long since ?nished and those that are still continuing and in the midst of
which I live. Some readers may be surprised by the changes of manner which
this entails. I can only hope that the reader will realise the inevitability of
diversi?cation and appreciate the unavoidable reticences necessitated by the
law of libel.
the autobiography of bertrand russell 48614
RETURN TO ENGLAND
Crossing the Atlantic in the ?rst half of 1944 was a complicated business.
Peter and Conrad travelled on the Queen Mary at great speed but with extreme
discomfort, in a ship completely crowded with young children and their
mothers, all the mothers complaining of all the other children, and all the
children causing the maximum trouble by conduct exposing them to the
danger of falling into the sea. But of all this I knew nothing until I myself
arrived in England. As for me, I was sent in a huge convoy which proceeded
majestically at the speed of a bicycle, escorted by corvettes and aeroplanes.
I was taking with me the manuscript of my History of Western Philosophy, and the
unfortunate censors had to read every word of it lest it should contain infor-
mation useful to the enemy. They were, however, at last satis?ed that a knowl-
edge of philosophy could be of no use to the Germans, and very politely
assured me that they had enjoyed reading my book, which I confess I found
hard to believe. Everything was surrounded with secrecy. I was not allowed to
tell my friends when I was sailing or from what port. I found myself at last on
a Liberty ship, making its maiden voyage. The Captain, who was a jolly fellow,
used to cheer me up by saying that not more than one in four of the Liberty
ships broke in two on its maiden voyage. Needless to say, the ship was
American and the Captain, British. There was one o?cer who whole-
heartedly approved of me. He was the Chief Engineer, and he had read The
ABC of Relativity without knowing anything about its author. One day, as I was
walking the deck with him, he began on the merits of this little book and,
when I said that I was the author, his joy knew no limits. There was one other
passenger, a business man, whom the ship’s o?cers did not altogether like
because they felt that he was young enough to ?ght. However, I found
him pleasant and I quite enjoyed the three weeks of inactivity. There wasconsidered to be no risk of submarines until we were approaching the coast
of Ireland, but after that we were ordered to sleep in trousers. However, there
was no incident of any kind. We were a few days from the end of our journey
on D-day, which we learned about from the wireless. Almost the whole
ship’s crew was allowed to come and listen. I learned from the wireless
the English for ‘Allons, enfants de la patrie, le jour de gloire est arrivé.’ The
English for it is: ‘Well, friends, this is it.’
They decanted us at a small port on the northern shore of the Firth of Forth
on a Sunday. We made our way with some di?culty to the nearest town,
where I had my ?rst glimpse of Britain in that war-time. It consisted, so far as
I could see at that moment, entirely of Polish soldiers and Scotch girls, the
Polish soldiers very gallant, and the Scotch girls very fascinated. I got a night
train to London, arrived very early in the morning, and for some time could
not discover what had become of Peter and Conrad. At last, after much frantic
telephoning and telegraphing, I discovered that they were staying with her
mother at Sidmouth, and that Conrad had pneumonia. I went there at once,
and found to my relief, that he was rapidly recovering. We sat on the beach,
listening to the sound of naval guns o? Cherbourg.
Trinity College had invited me to a ?ve-year lectureship and I had accepted
the invitation. It carried with it a fellowship and a right to rooms in College.
I went to Cambridge and found that the rooms were altogether delightful;
they looked out on the bowling green, which was a mass of ?owers. It was a
relief to ?nd that the beauty of Cambridge was undimmed, and I found the
peacefulness of the Great Court almost unbelievably soothing. But the prob-
lem of housing Peter and Conrad remained. Cambridge was incredibly full,
and at ?rst the best that I could achieve was squalid rooms in a lodging house.
There they were underfed and miserable, while I was living luxuriously in
College. As soon as it became clear that I was going to get money out of my
law-suit against Barnes,
1
I bought a house at Cambridge, where we lived for
some time.
