tely a very
accurate way of describing the case. To write great satire, to attack a
man so that he feels the attack and half acknowledges its justice, it is
necessary to have a certain intellectual magnanimity which realises the
merits of the opponent as well as his defects. This is, indeed, only
another way of putting the simple truth that in order to attack an army
we must know not only its weak points, but also its strong points.
England in the present season and spirit fails in satire for the same
simple reason that it fails in war: it despises the enemy. In matters of
battle and conquest we have got firmly rooted in our minds the idea (an
idea fit for the philosophers of Bedlam) that we can best trample on a
people by ignoring all the particular merits which give them a chance of
trampling upon us. It has become a breach of etiquette to praise the
enemy; whereas, when the enemy is strong, every honest scout ought to
praise the enemy. It is impossible to vanquish an army without having a
full account of its strength. It is impossible to satirise a man without
having a full account of his virtues. It is too much the custom in
politics to describe a political opponent as utterly inhuman, as utterly
careless of his country, as utterly cynical, which no man ever was since
the beginning of the world. This kind of invective may often have a
great superficial success: it may hit the mood of the moment; it may
raise excitement and applause; it may impress millions. But there is one
man among all those millions whom it does not impress, whom it hardly
ever touches; that is the man against whom it is directed. The one
person for whom the whole satire has been written in vain is the man
whom it is the whole object of the institution of satire to reach. He
knows that such a description of him is not true. He knows that he is
not utterly unpatriotic, or utterly self-seeking, or utterly barbarous
and revengeful. He knows that he is an ordinary man, and that he can
count as many kindly memories, as many humane instincts, as many hours
of decent work and responsibility as any other ordinary man. But behind
all this he has his real weaknesses, the real ironies of his soul:
behind all these ordinary merits lie the mean compromises, the craven
silences, the sullen vanities, the secret brutalities, the unmanly
visions of revenge. It is to these that satire should reach if it is to
touch the man at whom it is aimed. And to reach these it