5) Revelation of the Mystery of the Utilisation of Human Impulses, or Clémence d’Harville
so—cannot by any means entertain the thought that there is a world in which consciousness and being are distinct; a world which continues to exist when I merely abolish its existence in thought, its existence as a category or as a standpoint; i.e., when I modify my own subjective consciousness without altering the objective reality in a really objective way, that is to say, without altering my own objective reality and that of other men. Hence the speculative mystical identity of being and thinking is repeated in Criticism as the equally mystical identity of practice and theory. That is why Criticism is so vexed with practice which wants to be something distinct from theory, and with theory which wants to be something other than the dissolution of a definite category in the "boundless generality of self-consciousness". Its own theory is confined to stating that everything determinate is an opposite of the boundless generality of self-consciousness and is, therefore, of no significance; for example, the state, private property, etc. It must be shown, on the contrary, how the state, private property, etc., turn human beings into abstractions, or are products of abstract man, instead of being the reality of individual, concrete human beings.
Finally, it goes without saying that whereas Hegel's Phänomenologie, in spite of its speculative original sin, gives in many instances the elements of a true description of human relations, Herr Bruno and Co., on the other hand, provide only an empty caricature, a caricature which is satisfied with deriving any determinateness out of a product of the spirit or even out of real relations and movements, changing this determinateness into a determinateness of thought, into a category, and making out that this category is the standpoint of the product, of the relation and the movement, in order then to be able to look down on this determinateness triumphantly with old-man's wisdom from the standpoint of abstraction, of the general category and of general self-consciousness.
Just as in Rudolph's opinion all human beings maintain the standpoint of good or bad and are judged by these two immutable conceptions, so for Herr Bauer and Co. all human beings adopt the standpoint of Criticism or that of the Mass. But both turn real human beings into abstract standpoints.
of how he makes the passions useful and "gives the good natural disposition of Clémence d'Harville an appropriate development".
"Rudolph," says Herr Szeliga, "draws her attention to the entertaining aspect of charity, a thought which testifies to a knowledge of human beings that can only arise in the soul of Rudolph after it has been through trial."
The expressions which Rudolph uses in his conversation with Clémence:
"faire attrayant", "utiliser le goût naturel?', "régler l'intrigue", "utiliser les penchants à la dissimulation et à la ruse", "changer en qualités généreuses des instincts impérieux, inexorables" (1) etc., these expressions just as much as the impulses themselves, which are mostly attributed here to woman's nature, betray the secret source of Rudolph's wisdom — Fourier. He has come across some popular presentation of Fourier's theory.
The application is again just as much Rudolph's Critical own as is the exposition of Bentham's theory given above.
It is not in charity as such that the young marquise is to find the satisfaction of her essential human nature, a human content and purpose of her activity, and hence entertainment. Charity offers rather only the external occasion, only the pretext, only the material, for a kind of entertainment that could just as well use any other material as its content. Misery is exploited consciously to procure the charitable person "the piquancy of a novel, the satisfaction of curiosity, adventure, disguise, enjoyment of his or her own excellence, violent nervous excitement", and the like.
Rudolph has thereby unconsciously expressed the mystery which was revealed long ago, that human misery itself, the infinite abjectness which is obliged to receive alms, must serve the aristocracy of money and education as a plaything to satisfy its self-love, tickle its arrogance and amuse it.
The numerous charitable associations in Germany, the numerous charitable societies in France and the great number of charitable quixotic societies in England, the concerts, balls, plays, meals for the poor, and even the public subscriptions for victims of accidents, have no other object. It seems then that along these lines charity, too, has long been organised as entertainment.
The sudden, unmotivated transformation of the marquise at the mere word "amusant" makes us doubt the durability of her cure;
or rather this transformation is sudden and unmotivated only in appearance and is caused only in appearance by the description of
charité as an amusement. The marquise loves Rudolph and Rudolph wants to disguise himself along with her, to intrigue and to indulge in charitable adventures. Later, when the marquise pays a charity visit to the prison of Saint-Lazare, her jealousy of Fleur de
Marie becomes apparent and out of charity towards her jealousy she conceals from Rudolph the fact of Marie's detention. At the best, Rudolph has succeeded in teaching an unhappy woman to play a silly comedy with unhappy beings. The mystery of the philanthropy he has hatched is betrayed by the Paris fop who invites his partner to supper after the dance in the following words:
"Ah, Madame! ce n'est pas assez d'avoir dansé au bénéfice des ces pauvres Polonais ... soyons philanthropes jusqu'au bout ... allons souper maintenant au profit des pauvresl"(2)