My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleyunderstood less well than history, and born, above all, of our undying belief in theinvincible spirit of that final product of the ages—the modern man. We salute ourgreat antagonist, from whose great warning we have learnt so much, but we rejectutterly the fatality of his conclusion. We believe that modern man, with the newgenius of modern science within him and the inspiration of the modern spirit to guidehim, can find the answer to the historic fatality.'Before returning to the theme of Spengler I summarised two objects of our continualattack, which were only related to Spengler in that he too was determinist in attitude.There were really three doctrines of determinism at that time, Marx, Freud andSpengler; all in some aspects rejected by our belief in a Faustian revival of the humanwill. Spengler at least recognised the possibility of a temporary reply to his owndeterminism—'. . . when money is celebrating its last victories, . . . and the Caesarismthat is to succeed approaches with calm, firm tread . . .'—while I went further andaffirmed that with the aid of modern techniques a final answer could find permanentexpression in a 'persisting dynamism'.I referred to the determinism of Marx and Freud: 'The doctrines of moderndisintegration are classic in form, and pervade the political parties, which fade from aflaccid and universal "liberalism" into the sheer disruption and corruption of socialismserving usury. The doctrinaires of the immediate past come to the aid of politicaldefeatism with the negation of manhood and self-will, and the scientific formulationof surrender as a faith. In the sphere of economics Marx portrays humanity as thehelpless victim of material circumstance, and in the sphere of psychology Freudassists the doctrine of human defeatism with the teaching that self-will and self-helpare no longer of any avail, and that man is equally the helpless toy of childish andeven pre-natal influence. Marx's "materialist conception of history" tells us that manhas been moved by no higher instinct than the urge of his stomach, and Freudsupports this teaching of man's spiritual futility with the lesson that man can neverescape from the squalid misadventures of childhood. . . . This predestination ofmaterialism has proved in practice even more destructive of the human will and spiritthan the old and discredited "predestination of the soul". It has paralysed theintellectual world into the acceptance of surrender to circumstance as an article offaith.'To these destructive doctrines of material defeatism our renaissant creed returns adetermined answer. To Marx we say it is true that if we observe the motive of adonkey in jumping a ditch, we may discern a desire to consume a particularlyluxuriant thistle that grows on the other side. On the other hand, if we observe a manjumping a ditch, we may legitimately conclude that he possesses a different andpossibly a higher motive. To Freud we reply that, if indeed man has no determinationof his own will beyond the idle chances of childhood, then every escape from heredityand environment, not only of genius but of every determined spirit in history, is but afigment of historic imagination. In answer to the fatalistic defeatism of the"intellectual" world our creed summons not only the whole of history as a witness tothe power and motive force of the human spirit, but every evidence and tendency ofrecent science.'Some of my contemporaries were excessively preoccupied with Marx and Freud, JohnStrachey particularly so, and I remember teasing him with the observation: 'You are275 of 424