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Albert '. Camus

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The RebeI
. } An Essay on Man in Revolt
j

With a Foreword by Sir Herbert Read

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i A ' revised and complete translation
of L'HOMME REVOLTf

i by Anthony Bower

{
CD New York Vintage Boo'"

A DIVISION OF RANDOM HOUSE

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Nihilism and History
* . ,~~::~. Jeh:il~~~! 4~t"R>~i:~~!~~~~if~~n~~~~i~a~~ih~~'I!
[
. .
One hundred and fifty years of metaphysical rebellion
and of nihilism have witnessed the persistent reappearance,
. under different guises, of the same ravaged countenance:
. the face of human protest. AI! .QLtnem, ' decrying, the__gu-
man condition and its creator, have affirmed the solitude
ohnim .and the nonexistence 'of any kind of ttioraIlt~~'~~ut, .
at'the' same time they have all tried to construct a purely
terrestrial kingdom where their chosen principles will hold
sway. A.~~, rivals of the ,c:::reat9x,tbey Q~y£..j}!(!s~apablybeen
led to the point . of rec<?!lstrl!cting, .£!CEation a~~ording to
their own' concepts. Those who rejected; for -ihe sake of
· ·the.' world ,they had _jiisLcreated,,:,aICoJiiir'jjrij!cjples 'but
desire and power,have rushed to suicide or madness ahd
nave proclaimed t1!~ ,"~E()c.~lYps.e~ A"s-' for ' the rest, 'who
wanted to create their own principles, they have chosen
pomp and ceremony, the world of appearances, or banal-
ity, or again murder and destruction. But Sadeand the
romantics, Karamazov or Nietzsche 01.lly entered .the w0.l:ld
()t4.elltl1 because they. wanted to discover the true life. So
that bya process of inversion, it is the desperate appeal for
order that rings through this insane universe. Their con-
clusions 11 11ve only proved disastrous or destructive to free-
dorr(JroInthe: in9'iri~hrtli¢y)aid' aside the burden of re-
'bellion, fled the tension that it implies, -ahd chose the coin-
. 'fof(ofty~~'nny 'or ot' s~iyi,~,!de. . " _ . ' . ..
f1
' ~1!m~.t!.~!1J>up:ecti()I~'inits exalted and tragic forms,
. . is only, and can only be, a p~olonged protest against death;.
a .~,io!e~t acc?sation against the universal death ·penalty. In
every case that we have come across, .the protest is always
directed at ~very~jng j,n cr.eatio~ which is dissonant,
101 / Metaphysical Rebellion
opaque, or promises the sblutionof continuity. Essentially,
ffien, '\ve-are·~~~~itig~=iV:(t4~a. pem:et~aT:ae!!l~!!,··!oJ..~unit)'"-
The rejection of death, the desire for immortality andfor
'~!a#.tY,-::'a!§ : W~~~P1~iIiHWng~J?l::JilCiheSe::e~ti~v.'agaQ£%,.,
whether sublime or puerile. Is it only a cowardly and per-
sonal refusal to die? No,for many of these rebels have paid
the ultimate price in order to . live up to their .own de-
Doth,lOg lasts, then nothing is.' ju,stifit;d; .,eyery~hi~g '" t.h~~
. <dies .' isdepiive~' . of t;neanit:.lg. TO,)igpt .agahlst ,geat4.
'amourits to' dl1imiIlgthatJiie. hasa. meal!ing,t~ JigQ.ti~~
for .o~q~r_aIl,~~for~unity., .. ' .
. The ,P.!2t~~L~~~~~~~. ~.Y..il, which is at the very core of
metaphysic'al revolt is significant in this regard. IUs. pot
the suffering of a child, which is repugnant ' in itself, but
the fact 'that'the'''suffering iSiiot justified. After all; pain;
~exile,4 or -cQiifinement" 'aie" someti;nes" accepted when dic-
tated by gQod sense or by the doctor. In the eyes of the
~~~~~~\\Ih:~t is missi!!gJr9m ,t he mis~ry of the world, as
well as frorrLitsmoments of happi.ne~s, is' some principle
. bY 'which they can be explained. The insurrection against '
-~vif'is, above all, a demand fo~ unity. The rebel obstinately
'confronts a world condemned tode!lth and the impene-
trable obscurity of the human conditiQn with his demand
for life and absolute clarity. H~ is seeking, without !c~ow­
ing ,it, a mgral philosophy . or a religion. Rebellion,even
. 'though it is blind, is a form of asceticism. Therefore, if
