NON-ACTING 113
soul in it — the soul has gone else^vhe^e ; these millions of armed men who are daily drilled to prepare for a general war of extermination, no longer hate the men they are expected to fight, and none of their leaders dares to proclaim this war. As for the appeals, and even the threatening claims, that rise from the suffering and the oppressed — a great and sincere pity, recognising their justice, begins at last to respond from above.
Agreement is inevitable, and will come at an ajipointed time, nearer tlian is expected. I know not if it be because I shall soon leave this eartli and the rays that are already reaching mo from below the horizon have disturbed my sight, but I believe our world is about to begin to realize the words, 'Love one another,' without, however, being concerned whether a man or a God uttered them.
The spiritual movement one recognises on all sides, and which so many naive and ambitious men expect to be able to direct, will be absolutely humanitarian. Mankind, which does nothing moderately, is about to be seized with a frenzy, a madness, of love. This will not, of course, happen smoothly or all at once ; it will invi^lve misunderstandings— even sanguinary ones perchance — so trained and so accustomed have we been to hatred, even by those, sometimes, whose mission it was to teach us to love one another. But it is evident that this great law of brotherhood must be accom- plished some day, and I am convinced that the time is commencing when our desire for its accomplishment will become irresistible.
A. Dumas.
June 1, 1893.
Tliere is a great difference between DumasMetter and Zola^s speech, not to mention the external fact that Zola seems to court the approval of the youths he addresses, whereas Dumas' letter does not flatter them, nor tell them they are important people and that ever}i;hing depends on them (which they should never believe if they wish to be good for an}i:hing) ; on the contrary, it points out to them their habitual faults : their presumption and their levity. Tlie chief difference between these two writings consists in the fact that Zola's speech aims at keeping men in the path they are
