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ELIE HALEVY ON ENGLAND AND THE ENGLISH

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 September 2014

K. STEVEN VINCENT
K. STEVEN VINCENT*
Affiliation:
Department of History, North Carolina State University E-mail: svincent@ncsu.edu
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Extract

Elie Halévy became famous as a historian of England in the years before World War I, due to his lectures on England at the Ecole libre des sciences politiques, his three-volume analysis of utilitarianism published between 1901 and 1904, a 1906 article on the birth of Methodism, and the 1912 book L’Angleterre en 1815. In these last two works he argued—in what became known as the Halévy thesis—that English Protestantism, and especially the evangelical forms of English Protestantism associated with Methodism, were a key element of Britain's sociopolitical stability. This deep-seated religiosity, he argued, was supportive of British liberalism and British philanthropy; it was responsible for an England that, in his own words, “governs itself, in place of being governed from above.”

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Forum: Elie Halévy, French Liberalism, and the Politics of the Third Republic
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Modern Intellectual History , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , April 2015 , pp. 173 - 196
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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References

1 Halévy, Elie, La formation du radicalisme philosophique, nouvelle édition dirigée par Monique Canto-Sperber, 3 vols. (Paris, 1995; first published 1901–4)Google Scholar.

2 Elie Halévy, “La naissance du Méthodisme en Angleterre,” La revue de Paris (1906), 519–39, 841–67.

3 Halévy, Elie, Histoire du peuple Anglais au XIXe siècle, vol. 1, L’Angleterre en 1815 (Paris, 1912)Google Scholar.

4 For a clear statement of this thesis, see ibid., 364. In a letter to Lucien Herr (30 Dec. 1910), Halévy summarized the thesis of L’Angleterre en 1815: “C’est le ‘réveil évangélique’ du XVIIIe siècle qui explique le caractère tempéré du ‘libéralisme’ et de l’‘individualisme’ anglais au XIXe siècle, qui a peu à peu rendu impossible en Angleterre la formation de partis réactionnaires et révolutionnaires à la manière continentale.” Halévy, Elie, Correspondance (1891–1937), texts réunis et présentés par Henriette Guy-Loë (Paris, 1996), 413Google Scholar.

5 Halévy, Elie, Histoire du peuple Anglais au XIXe siècle, vol. 2, De lendemain de Waterloo à la veille du Reform Bill (1815–1830) (Paris, 1923), viGoogle Scholar.

6 Halévy, La formation du radicalisme philosophique, vol. 3, Le radicalisme philosophique, 243.

7 In 1897, Halévy wrote to Bouglé, concerning his work on the Utilitarians, “Le problème que je me pose est d’ailleurs, je crois te l’avoir déjà dit, un problème de philosophie de l’histoire: quelle est l’importance historique d’une doctrine?” Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 14 Oct. 1897, Correspondance (1891–1937), 201.

8 In a letter to Xavier Léon of (probably 12 or 19) November 1902, Halévy made the point that he is absorbed in “l’histoire des doctrines économiques.” Halévy, Correspondance (1891–1937), 328. Three years later, in 1905, he wrote to Léon that, “J’y fais de plus en plus, ce qui vaut mieux, de l’histoire et de la doctrine.” Halévy, (14 janvier 1905), Correspondance (1891–1937), 360.

9 A version of these lectures was published posthumously. Halévy, Elie, Histoire du socialisme européen (Paris, 1948)Google Scholar.

10 “Séance du le 20 mars 1902,” Bulletin de la société française de philosophie, 122.

11 Cited by Brunschvicg, Léon, “Le philosophe,” Elie Halévy 1870–1937 (Paris, n.d. (1938)), 29Google Scholar.

12 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 177. Later in the same volume, Halévy argues that sentiment and opinion are also central to economic exchanges (criticizing the rigidly rationalistic views of the English economists like Ricardo). “Ricardo et ses disciples ont tort de considérer les hommes en général, et les hommes d’affaires en particulier, comme des calculateurs exacts, réglant leurs actions sur la connaissance complète de toutes leurs conséquences possibles. Sur le marché de l’argent comme sur le marché des valeurs, l’opinion, non la raison, règne en maîtresse.” Ibid., 332.

