''The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu'' (in the original French, ''Dialogue aux enfers entre Machiavel et Montesquieu ou la politique de Machiavel au XIXe siècle'') is a

political satire Political satire is satire that specializes in gaining entertainment from politics; it has also been used with subversive intent where political speech and dissent are forbidden by a regime, as a method of advancing political arguments where s ...

written by French attorney

Maurice Joly Maurice Joly (22 September 1829 – 15 July 1878) was a French political writer and lawyer known for '' The Dialogue in Hell Between Machiavelli and Montesquieu'', a political satire of Napoleon III. Known life Most of the known informati ...

in protest against the regime of

Napoleon III Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A neph ...

(a.k.a. Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte), who ruled France from 1848–1870. It was translated into English in 2002. Small portions were translated in 1967 as an appendix to

Norman Cohn Norman Rufus Colin Cohn FBA (12 January 1915 – 31 July 2007) was a British academic, historian and writer who spent 14 years as a professorial fellow and as Astor-Wolfson Professor at the University of Sussex. Life Cohn was born in London, to ...

's '' Warrant for Genocide'', which identifies it as the main source of the later '' Protocols of the Elders of Zion'', though ''The Dialogue'' itself makes no mention of Jews. The piece uses the literary device of a dialogue of the dead, invented by ancient Roman writer

Lucian Lucian of Samosata, '; la, Lucianus Samosatensis ( 125 – after 180) was a Hellenized Syrian satirist, rhetorician and pamphleteer who is best known for his characteristic tongue-in-cheek style, with which he frequently ridiculed supersti ...

and introduced into the French

belles-lettres is a category of writing, originally meaning beautiful or fine writing. In the modern narrow sense, it is a label for literary works that do not fall into the major categories such as fiction, poetry, or drama. The phrase is sometimes used pejora ...

by Bernard de Fontenelle in the 18th century. Shadows of the historical characters of

Niccolò Machiavelli Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli ( , , ; 3 May 1469 – 21 June 1527), occasionally rendered in English as Nicholas Machiavel ( , ; see below), was an Italian diplomat, author, philosopher and historian who lived during the Renaissance. ...

and

Montesquieu Charles Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu (; ; 18 January 168910 February 1755), generally referred to as simply Montesquieu, was a French judge, man of letters, historian, and political philosopher. He is the princi ...

meet in Hell in the year 1864 and dispute on politics. In this way Joly tried to cover up a direct, and then illegal, criticism of Louis-Napoleon's rule.

Summary

Joly relates in his 1870 autobiography that one evening, while thinking of economist

Abbé Galiani Ferdinando Galiani (2 December 1728, Chieti, Kingdom of Naples – 30 October 1787, Naples, Kingdom of Naples) was an Italian economist, a leading Italian figure of the Enlightenment. Friedrich Nietzsche referred to him as "a most fastidious and ...

's treatise ''Dialogues sur le commerce des blés'' ("''Dialogues on the commerce in wheat''") and walking by Pont Royal, he was inspired to write a dialogue between Montesquieu and Machiavelli. The noble baron Montesquieu would make the case for

liberalism Liberalism is a Political philosophy, political and moral philosophy based on the Individual rights, rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality and equality before the law."political rationalism, hostilit ...

; the Florentine politician Machiavelli would present the case for

despotism Despotism ( el, Δεσποτισμός, ''despotismós'') is a form of government in which a single entity rules with absolute power. Normally, that entity is an individual, the despot; but (as in an autocracy) societies which limit respect an ...

. Machiavelli claims that he "... wouldn't even need twenty years to transform utterly the most indomitable European character and render it as a docile under tyranny as the debased people of Asia". Montesquieu insists that the liberal spirit of the peoples is invincible. In 25 dialogues, step by step, Machiavelli, who by Joly's plot covertly represents Napoleon III, explains how he would replace freedom with despotism in any given European country: "... Absolute power will no longer be an accident of fortune but will become a need" of the modern society. At the end, Machiavelli prevails. In the curtain-line Montesquieu exclaims "Eternal God, what have you permitted!...". The book was published anonymously (par un contemporain, ''by a contemporary'') in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

in 1864 and smuggled into France for distribution, but the print run was seized by the police immediately upon crossing the border. The police swiftly tracked down its author, and Joly was arrested. The book was banned. On 25 April 1865, he was sentenced to 18 months at the

Sainte-Pélagie Prison Sainte-Pélagie was a prison in Paris, in active use from 1790 to 1899. It was founded earlier than that, however, in 1662, as place for "repentant girls" and later "debauched women and girls." The former Parisian prison was located between the ...

in Paris. The second edition of "Dialogues" was issued in 1868 under Joly's name. Campaigning against Napoleon III at the

1870 French constitutional referendum A constitutional referendum was held in France on 8 May 1870. Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p673 Voters were asked whether they approved of the liberal reforms made to the constitution A c ...

, Joly wrote an epilogue to his "Dialogue". It was published at ''Le Gaulois'' and ''La Cloche'' magazines.

Legacy

In the beginning of the 20th century Joly's book was used as a basis for ''

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion ''The Protocols of the Elders of Zion'' () or ''The Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion'' is a fabricated antisemitic text purporting to describe a Jewish plan for global domination. The hoax was plagiarized from several ...

'', an infamous Russian-made

antisemitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Ant ...

literary forgery Literary forgery (also known as literary mystification, literary fraud or literary hoax) is writing, such as a manuscript or a literary work, which is either deliberately misattributed to a historical or invented author, or is a purported memoir ...

. There is an abundance of evidence that ''The Protocols'' were lavishly plagiarized from ''The Dialogue''. Joly's book, however, was a satire on French politics of the Second Republic and Second Empire and contained no antisemitic material (or indeed any references to Jews at all); the anonymous authors of the ''Protocols'' interpolated a sinister Jewish cabal for the original's references to members of the government of Napoleon III.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Dialogue In Hell Between Machiavelli And Montesquieu, The Dialogues Satirical books 1864 books Protocols of the Elders of Zion Cultural depictions of Niccolò Machiavelli Montesquieu Cultural depictions of writers Cultural depictions of philosophers Cultural depictions of French men Hell in popular culture