Sunday 1 March 2020

Bernal's "Devil" Is Anderson's "Protean Enemy"

Why do the first lines of attack against the inorganic forces of the world and the organic structure of our bodies seem so doubtful, fanciful and Utopian? Because we can abandon the world and subdue the flesh only if we first expel the devil, and the devil, for all that he has lost individuality, is still as powerful as ever. The devil is the most difficult of all to deal with: he is inside ourselves, we cannot see him. Our capacities, our desires, our inner confusions are almost impossible to understand or cope with in the present, still less can we predict what will be the future of them. Psychology at the present day is hardly in a better state than physics in the time of Aristotle; it has acquired a vocabulary, the general movements and transformations of conscious and unconscious motives are described, but nothing more.
-copied from The Devil. 

See the blog search result for "The Protean Enemy." (Scroll down.)

In particular:

"The enemy was old and strong and crafty, it took a million forms and it could never quite be slain. For it was man himself - the madness and sorrow of the human soul, the revolt of a primitive against the unnatural state called civilization and freedom. Somebody would try again. His methods would be different, he might not have the same avowed goal, but he would be the enemy and the watchers would have to break him. And who shall watch the watchmen?"
-copied from What We Expect.

Bernal's account of this inner "Devil" immediately recalled Anderson's account of the old and protean enemy.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Kaor, Paul!

This sounds a lot like the Christian doctrine of Original Sin.

Ad astra! Sean