13 Elie Halévy to his family (19 Nov. 1892), Correspondance (1891–1937), 94.

14 Elie Halévy to René Berthelot, Friday evening (25 novembre 1892), Fond Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 11. A portion of this letter is in Correspondance (1891–1937), 101.

15 Elie Halévy to Mme Ludovic Halévy, 26 Nov. 1892, Correspondance (1891–1937), 102.

16 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 28 April (1898), Correspondance (1891–1937), 243.

17 Elie Halévy to Daniel Halévy (probably 16 Nov. 1900), Correspondance (1891–1937), 284.

18 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 19 April 1905, Correspondance (1891–1937), 363.

19 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 40.

20 Elie Halévy to Bertrand Russell, Friday 18 (Sept. 1903); and 12 Dec. 1903, Correspondance (1891–1937), 345–6, 348–9. Also see the discussion in Frobert, Ludovic, Elie Halévy: République et économie (1896–1914) (Villeneuve d’Ascq Cédex, 2003), 114–18Google Scholar.

21 Elie Halévy, L’Angleterre et son empire (Paris, 1905), 121–2.

22 “La constitution britannique, disions-nous, est une constitution ‘confuse’. Elle est, devrait-on dire encorer, une constituition ‘diffuse’. Non seulement tous les pouvoirs sont confondus; mais encore, et surtout, le chef de l’Etat est sans pouvoirs, ou presque sans pouvoirs.” Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 38.

23 Ibid., 144. Halévy made similar statements about the meager importance of constitutional issues in England in his correspondence. See, for example, Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 15 May (1898), Correspondance (1891–1937), 247, where he is “assez sceptique sur la profondeur et l’importance des questions constitutionnelles.”

24 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 307, 338.

25 Ibid. 25.

26 See Halévy's discussion of these dimensions of English Methodism in “La naissance du Méthodism en Angleterre,” 536–9.

27 Ibid.

28 Ibid., 525–6.

29 Ibid., 528.

30 Ibid., 526.

31 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 427.

32 Ibid., 564.

33 Halévy, La formation du radicalisme philosophique, vol. 2, L’évolution de la doctrine utilitaire de 1789 à 1815, 192–93.

34 Halévy, La formation du radicalisme philosophique, vol. 1, La jeunesse de Bentham 1776–1789, 23–4.

35 Ibid., 24–5.

36 Ibid., 38.

37 Ibid., 94. As Halévy pointed out, Bentham's model prison, the “panopticon,” was a radical extension of this belief in imposed order and reform. Ibid., 104–6.

38 Ibid., 124–6, emphasis added.

39 Ibid., 146–7.

40 For example, when discussing the economic theories of Smith, Paine, and Godwin, Halévy emphasized the divergent conclusions reached by these thinkers, all of whom started with similar utilitarian assumptions. “C’est ici le lieu de marquer le caractère paradoxal que present le marche des idées dans l’histoire.” Halévy, L’évolution de la doctrine utilitaire de 1789 à 1815, 90.

41 Ibid., 90.

42 Halévy, Le radicalisme philosophique, 205–6.

43 Ibid., 223–4.

44 Ibid., 243.

45 During the 1920s and early 1930s, Halévy returned to his history of the English people, but rather than pick up his chronological analysis by focusing on Victorian England (previously he had completed only the volumes up to 1841), he decided to focus on the decades before World War I—a period that he judged to be the “epilogue” of the nineteenth century. See Halévy, Elie, Histoire du peuple anglais au XIXe siècle, épilogue (1895–1914), vol. 1, Les impérialistes au pouvoir (1895–1905) (Paris, 1926)Google Scholar, vol. 2, Vers la démocratie sociale et vers la guerre (1905–1914) (Paris, 1932). He had, however, analyzed some aspects of this period of English history earlier. See Halévy, Elie, L’Angleterre et son empire (Paris, 1905), esp. 121–3Google Scholar, where he noted the “degeneration” and growing “decadence” of English society, as its empire grew and as it became more capitalistic and administrative. “Il est possible que l’habitude de la domination et de la conquête finesse par diminuer les qualities laborieuses du people anglais.” Ibid., 122.

