The following book review is copied from 'Behind World Revolution'
by Richard Gilman.


APPENDIX C

A REVIEW OF NESTA WEBSTER'S 'WORLD REVOLUTION - THE PLOT 
AGAINST CIVILIZATION'
(REPRINTED FROM THE JULY 9, 1921 ISSUE OF 'THE SATURDAY 
REVIEW' (LONDON))

REVOLUTION AND THE JEWS.

World Revolution: The Plot Against Civilization. By Nesta H. 
Webster. Constable 18s. net.

   In reading any book with such a title as 'World 
Revolution' one is driven nowadays to ask oneself, "Is this 
history or is it propaganda?" The impression left on the 
mind after reading Mrs. Webster's book is that it comes into 
the latter category, since it seems to have been written to 
prove two theses, (a) that the Jews are the authors of all 
political and social unrest, and (b) that Revolution, or 
unrest in action, is always an artificial product - the 
creation of the Hidden Hand.
   Mrs. Webster surveys the changes of the last 145 years, 
taking as her starting point the French Revolution. She is 
less interested apparently in historical facts than in the 
theses she is able to deduce by a selection from the general 
body of historical truth of such facts only as support her 
theories. Therefore, we make no apology for dealing with the 
purpose, rather than the substance, of this book.
   Most people will agree with Mrs. Webster that the series 
of social upheavals known as the French Revolution were not 
spontaneous in origin, but the result of associative 
agitation. Owing to restrictions on publishing and on 
speaking in public, this agitation was conducted in secrecy 
and took refuge in Lodges which later blossomed into Clubs. 
Mrs. Webster quotes the evidence of contemporary observers 
to prove that German Illuminism, as patented by Adam 
Weishaupt, penetrated the Lodges of the Grand Orient in 
France in the years immediately preceding 1789, and made of 
them active units in promoting Revolution. Incidentally she 
gibes at "interested historians anxious to suppress the 
truth" about Illuminism, and also at the "official 
historian," whose business "is not to inquire into causes, 
but to present the sequence of events in a manner 
unintelligible to the philosopher." It is always possible 
that historians "interested" and "official" alike may be a 
little timid of building upon such shaky foundations as are 
offered by Barruel, Robison, Deschamps, Le Couteuix, De 
Canteleu (sic) and other authorities on Illuminism.
   There was no Jew behind the French Revolution, so far as 
we know; even Martinez Pasqually, whom Mrs. Webster calls "a 
Portuguese Jew," is now stated by Mr. Waite to be a 
Christian of Grenoble. By no known process of historical 
deduction, based on historical fact, can Jews be held to 
account for the French Revolution; yet this does not deter 
Mrs. Webster from advancing by innuendo the thesis to which 
she is wedded. For example, we read (p.19), "The years 1781-
2 were remarkable for the emancipation of the Jews" and that 
"eight years before the Revolution the programme in favour 
of Judaism was sent out by Prussia," also that there was a 
"wave of pro-Semitism" during those years. We are told that 
at the great Masonic Congress at Wilhelmsbad (1782) it was 
decided not to exclude Jews from Lodges, and again, that 
after this Congress the headquarters of Illuminated Masonry 
were transferred to Frankfort, "the stronghold of Jewish 
finance." A passage from Prudhomme is quoted (p.92) dealing 
with the fact that Jews in 1790 were allowed to rank as 
citizens in Paris; it ends like this, "What mysteries of 
iniquity would be revealed if the Jews, like the mole, did 
not make a point of working in the dark." Later (p.160), she 
allows herself to say of Jews, "We have 'seen' their mole-
like working below ground during the first French Revolution 
'suspected' by Prudhomme." By piling suggestion and innuendo 
on a foundation of hypothesis, Mrs. Webster makes a gallant 
effort to see the Jew behind the French Revolution and to 
make us see him too - but she has failed. She is more 
successful with the Revolutions of 1830 and 1848 in which, 
as is well known, many Jews were involved. In dealing with 
recent events Mrs. Webster makes considerable play with the 
'Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion,' published in 
England as 'The Jewish Peril.' We thought they were regarded 
by everyone as anti-Semitic Propaganda of a particularly 
vulgar kind; but they are trotted out again apparently to 
prove that the Jews to-day are the direct, if only the 
spiritual, descendants of Weishaupt's Illuminati. The 
history of the Protocols is suspicious, but there is no 
reason why the reputed author Nilus should not have been 
familiar with the teaching of Weishaupt. And if we go far 
enough back, may not Plato have been the spiritual father of 
Weishaupt? for did he not in his 'Republic' propose that 
"the Guardians" should have wives in common, that children 
should be taken from parents at birth, and that they should 
hold no private property?
   Is it a coincidence that the words of Nilus bear as close 
a family likeness to the reflections of Pobyedonoszeff, the 
Procurator of the Holy Synod, as they do to the teaching of 
Weishaupt? Is it possible that the 'Protocols' could be 
anti-Jewish propaganda used in preparation for the pogroms 
which disfigured Russia in the early years of the century? 
In spite of the note of alarm sounded in 'World Revolution,' 
there are several cheering reflections to be gathered from 
the book. One is that the emissaries of the Hidden Hand 
always seem to fall out. Weishaupt quarrels with Knigge, 
Robespierre destroys Danton, Marx disagrees with Bakunin. It 
seems to be not so much a case of a Hidden Hand as of Hidden 
Hands which fight one with another. If this is so, what is 
the exact force of the blow they can give to civilisation? 
Another consolation for English people is tucked away in the 
middle of a long paragraph on Chartism, "The truth is that 
in a country where reforms were in progress revolution could 
make little headway."
   In detesting Bolshevism and all that it connotes we are 
in complete agreement with Mrs. Webster. Her views on 
religious versus secular Communism are entirely sound; they 
amount to this - that Communism is so shattering of well-
being in this world that it can only be practised with 
success by people who have renounced this world to gain the 
next.
------------------------------------------------------------