VJ-day and the General Election which immediately followed it occurred
while we were living in this house. It was also there that I wrote most of my
book on Human Knowledge, its Scope and Limits. I could have been happy in
Cambridge, but the Cambridge ladies did not consider us respectable. I
bought a small house at Ffestiniog in North Wales with a most lovely view.
Then we took a ?at in London. Though I spent much time in visits to the
Continent for purposes of lecturing, I did no work of importance during
these years. When, in 1949, my wife decided that she wanted no more of me,
our marriage came to an end.
Throughout the forties and the early ?fties, my mind was in a state of
confused agitation on the nuclear question. It was obvious to me that a
nuclear war would put an end to civilisation. It was also obvious that unless
the autobiography of bertrand russell 488there were a change of policies in both East and West a nuclear war was sure
to occur sooner or later. The dangers were in the back of my mind from the
early ’twenties. But in those days, although a few learned physicists were
appreciative of the coming danger, the majority, not only of men in the
streets, but even of scientists, turned aside from the prospect of atomic war
with a kind of easy remark that ‘Oh, men will never be so foolish as that’. The
bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 ?rst brought the possibility of
nuclear war to the attention of men of science and even of some few politi-
cians. A few months after the bombing of the two Japanese cities, I made a
speech in the House of Lords pointing out the likelihood of a general nuclear
war and the certainty of its causing universal disaster if it occurred. I forecast
and explained the making of nuclear bombs of far greater power than those
used upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki, fusion as against the old ?ssion bombs,
the present hydrogen bombs in fact. It was possible at that time to enforce
some form of control of these monsters to provide for their use for peaceful,
not warlike, ends, since the arms race which I dreaded had not yet begun. If
no controls were thought out, the situation would be almost out of hand. It
took no great imagination to foresee this. Everybody applauded my speech;
not a single Peer suggested that my fears were excessive. But all my hearers
agreed that this was a question for their grandchildren. In spite of hundreds
of thousands of Japanese deaths, nobody grasped that Britain had escaped
only by luck and that in the next war she might be less fortunate. Nobody
viewed it as an international danger which could only be warded o? by
agreement among the Great Powers. There was a certain amount of talk,
but no action was taken. This easy-going attitude survives among the laity
even down to the present day. Those who try to make you uneasy by
talk about atom bombs are regarded as trouble-makers, as people to be
avoided, as people who spoil the pleasure of a ?ne day by foolish prospects of
improbable rain.
Against this careless attitude I, like a few others, used every opportunity
that presented itself to point out the dangers. It seemed to me then, as it still
seems to me, that the time to plan and to act in order to stave o? approaching
dangers is when they are ?rst seen to be approaching. Once their progress is
established, it is very much more di?cult to halt it. I felt hopeful, therefore,
when the Baruch Proposal was made by the United States to Russia. I thought
better of it then, and of the American motives in making it, than I have since
learned to think, but I still wish that the Russians had accepted it. However,
the Russians did not. They exploded their ?rst bomb in August, 1949, and it
was evident that they would do all in their power to make themselves the
equals of the United States in destructive – or, politely, defensive – power.
The arms race became inevitable unless drastic measures were taken to avoid
it. That is why, in late 1948, I suggested that the remedy might be the threat
return to england 489of immediate war by the United States on Russia for the purpose of forcing
nuclear disarmament upon her. I have given my reasons for doing this in an
Appendix to my Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare. My chief defence of the view
I held in 1948 was that I thought Russia very likely to yield to the demands of
the West. This ceased to be probable after Russia had a considerable ?eet of
nuclear planes.
This advice of mine is still brought up against me. It is easy to understand
why Communists might object to it. But the usual criticism is that I, a paci?st,
once advocated the threat of war. It seems to cut no ice that I have reiterated ad
nauseum that I am not a paci?st, that I believe that some wars, a very few, are
justi?ed, even necessary. They are usually necessary because matters have
been permitted to drag on their obviously evil way till no peaceful means can
stop them. Nor do my critics appear to consider the evils that have developed
as a result of the continued Cold War and that might have been avoided, along
with the Cold War itself, had my advice to threaten war been taken in 1948.