the rebel blasphemes, it is in the hope of finding a new
god. He staggers under the shock of the first and most pro-
found of all religious experiences, but it is a disenchanted
religious experience. It is not reb.elliQn itself that is noble,
....but its . aims, even though . it~,. achlei ements
ignoble.
'are
~. "'. ".
iiC times-)
. --.' . . .
,.... ~--~At least we must know how to recognize the ignoble
ends it achieves. Eachtime that it deifies the total rejec-
. ~ion, the absolute ' negation, ' of what exists;""·i(A.e,st~QYi.
EaSh. : time that it> blindly , accepts what' exists ·arid gives
.Y9iceto absQlute ,assel}t;':~ it . d,estroys " ag~in ~ 'Batted oftlie
creator can tum to hatred .of creation ()r.t()(!xclu~i,v~ ~,M
q~(i.a.nt love of what exists. B9.t:jn: both " cases_it~.eJl<i.t in
murder and loses the right to be called rebellion. One can-
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_0 _ _ _ • _ _ _ _ ••• ____• __• _ . _ _ • ___ _ _ _ _ • _ _ •• _ . _ _ _ _ •
~
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~ :::-..
(f~~i The Rebel . 103/ Metaphysical Rebellion
be nihilist in two ways, in both by having an intemperate
recourse to absolutes. Apparently there ' are rebels who
want to die and those who want to cause death. But they
are identical, £onsumed with desire for the true life, frus-
.tx:at ed ~Y th~i~ gesir~" f2f 'e:xisten.~e::if.Qu::th~)'~f'9r~ 'piere'iring .
__ ~~n~xal!~ed Imu~Jice_ t~. 11).u.tilat~~j~~t~c.e;, At this pitch of
,mdlgnatlOn, re,ason becomes madness. If it is true that the
linstinctive rebellion orthe human heart advances gradually
I~hrough the centuries toward its most complete realization,
lIt has also grown, as we have seen, in blind aY,dacity" to ,
\the inordinate extent of deciding to answer ' universal '
\murder by metaphysical assassination. .
. The eve!l if, which we have already recognized as mark-
. ing the most important moment of metaphysical rebellion,
is in any case only fulfilled in absolute destruction. It is
not the nobility of rebellion that illuminates the world
today, but nihilism. And it is the consequences of nihilism
that we must retrace, without losing sight of the truth
I innate in its origins. Even if God existed, Ivan would never
';' I' surrender to Him in the face of the injustice done to man.
\:~ But a longer contemplation of this injustice, a more bitter
~ approach, transformed the "even if you exist" into "you
I versal rule. We have arrived at the moment when rebel-
I '" ". / do not deserve to exist," therefore "you do not exist." The
I 'I> ~ l victims have found in their own innocence the justification
I i
~- .:') for the final crime. Convinced of their condemnation and
1'~11 without hope of immortality, they decided to murder God.
1l :;; I\-: If it is false to say that from that day began the tragedy
Ii' \
of contemporary man, neither is it true to say that there
1'\ I was where it ended. On the contrary, this attempt ind;-
i cates the high.est point in a dram.a that began with the
i end of the anCIent world and of whIch the final words have
': not yet been spoken. From this moment, man decides to
:exclude himself from grace and to live by his own means.
'.Progress, from the time of Sade up to the present 'day,
has consisted in gradually enlarging the stronghold where,
,according to his own rules, man without God brutally
t wields power. In defiance of the divinity, the frontiers of
. this stronghold have been gradually extended, to the point
jl! of making the entire universe into a fortress erected against
Ii .' the fallen and exiled deity. M~JI, at the culmination of
his rebellion, ~ru;.;Ir£erated
.
hiniselC from Sade's lurid castle
I
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.- _. •• -"_._-_. ----
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-
to the concentration camps, man's greatest liberty con-
sisted only in , building the prison of his crimes. But the
state of siege gradually spreads, the demand for freedom
