Tariq Ali - The Stone Woman

The Baron chuckled in agreement. “Comte’s three favourite secular saints for his new Church were Julius Caesar, Joan of Arc and Dante: the first a tyrant, the second a deluded peasant woman who wanted to be a soldier and the third a great poet. I’m glad Comte appreciated the Commedia , but surely we cannot be expected to take this fellow seriously. Like all talented charlatans he attracted many followers, but much of what he wrote was well-intentioned gibberish.”

“He also said that one day society would be ruled by banks and the whole of Europe united into a western republic ruled by bankers,” Memed added contemptuously. “What could he have been thinking of when he wrote all this rubbish?”

“The pair of you are far too dismissive,” said Iskander Pasha. “When I was in Paris, Hasan and I used to disguise ourselves and attend radical gatherings. Comte was very much the fashion. He was seen as a true follower of the Enlightenment. Many people come up with ideas for providing an alternative to religion. Robespierre tried something, did he not? The Mughal King Akbar attempted a new religion in India, of all places. Long before him, in the fourteenth century, our own Sultan Bayezid the First wanted to achieve a union of Islam, Judaism and Christianity. His sons were named Musa, Isa and Memed. When he tried to win over Pope Nicholas to this idea they tried to convert him to Christianity. He then realised his dream was impossible and gave up altogether.”

“Yes,” said the Baron, “and wasn’t it Sultan Bayezid the First who claimed descent from King Priam of Troy?”

“Baron,” laughed Iskander Pasha, “before we go any further in discussing the whims of men who ruled us for many centuries, let me ask you two questions. If we act and build a new republic, will Prussia be an ally or an enemy?”

“You mean Germany and, yes, it would be an ally, if only to stop you becoming a bridgehead for our ever-ambitious English friends, who strive hard to deny us our share of trade. They believe the world belongs to them, which is a fatal illusion as all Empires discover sooner or later. There is something else in your favour. Our young Kaiser Wilhelm the Second is a neurotic mystic. For that reason alone he might have been inclined towards Istanbul, but he is also a great enthusiast for the religious and warlike mania exhibited in the operas of a dreadful man named Wagner, who writes bad music and dresses equally badly in a ridiculous beret and a velvet jacket. Our young Emperor has a feverish brain, which gives him too many sleepless nights. He dreams of himself as Parsifal. I think he will wage war against someone. The choice of enemies is not limitless. Will he strike his Russian cousin first or his British cousin? When this war is waged, he will need allies. Does that answer your question? Good.”

Memed began to chuckle. “I do not share the Baron’s dislike for the music of Wagner. Its structure appeals to me, though I accept it is far more demanding than the simple tunes of these well-meaning but not highly intelligent Italians. Puccini, Verdi and dear Donizetti Pasha are pleasing enough, but the structure of Wagner’s music makes you think. If the Baron were serious he would—”

The Baron looked at his friend with total contempt and raised his hand to silence him. “Some other time, Memed. Now, what is the nature of your second inquiry, Iskander Pasha?”

“You have been mocking our fondness for Comte and I greatly appreciate your scepticism. We all have our weaknesses, my dear Baron. What appeals to us in Comte is not his list of secular saints, but his unyielding rationalism. It is the clergy that provided our Sultans with the moral power to impede progress for so long. It is pointless decapitating a single head, when the beast we confront is double-headed. Halil, you see, has a real problem. Some of his subordinates are very hot-headed. The situation demands that they are taught the art of patience. But in order to calm them, one must have a master-plan with some chance of success. He has come to us for help because next week he will be visited here by six of these young firebrands. Our choices have moved beyond the luxury of a relaxed intellectual debate within the confines of this library. The lives of others depend on what advice we offer my son. He was very happy when he became a general, but he never realised that one day his men might call on him to wage a war against the enemy at home, including the very people who had made him a general. My father would have advised him either to turn in the traitors or resign his post and rest for a few months in Alexandria. Some years ago, in my role as a responsible father and a pillar of the state I, too, might have said something similar, but those times have gone, Baron. Now do you understand what is at stake?”

The Baron became pensive. He had realised that this had not been intended as an evening of clever talk where his rapier intelligence could outwit all of us. Halil stressed the urgency of what his father had just said.

“If not Comte, then who? Hegel?”

“No, no. Definitely not Hegel.” His tone had changed. He was no longer trying to impress, but had become reflective. “I think the man of the hour for your officers is someone they will never even have heard of, let alone read. I am thinking of an Italian by the name of Niccolo Machiavelli. He is the great thinker of politics and statecraft. You need him badly at this moment.”

“How ridiculous you are, Baron,” said Memed. “Of course we’ve heard of Machiavelli. There was a vigorous exchange between the Ottomans and Renaissance Italy. Did you know that the Sultan had asked Leonardo and Michelangelo to design a bridge across the Bosporus?”

“This is a serious discussion, Memed.” The Baron’s tone was frosty. “Let us leave diversions, however pleasant, for another day. If nothing changes here soon you might even lose your beloved Bosporus. Many people may well have heard of Machiavelli, but how many have read him, how many have understood what he was really writing about all those years ago? Anyone here excepting me? No, I thought not, and I’m not surprised. I would have been one of you had I not been a pupil of Hegel’s successors. I only read Machiavelli because Hegel wrote of him with such respect in his celebrated 1802 text ‘On the German Constitution’. It was that essay by Hegel that made me want to read the object of such unstinting admiration.”

“We will study closely whatever books have to be read, Baron,” said Halil with impatience. “What you need is to explain: why this Italian and why now?”

“This evening has become too heavy for me,” said Memed. “I’m not sure I can stay awake for the lecture on Machiavelli that the Baron is preparing to deliver. Haiti’s men are preparing a revolution and all we offer them is ideas.”

The Baron glared at him. “Perhaps you should retire to bed in your crimson silk pyjamas and dream of Michelangelo hovering over the Bosporus, Memed, while I stay here with Halil to help save your country. Without a goal based on ideas, all radical action is meaningless.”

Nobody left the room. I exchanged glances with Selim, who had been completely engrossed by the discussion this evening.

“I’m sure I forced Memed and Iskander to read Hegel’s essay when I was a young tutor in their Istanbul house all those centuries ago. Can either of you remember the opening sentence?”

Memed looked away in disgust. Iskander Pasha raised his hand as if he were in class.

“Good,” said the Baron. “Iskander?”

“ Deutschland ist kein Staat mehr .”

“Excellent,” said the Baron, imagining he was a tutor once again. “That’s correct. Deutschland ist kein Staat mehr. Germany is a state no longer. The Ottoman Empire is a state no longer. Italy was a state no longer. A new state was necessary to move forward. Machiavelli’s prince is the state. This great and original Italian philosopher of politics observes the reality of Italy as it is and not as some imagine it. What he sees is a split and divided country, permanently vulnerable to attack by foreign powers. Not exactly the same, but not so different from the split and divided Empire, confronting an assault by foreign states. Machiavelli’s greatness lies in this fact: he does not resort to the past, to antiquity, to plan a new future. He sees it all in the present and understands that something new is required…”