Had it been taken, the results remain hypothetical, but so far as I can see it is
no disgrace, and shows no ‘inconsistency’ in my thought, to have given it.
None the less, at the time I gave this advice, I gave it so casually without
any real hope that it would be followed, that I soon forgot I had given it. I had
mentioned it in a private letter and again in a speech that I did not know was
to be the subject of dissection by the press. When, later, the recipient of the
letter asked me for permission to publish it, I said, as I usually do, without
consideration of the contents, that if he wished he might publish it. He did
so. And to my surprise I learned of my earlier suggestion. I had, also, entirely
forgotten that it occurred in the above-mentioned speech. Unfortunately, in
the meantime, before this incontrovertible evidence was set before me, I had
hotly denied that I had ever made such a suggestion. It was a pity. It is
shameful to deny one’s own words. One can only defend or retract them. In
this case I could, and did, defend them, and should have done so earlier but
from a fault of my memory upon which from many years’ experience I had
come to rely too unquestioningly.
My private thoughts meanwhile were more and more disturbed. I became
increasingly pessimistic and ready to try any suggested escape from the dan-
ger. My state of mind was like a very much exaggerated nervous fear such as
people are apt to feel while a thunder-storm gathers on the horizon and has
not yet blotted out the sun. I found it very di?cult to remain sane or to reject
any suggested measures. I do not think I could have succeeded in this except
for the happiness of my private life.
For a few years I was asked yearly to give a lecture at the Imperial Defence
College in Belgrave Square. But the invitations stopped coming after the
lecture in which I remarked that, knowing that they believed you could not
be victorious in war without the help of religion, I had read the Sermon on
the autobiography of bertrand russell 490the Mount, but, to my surprise, could ?nd no mention of H-bombs in it. My
audience appeared to be embarrassed, as they were good Christians as well as,
of course, warriors. But, for myself, I ?nd the combination of Christianity
with war and weapons of mass extinction hard to justify.
In 1948, the Western Powers endeavoured to create a union which should
be the germ of a World Government. The Conservative Party approved and
wished Britain to become a member. The Labour Party, after some hesitation,
opposed the scheme, but left individual members free to support it or not, as
they thought ?t. I joined and made a possibly somewhat excessive attack
upon one of the few Communists present at the international Congress
assembled at The Hague to consider the scheme. In his speech he had
maintained that Communists have a higher ethic than other men. This was
just after the fall of the Democratic Government of Czechoslovakia and my
remarks had the complete agreement of the bulk of the people present.
The younger Masaryk’s suicide as a result of his rough handling by the
Communists had shocked us all, and almost all of us had the conviction that
cooperation with the East was for the present impossible. I said: ‘If you can
persuade me that hounding your most eminent citizen to his death shows a
higher ethical outlook than that of the West, I shall be prepared to support
you, but, till that time comes, I shall do no such thing.’
Towards the end of the war, after my return to England, and for some time
thereafter, the Government used me to lecture to the Forces. The Forces had
become more paci?c than I expected as the war neared its end, and I remem-
ber that Laski and I were sent together on one occasion to speak to some of
the air men. Laski was more radical than I was, and they all agreed with him.
In the middle of my lecture I suddenly realised that half of my audience was
creeping out of the hall and I wondered if I had o?ended them in some way
more drastic than merely failing to be su?ciently radical. Afterwards, I was
told that the men had been called away to combat the last of the German air
raids against England.
At the time of the Berlin air lift, I was sent by the Government to Berlin to
help to persuade the people of Berlin that it was worth while to resist Russian
attempts to get the Allies out of Berlin. It was the ?rst and only time that
I have been able to parade as a military man. I was made a member of the
armed forces for the occasion and given a military passport, which amused
me considerably.