46 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 366.

47 Referring to the changes in England in the first decade of the twentieth century, Halévy wrote, “De grandes vagues venues des pays chauds, juives, catholiques, mais surtout païennes, venaient batter, effriter la vieille falaise protestante et nordique.” Halévy, Vers la démocratie sociale et vers la guerre, 76.

48 Halévy, “Avant-propos,” Les impérialistes au pouvoir, i–vi, vi.

49 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé (probably 8 Jan. 1902), Correspondance (1891–1937), 320, original emphasis.

50 My discussion draws from the analysis by Cheryl Welch of “inquietude” in Tocqueville's thought. See Welch, Cheryl, “A New Democracy in America,” French Politics, Culture & Society, 21 (2003), 131–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

51 See the letter of Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 30 March (1901), Correspondance (1891–1937), 298–99.

52 See the letters of Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 2 March (1903) and 10 Aug. (1902), Correspondance (1891–1937), 332, 324.

53 See the letters of Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 29 Oct. 1901 and 5 Jan. (1902), Correspondance (1891–1937), 311, 319. See also Halévy, Les impérialistes au pouvoir, 89, where Halévy writes of the “état de frénésie patriotique” in England during the Boer War.

54 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 29 Oct. 1901, Correspondance (1891–1937), 311.

55 See the letter of Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 8 Jan. (1903), Correspondance (1891–1937), 331.

56 See the letter of Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 19 Dec. (1901), Correspondance (1891–1937), 318.

57 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 16 (July 1900), Correspondance (1891–1937), 282.

58 Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 33, Folder 13, original emphasis.

59 Ibid. Most of the manuscripts are not dated; however, this fragment is dated 21 April 1904.

60 See, for example, Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé (20 Feb. 1895), Correspondance (1891–1937), 145; Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 18 (June 1895), Correspondance (1891–1937), 159.

61 Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 33, Folder 13.

62 Stefan Collini has argued that similar notions were major elements of political and social thought in Victorian England. Collini, Stefan, Public Moralists: Political Thought and Intellectual Life in Britain 1850–1930 (Oxford, 1991)Google Scholar.

63 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 4 May 1897, Fonds Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 8.

64 Elie Halévy to Daniel Halévy, 17 March 1893, Correspondance (1891–1937), 133.

65 “Séance générale: 11ième congrès de philosophie—Genève,” Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 12 (1904), 1103–13.

66 Ibid., 1108.

67 Ibid., 1113.

68 Halévy, Le radicalisme philosophique, 243.

69 Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 33, Folder 20.

70 Halévy, Elie, Histoire du peuple Anglais au XIXe siècle, vol. 2, Du lendemain de Waterloo à la veille du Reform Bill (1815–1830) (Paris, 1923), vi–viiGoogle Scholar.

71 Ibid., vi.

72 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé (24 Nov. 1901), Correspondance (1891–1937), 315.

73 The phrase “spontaneous collectivism” is in the first lecture for his class on the history of European socialism. Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris). For Halévy's positive assessment of societies where individuals are co-proprietors see Halévy, Elie, “Les principes de la distribution des richesses,” Revue de métaphysique et de morale, 14 (1906), 545–95, 571Google Scholar.

74 “Séance générale,” 1112.

75 Halévy, Le radicalisme philosophique, 236–7.

76 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé (7 Feb. 1899), Correspondance (1891–1937), 261.

77 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 4 Feb. (1903), Correspondance (1891–1937), 332.