wants to embrace all mankind. Then the only kingdom
that is opposed to the kingdom of grace must be founded
-namely, the kingdom of justice-and the human com-
munity must be reunited among the debris of the fallen
City of God. To kill God and to build a Church are the
constant and c'ofiffai:lictOry-purpose of 'rebellion.) \bsolute
.freedoij).--:final1y~ b,ecpm~s ~.. prisori. of absol1,1~~ "Q1Jt!~§l:~' a;-_col~
-, lectiv~ .a$etif.i!iPJ _:l , ~tory to"b-e-brougi:i't- to an end., The
. nineteenth century, which fs 'fhe -C'entlity of rebellion, thus
merges into the twentieth, the century of justice . and
ethics, in which everyone indulges in self-recrimination.
Chamfort, the moralist of rebellion, had already provided
the formula: "One must be just before being generous, as
one must have bread before having take." Thus the ethic
of luxury will be renounced in favor of the bitter morality
-of the empire-builders.
We must now embark on the subject of this con-
vulsive effort to control the world and to introduce a uni-
lion, rejecting every aspect of servitude, attempts to annex
all creation. Every time it experiences a setback, we have
already seen that the political solution, the solution of
conquest, is formulated. Henceforth, with the introduc-
tion of moral nihilism, it will retain, of all 'its acquisitions,
only the ~ill .J(;U?.9w,~r;,\)n pxinciple, the rebel.op}y ,wanted
~p" conquer_" his"p~I,l . ~~!~t~n~ _~r& to ." main~ain it in._t?_e
f~ce of God. Bufhe- forgetsj:J.is, origins anp.,J:>yt~_e~ Ia.:N. 9f
spiritual ' iulperialisiii, he sets out in sea,rch of \},orld.,. cpn.-
quest by way of an infinitely m'ultiplied ~eries ,9!},!l,\l!,~~~ :
He drove God from "His heaven--;' 15.'u t now that the .spirit of
metaphysical ' rebellion. ' op~plY . 'jOins forces .with ! ev9lu-
tionary movements, the irrational ,G.laim for fre~d,Qm.~p?!:,a-
,.:doxlcally adopts rea~.9'!!' !!~~' L"Y.~i1.p.on" ilpd a ~ the .onl~, ~~?-J1i!. .
of conquest which appears entirely huma.I,l' WIth the
'ueath of God,' mankindrenfairis; ' and' by' this we mean the
history that we must understand and shape. Nihilism,
which, in the very midst of rebellion, smothers · the force
of creation, only adds "that one is justified in using every
'\ ,Y,", i:,-t,~~;\
 Part Three

Historical Rebellion.

*
Freedom,"that terrible word inscribed on the chariot
of the storm," 1 is the motivating principle of all revolu- ·
Jtions. ~ithout it. justice seems inconceivable to the
rebel's mind. There comes a time, however, whe~ justice
demands the suspension of freedom. Then terror, on a
grand or small scale, makes Its appearance to consummate
the revolution. ~very act of rebellion expresses a nosta~ia .
"for innocence and an appeal to the esse?ce of being. ut
on da nos tal ia takes u arms and assumes. the responsi-
. iIi of total uilt· in other words ado ts mur er an
vio encc::.. The servile rebellions, the regicide revo utIons,
and those of the twentieth century have thus, consciously,
acce ted a burden of uilt which increased in proportion
_~.the de ree of liberation t e propose 0 10 to uce.
This · contradiction,_which as · ecome on y 0 VlOUS,
prevents our contemporary revolutionaries from displaying
that aspect of happiness and optimism which shone forth
from the faces and _the speeches of the members of the
Constituent Assembly in 1789. Is this contradiction in-)
e.vitable? Does it ~haracterize or betra~ the value of re~el­
hon? These questions are bound to anse about revolution .
. as they are bound to arise about metaphysical rebellion.
Actually, revolution is only the logical consequence of
metaphysical rebellion, and we shall discover, in our analy-
sis of the revolutionary movement, the same desperate and
bloody effort to affirm the dignity of man in defiance ot
the things that deny its existence. The revolutionary spirit
thus undertakes the defense of that part of man which
refuses to submit. In other words, it tries to assure him
1 Philothee O'Neddy.