I had known Berlin well in the old days, and the hideous destruction that I saw
at this time shocked me. From my window I could barely see one house stand-
ing. I could not discover where the Germans were living. This complete destruc-
tion was due partly to the English and partly to the Russians, and it seemed to me
monstrous. Contemplation of the less accountable razing of Dresden by my own
countrymen sickened me. I felt that when the Germans were obviously about
return to england 491to surrender that was enough, and that to destroy not only 135,000 Germans
but also all their houses and countless treasures was barbarous.
I felt the treatment of Germany by the Allies to be almost incredibly fool-
ish. By giving part of Germany to Russia and part to the West, the victorious
Governments ensured the continuation of strife between East and West,
particularly as Berlin was partitioned and there was no guarantee of access
by the West to its part of Berlin except by air. They had imagined a peaceful
co-operation between Russia and her Western allies, but they ought to have
foreseen that this was not a likely outcome. As far as sentiment was con-
cerned, what happened was a continuation of the war with Russia as the
common enemy of the West. The stage was set for the Third World War, and
this was done deliberately by the utter folly of Governments.
I thought the Russian blockade was foolish and was glad that it was unsuc-
cessful owing to the skill of the British. At this time I was persona grata with the
British Government because, though I was against nuclear war, I was also
anti-Communist. Later I was brought around to being more favourable
to Communism by the death of Stalin in 1953 and by the Bikini test in
1954; and I came gradually to attribute, more and more, the danger of
nuclear war to the West, to the United States of America, and less to Russia.
This change was supported by developments inside the United States, such as
McCarthyism and the restriction of civil liberties.
I was doing a great deal of broadcasting for the various services of the ???
and they asked me to do one at the time of Stalin’s death. As I rejoiced
mightily in that event, since I felt Stalin to be as wicked as one man could be
and to be the root evil of most of the misery and terror in, and threatened by,
Russia, I condemned him in my broadcast and rejoiced for the world in his
departure from the scene. I forgot the ??? susceptibilities and respectabilities.
My broadcast never went on the air.
In the same year that I went to Germany, the Government sent me to
Norway in the hope of inducing Norwegians to join an alliance against
Russia. The place they sent me to was Trondheim. The weather was stormy
and cold. We had to go by sea-plane from Oslo to Trondheim. When our
plane touched down on the water it became obvious that something was
amiss, but none of us in the plane knew what it was. We sat in the plane while
it slowly sank. Small boats assembled round it and presently we were told to
jump into the sea and swim to a boat – which all the people in my part
of the plane did. We later learned that all the nineteen passengers in the
non-smoking compartment had been killed. When the plane had hit
the water a hole had been made in the plane and the water had rushed in. I
had told a friend at Oslo who was ?nding me a place that he must ?nd me a
place where I could smoke, remarking jocularly, ‘If I cannot smoke, I shall
die’. Unexpectedly, this turned out to be true. All those in the smoking
the autobiography of bertrand russell 492compartment got out by the emergency exit window beside which I was
sitting. We all swam to the boats which dared not approach too near for fear
of being sucked under as the plane sank. We were rowed to shore to a place
some miles from Trondheim and thence I was taken in a car to my hotel.
Everybody showed me the utmost kindness and put me to bed while my
clothes dried. A group of students even dried my matches one by one. They
asked if I wanted anything and I replied, ‘Yes, a strong dose of brandy and a
large cup of co?ee’. The doctor, who arrived soon after, said that this was
quite the right reply. The day was Sunday, on which day hotels in Norway
were not allowed to supply liquor – a fact of which I was at the time
unaware – but, as the need was medical, no objection was raised. Some
amusement was caused when a clergyman supplied me with clerical clothing
to wear till my clothes had dried. Everybody plied me with questions. A
question even came by telephone from Copenhagen: a voice said, ‘When you
were in the water, did you not think of mysticism and logic?’ ‘No’, I said.
