Henry de Montherlant, Revolutions, Minds, and Habits (June Solstice)
"For the Mind as well there was no more difference between those “opposed” forms of life than there was between that little swell and another little swell of the neighboring Seine."
Henry de Montherlant
Revolutions, Minds, and Habits
From June Solstice
Revolutions affect minds but not habits. One may make minds think almost whatever one wants, indiscriminately, successively, and even simultaneously. Thinking being beliefs, among the common people. But the underlying nature of a being has a different consistency and a different persistence. The devil does not grieve when revolution is carried out by priests: he knows that henceforth people will go to mass, but that the little corruptions of which he is fond will continue as before. Hypocrisy? Certainly not. A young lad, with complete sincerity, makes propaganda for the “moral order” in the morning, and in the evening puts a bun in the oven of a young girl, and his work of the evening does not at all discredit, in my opinion, his work of the morning. One should not be more astonished by these watertight compartments in man than the prairie is astonished by receiving side by side — yes, literally, juxtaposed — rain and sun. Man is an orchestra that is tuning its instruments before the performance: each instrument plays only for itself, and cares nothing for the others.