XXXVIII
VISIT TO ALFRED NOBEL
Arrival at Zurich · Nobel begins to take an interest in the peace movement, and joins us · Trips on the lake · A glimpse into his views of life · His first project for an act in furtherance of the cause of peace
We left Bern a few days before the close of the Conference in order to accept the invitation of Alfred Nobel, who was staying at Zurich. Our host had put at our disposal in the Hotel Bauer au lac, where he himself lodged, a suite of rooms that the Empress Elisabeth had vacated the day before after a short visit. I found still lying on the toilet table a pale faded rose....
Alfred Nobel came to meet us at the railway station and conducted us to the drawing-room prepared for us, and there, a half hour later, he joined us at dinner. He had us tell him all about the meetings of the Bern Congress. He also gave us his name as a member of the Austrian Peace Society, with a contribution of two thousand francs. He had sent a like sum through me to the Congress committee at Rome the year before.
“What you are handing me,—and I thank you for it,”—I said, “comes from amiability rather than from conviction. A few days ago in Bern you expressed your doubts regarding the cause....”
“Regarding the cause and its justice—no, I have no doubts about that, but only as regards the question whether it can be realized; nor do I yet know how your Unions and Congresses propose to take hold of the work....”
“Then if you knew that the work was being well taken hold of would you take a hand and help?”
“Yes, I would. Inform me, convince me,—and then I will do something great for the movement.”
I replied that I could not then, entre la poire et le fromage, explain the whole matter, expel deeply-rooted doubts, and evoke firm conviction; but I would from that time forth keep him posted, send him regularly my review and other publications appertaining to the matter, and would endeavor to give him not only “information” but enthusiasm.
“All right, try for that—I like nothing so much as to be able to feel enthusiasm, a capacity which my experiences in life, and my fellow-men, have greatly weakened.”
Nobel owned a tiny aluminium motor boat, in which we took delightful trips around the lake in his company; the silvery craft darted swiftly over the waters without rocking. We sat leaning back in comfortable deck chairs covered with soft plaids, let the magic panorama of the lake shores pass before our eyes, and talked about a thousand things between heaven and earth. Nobel and I even agreed that we would write a book together, a polemic against everything that keeps the world in wretchedness and stupidity. Nobel was very strongly inclined to Socialism in his views: thus, he said it was improper for rich men to leave their property to their relatives; he regarded great inheritances as a misfortune, for they have a paralyzing effect. Great accumulations of property should go back to the community and common purposes; the children of the rich should inherit only so much that they could be well educated and kept from want, but little enough so that they should be stimulated to work, and through this to renewed enrichment of the world.
The days in Zurich went swiftly. Trips on the lake, excursions to places within and without the city, during which I admired the opulence of the villas that fringe the city, which all look more like castles.
“Yes, the silkworms have spun all that,” said Nobel.
“Perhaps dynamite factories are even more profitable than silk mills,” I remarked, “and less innocent.”
“Perhaps my factories will put an end to war even sooner than your Congresses; on the day when two army corps may mutually annihilate each other in a second, probably all civilized nations will recoil with horror and disband their troops.”
It was his belief that scientific progress and technical discoveries are destined to regenerate mankind. “Every new discovery,” he wrote me once, “modifies the human brain and makes the new generation capable of receiving new ideas.” From a letter of Alfred Nobel’s which was not addressed to me, but came under my eyes, I copied the following passage; it gives a glimpse into his philosophy of life:
To spread the light is to spread prosperity (I mean general prosperity, not individual wealth), and with prosperity will disappear the greatest part of the evils that are the inheritance of dark ages.
The conquests of scientific investigation, and its ever-widening field, awaken in us the hope that the microbes—the soul’s as well as the body’s—will gradually disappear, and the only war which mankind will wage will be the war against these microbes. Then Bacon’s splendid phrase that there are deserts in time will be applicable only to times that lie far back in the past.
On our departure I had to reiterate my promise to keep Alfred Nobel regularly informed about the progress of the peace movement; and from that time forth, though (alas!) I never saw him again, I corresponded with him indefatigably in regard to the cause of peace. As a testimony of how quickly and eagerly he became interested in its behalf I include here a letter which he wrote me a few months after our meeting in Switzerland:
Dear Friend:
May the new year prove prosperous to you and to the noble campaign which you are carrying on with so much power against human ignorance and ferocity.
I should like to dispose of a part of my fortune by founding a prize to be granted every five years—say six times, for if in thirty years they have not succeeded in reforming the present system they will infallibly relapse into barbarism.
The prize would be awarded to him or her who had caused Europe to make the longest strides toward ideas of general pacification.
I am not speaking to you of disarmament, which can be achieved only very slowly; I am not even speaking to you of obligatory arbitration between nations. But this result ought to be reached soon—and it can be attained—to wit, that all states shall with solidarity agree to turn against the first aggressor. Then wars will become impossible. And the result would be to force even the most quarrelsome state to have recourse to a tribunal or else remain tranquil. If the Triple Alliance, instead of comprising only three states, should enlist all states, the peace of the centuries would be assured.