‘What did you think of?’ the voice persisted. ‘I thought the water was cold’, I
said and put down the receiver.
My lecture was cancelled as the man who had been intended to be the
Chairman had been drowned. Students took me to a place in the nearby
mountains where they had an establishment. In going and coming, they
walked me about in the rain and I remarked that Trondheim was as wet out of
the water as in it, a remark which seemed to please them. Apart from the rain,
which turned to snow in the region of the mountains, I found Trondheim
a pleasant place, but I was a little puzzled when I learnt that the Bishop
pronounced the place one way and the Mayor another. I adopted the Bishop’s
pronunciation.
I was astonished by the commotion caused by my part in this adventure.
Every phase of it was exaggerated. I had swum about one hundred yards, but
I could not persuade people that I had not swum miles. True, I had swum in
my great-coat and lost my hat and thrown my attaché case into the sea. The
latter was restored to me in the course of the afternoon – and is still in use –
and the contents were dried out. When I returned to London the o?cials all
smiled when they saw the marks of sea water on my passport. It had been in
my attaché case, and I was glad to recover it.
When I had returned to England in 1944, I found that in certain ways my
outlook had changed. I enjoyed once more the freedom of discussion that
prevailed in England, but not in America. In America, if a policeman
addressed us, my young son burst into tears; and the same was true (mutatis
mutandis) of university professors accused of speeding. The less fanatical atti-
tude of English people diminished my own fanaticism, and I rejoiced in the
feeling of home. This feeling was enhanced at the end of the forties when
I was invited by the ??? to give the ?rst course of Reith lectures, instead of
return to england 493being treated as a malefactor and allowed only limited access to the young.
I admired more than ever the atmosphere of free discussion, and this
in?uenced my choice of subject for the lectures, which was ‘Authority and
the Individual’. They were published in 1949 under that title and were
concerned very largely with the lessening of individual freedom which tends
to accompany increase of industrialism. But, although this danger was
acknowledged, very little was done either then or since to diminish the evils
that it was bringing.
I proposed in these lectures to consider how we could combine that degree
of individual initiative which is necessary for progress with the degree of
social cohesion that is necessary for survival. This is a large subject, and the
remarks that I shall make upon it here are no more than annotations on the
lectures and sometimes expansions of subjects that have interested me since
writing the book.
The problem comes down, in my view, to the fact that society should strive
to obtain security and justice for human beings and, also, progress. To obtain
these it is necessary to have an established framework, the State, but,
also, individual freedom. And in order to obtain the latter, it is necessary to
separate cultural matters from the Establishment. The chief matter in which
security is desirable now is security of nations against hostile enemies, and to
achieve this a world government must be established that is strong enough to
hold sway over national governments in international matters.
Since no defence is possible for a single nation against a more powerful
nation or a group of such nations, a nation’s safety in international matters
must depend upon outside protection. Aggression against a single nation by
another nation or group of nations must be opposed by international law and
not left to the wilful initiative of some warlike State. If this is not done, any
State may at any moment be totally destroyed. Changes in weapons may
frequently alter the balance of power. It happened, for example, between
France and England in the ?fteenth century when the Powers ceased to
defend castles and came to depend upon moving armies with artillery. This
put an end to the feudal anarchy which had until then been common. In like
manner, nuclear weapons must, if peace is to exist, put an end to war between
nations and introduce the practical certainty of victory for an international
force in any possible contest. The introduction of such a reform is di?cult
since it requires that the international Power should be so armed as to be
fairly certain of victory in warfare with any single State.