78 This phrase comes from a letter of Halévy to Xavier Léon, 31 Aug. (1891), Correspondance (1891–1937), 65. The same letter provides a concise statement of where Halévy situated the Revue de métaphysique et de morale in the intellectual world of French philosophy. “Il est nécessaire d’agir contre le misérable positivisme dont nous sortons, et l’agaçante religiosité où nous risquons de nous embourber,—de fonder une philosophie de l’action et de la réflexion,—d’être rationalists avec rage.” For discussions of the relation of the Revue de métaphysique et de morale to the culture of the era see Fabiani, Jean-Louis, Les philosophes de la république (Paris, 1988)Google Scholar; Christophe Prochasson, “Philosopher au XXe siècle: Xavier Léon et l’invention du ‘système’ R2M (1891–1902),” Revue de métaphysique et de morale (1993), 109–40; Louis Pinto, “Le détail de la nuance: La sociologie vue par les philosophes dans la Revue de métaphysique et de morale,” Revue de métaphysique et de morale (1993), 141–74; Jean-Louis Fabiani, “Métaphysique, morale sociologie: Durkheim et le retour à la philosophie,” Revue de métaphysique et de morale (1993), 175–91; Joel Revill, “Taking France to the School of the Sciences: Léon Brunschvicg, Gaston Bachelard, and the French Epistemological Tradition,” unpublished PhD thesis; Duke University, 2006; Stéphan Soulié, Les philosophes en République: l’aventure intellectuelle de la Revue de métaphysique et de morale et de la Société française de philosophie (1891–1914) (Rennes, 2009).

79 Halévy, “Avant-propos,” L’Angleterre en 1815, viii.

80 Halévy, L’Angleterre en 1815, 559, 564.

81 Halévy, “La naissance du Méthodisme en Angleterre,” 38.

82 Ibid., 40.

83 Elie Halévy to Mme Ludovic Halévy, 24 (Oct. 1892), Correspondance (1891–1937), 80, original emphases.

84 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 15 (June 1894), Correspondance (1891–1937), 143.

85 In October 1898, Halévy referred to the “une bande de cabotins hurleurs” who led the crowds during the Affair. Letter to Léon Brunschvicg, 9 (Oct. 1898), Correspondance (1891–1937), 255. This was a common reaction of Dreyfusard intellectuals. See, for example, the letter of André Beaunier to Elie Halévy, 9 Feb. 1898, in Savoir et engagement: Ecrits normaliens sur l’affaire Dreyfus, sous la direction de Vincent Duclert (Paris, 2006), 30: “C’est la foule qui m’effraie. Je ne puis te dire comme ju suis effrayé de cette foule anonyme, stupide, enragée.”

86 See the letter to Daniel Halévy (probably 13 May 1898), Correspondance (1891–1937), 246. Most graduates of the Ecole normale, however, were Dreyfusards. See Savoir et engagement.

87 Elie Halévy to Xavier Léon, 9 (Feb. 1898), Correspondance (1891–1937), 223.

88 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 14 Sept. (1905), Correspondance (1891–1937), 370.

89 Notes for these lectures are in the Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris). A version of these lectures was published posthumously: Halévy, Elie, Histoire du socialisme européen (Paris, 1948)Google Scholar.

90 Bédarida, François, “Elie Halévy et le socialisme anglais,” Revue historique, 254 (1975), 371–98, 373Google Scholar.

91 Halévy supported economic redistribution. See his article “Les principes de la distribution des richesses.” On Halévy's economic views see Frobert, Elie Halévy: République et économie.

92 Elie Halévy to Célestin Bouglé, 27 Feb. (1904), Correspondance (1891–1937), 352.

93 “Il faut . . . observer que la nature humaine est essentiellement instable et variable. Sans même se commettre à cette affirmation, il faut dire que l’homme a une histoire dans la mesure où sa nature est instable et variable. Le problème que l’historien doit résoudre, consiste à savoir pourquoi, parmi ses variations, quelques unes reuissent. Tandis que le plus grand nombre échoue.” Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris), Carton 33, Folder 32.

