Finally, how do societies progress? Tradition strives to maintain its stability, ceaselessly troubled by the innovations of individuals who are emancipated from the prejudices of their era or are impelled by new motives. Precursors, inventors, free spirits who are sometimes chimerical, fight, fall, and get up again. Their example rallies around them a section of youth; collects and wins over self-interested support. Tomorrow that minority, apparently defeated, will have modified the attitudes—if not the existence—of its enemies and friends alike. It has introduced a new usage, popularized a discovery, wrested a new freedom. It crystallizes and becomes in its turn rite and tradition. And so on and so forth. There is no more consistent element of progress than individual initiative.

Man wanted to “master nature.” Each step that brought this goal closer made him stronger, prouder, happier. But too often he forgot to master himself, or rather he naively thought he was his own master because he didn’t see the hands that guided him. And we have seen him, armed with precious knowledge, abandon himself to the transgressions of his ancestors, accepting their errors, preserving their laws, piously maintaining out-of-date usages. He couldn’t want, he can’t want as long as he doesn’t know. We can only understand the universe when we have seen clearly into ourselves. We can only dominate circumstances and things when we possess ourselves. A man who has no inner life is as insignificant as an apparition. What is needed is suggestive knowledge, the intimate knowledge of the human self. The role of the individualist is to remind us of this.

(Par-delà la Mêlée 16, 1917)