Apart from this connection with the dangers of war now that weapons of
mass destruction were being developed, these lectures were important in
my own life because they give the background of a subject which has
absorbed me in one way and another, especially since 1914: the relation of an
individual to the State, conscientious objection, civil disobedience.
the autobiography of bertrand russell 494The prevention of war is essential to individual liberty. When war is
imminent or actually in progress various important liberties are curtailed and
it is only in a peaceful atmosphere that they can be expected to revive. As a
rule, the interference with liberty goes much further than is necessary, but
this is an inevitable result of panic fear. When Louis XVI’s head was cut o?
other monarchs felt their heads insecure. They rushed to war and punished
all sympathy with the French Revolution. The same sort of thing, sometimes
in a less violent form, happened when Governments were terri?ed by the
Russian Revolution. If the individual is to have all the liberty that is his due,
he must be free to advocate whatever form of government he considers best,
and this may require the protection of an international authority, especially
since nuclear weapons have increased the power of nations to interfere with
each other’s internal a?airs. Individual liberty in war-time should extend to
personal participation in war.
In the course of these lectures, I gave a brief résumé of the growth and
decay of governmental power. In the great days of Greece there was not too
much of it: great men were free to develop their capacities while they lived,
but wars and assassinations often cut short their labours. Rome brought
order, but at the same time brought a considerable degree of eclipse to the
achievement of individuals. Under the Empire, individual initiative was
so curtailed as to be incapable of resisting new attacks from without. For
a thousand years after the fall of Rome, there was too little authority
and also too little individual initiative. Gradually, new weapons, especially
gunpowder, gave strength to governments and developed the modern State.
But with this came excessive authority. The problem of preserving liberty in a
world of nuclear weapons is a new one and one for which men’s minds are
not prepared. Unless we can adapt ourselves to a greater search for liberty
than has been necessary during the last few centuries, we shall sink into
private lethargy and fall a prey to public energy.
It is especially as regards science that di?cult problems arise. The modern
civilised State depends upon science in a multitude of ways. Generally, there
is old science, which is o?cial, and new science, which elderly men look
upon with horror. This results in a continual battle between old men, who
admire the science of their fathers, and the young men who realise the value
of their contemporaries’ work. Up to a point this struggle is useful, but
beyond that point it is disastrous. In the present day, the most important
example of it is the population explosion, which can only be combated by
methods which to the old seem impious.
Some ideals are subversive and cannot well be realised except by war or
revolution. The most important of these is at present economic justice. Political
justice had its day in industrialised parts of the world and is still to be sought
in the unindustrialised parts, but economic justice is still a painfully sought
return to england 495goal. It requires a world-wide economic revolution if it is to be brought
about. I do not see how it is to be achieved without bloodshed or how the
world can continue patiently without it. It is true that steps are being taken in
some countries, particularly by limiting the power of inheritance, but these
are as yet very partial and very limited. Consider the vast areas of the world
where the young have little or no education and where adults have not the
capacity to realise elementary conditions of comfort. These inequalities rouse
envy and are potential causes of great disorder. Whether the world will be
able by peaceful means to raise the conditions of the poorer nations is, to my
mind, very doubtful, and is likely to prove the most di?cult governmental
problem of coming centuries.
Ve r y di?cult problems are concerned with the inroads of war against
liberty. The most obvious of these is conscription. Military men, when there
is war, argue that it cannot be won unless all men on our side are compelled
to ?ght. Some men will object, perhaps on religious grounds or, possibly, on
the ground that the work they are doing is more useful than ?ghting. On such
a matter there is liable to be, or at any rate there ought to be, a division
between the old and the young. The old will say they are too aged to ?ght,
and many of the young ought to say that their work is more useful towards
victory than ?ghting.
The religious objection to taking part in warfare is more widespread.
Civilised people are brought up to think it is wicked to kill other people, and
some do not admit that a state of war puts an end to this ethical command.
The number who hold this view is not very large, and I doubt whether any
war has ever been determined by their action. It is good for a community to
contain some people who feel the dictates of humanity so strongly that even
in war-time they still obey them. And, apart from this argument, it is barbar-
ous to compel a man to do acts which he considers wicked. We should all
admit this if a law were proposed to punish a man for being a vegetarian, but
when it is a human being whose life is at stake, we begin to wonder whether