94 See the discussions of this issue by Acomb, Frances, Anglophobia in France 1763–1789: An Essay in the History of Constitutionalism and Nationalism (Durham, 1950)Google Scholar; and by Bell, David A., The Cult of the Nation in France: Inventing Nationalism, 1680–1800 (Cambridge, MA, 2001), esp. 78–106, 140–68Google Scholar.

95 Voltaire's Letters Concerning the English Nation (1733) is probably the most famous of these early reflections about England.

96 There is an extensive literature here. Among others see Jaume, Lucien, L’individu effacé: Ou le paradoxe du libéralisme français (Paris, 1997)Google Scholar; Vincent, K. Steven, Benjamin Constant and the Birth of French Liberalism (New York, 2011)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Craiutu, Aurelian, A Virtue for Courageous Minds: Moderation in French Political Thought, 1748–1830 (Princeton, 2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

97 See, especially, Drescher, Seymour, Tocqueville and England (Cambridge, MA, 1964)Google Scholar.

98 For a recent penetrating discussion, see Gunn, J. A. W., When the French Tried to Be British (Montreal and Kingston, 2009)Google Scholar.

99 Rousseau was critical of the English and their presumptions of liberty. In Du contrat social (livre III, chap. 15) he wrote, “the English people think they are free, they are wrong; they are free only during the election of members of Parliament. As soon as they are elected, there is slavery, there is nothing. In the short moments of their liberty, the use that they make of it merits that they lose it.” In his Considérations sur la gouvernement de Pologne (chap. 7), he wrote, “Representatives are difficult to deceive, but easy to corrupt, and it rarely happens that they are not. We have under our eyes the example of the Parliament of England.” In a 16 June 1760 letter to M. de Bastide he wrote, “When you print Paix perpétuelle, please, Sir, do not forget to send me the proofs . . . There is a note where I say that in twenty years the English will have lost their liberty, I believe that it is necessary to put the rest of their liberty, because there are too many fools that believe they still have some” (underlining in original).

100 For a recent analysis of the Physiocrats see Cheney, Paul, Revolutionary Commerce: Globalization and the French Monarchy (Cambridge, MA, 2010)Google Scholar.

101 Papiers Elie Halévy, Ecole normale supérieure (Paris).

102 See, especially, Taine, Hippolyte, Notes sur l’angleterre (Paris, 1871)Google Scholar; and Boutmy, Emile, Essai d’une psychologie politique du peuple anglais au XIXe siècle (Paris, 1901)Google Scholar. Halévy rejected, however, the racialist dimension of Taine's and Boutmy's descriptions. In 1892, for example, he wrote to René Berthelot: “Pour l’instant, je me livre, sur le compte des Anglais, à de profondes méditations ethnographiques; et j’en viens à cette conclusion que la race est peu de chose, le milieu, météorologique et sociologique, tout, ou peu s’en faut. Car des deux côtes de la Manche, d’Irlande à Londres d’une part, de Brest à Calais de l’autre, il y a un mélange à peu près identique de sang celtique, germain et scandinave. La différence d’histoire, d’institutions, un bras de mer ont fait la différence de moeurs et de caractère. Les Irlandais et les Écossais sont celtes; et cependant le sang-froid écossais et l’imagination irlandaise sont les deux pôles entre lequels oscille l’Angleterre.” Elie Halévy to René Berthelot, Friday evening (25 Nov. 1892), Correspondance (1891–1937), 101.

103 Renan, Ernst, Qu’est-ce qu’une nation? (Paris, 1882)Google Scholar. For this phrase of Théodule Ribot, see his La psychologie allemande contemporaine (Paris, 1879), 51.

104 Halévy, Vers la démocratie sociale et vers la guerre, 372–3.