As to the 'Protocols', if one does not ascribe it to any 
particuar race or culture, even supposing that it is 
propaganda, or perhaps originally a satire of sorts, then 
what is one to say about the 'fact' that those things 
contained within the document itself so accurately 
encapsulate many of the conditions found within our society 
for many years past & to the present?  Consider just one of 
its many statements (from Protocol No. 3):

   The constitution scales of these days will shortly break 
   down, for we have established them with a certain lack 
   of accurate balance in order that they may oscillate 
   incessantly until they wear through the pivot on which 
   they turn. The goyim are under the impression that they 
   have welded them sufficiently strong and they have all 
   along kept on expecting that the scales would come into 
   equilibrium. But the pivots - the kings on their thrones 
   - are hemmed in by their representatives, who play the 
   fool, distraught with their own uncontrolled in 
   irresponsible power. This power they owe to the terror 
   which has been breathed into the palaces. As they have 
   no means of getting at their people, into their very 
   midst, the kings on their thrones are no longer able to 
   come to terms with them and so strengthen themselves 
   against seekers after power. We have made a gulf between 
   the far-seeing Sovereign Power and the blind force of 
   the people so that both have lost all meaning, for like 
   the blind man and his stick, both are powerless apart.

It seems ever to be the way of all academia to ignore the 
content and substance of a book when once it is declared 
that the book is of a spurious nature.  How ironic!

However inaccurate Webster may have been in her general 
imputation of conspiracy to the Jews per se, it does not 
lessen the fact that world conspiracy does exist, and that 
it is attributable to some (perhaps loosely) cohesive group 
whose aims are coordinated toward the generation of chaos 
that they may reorder the world in accordance with their own 
configuration.  It seems to me that 'these' are the 
important things to recognize.
Howard Duck <hbduck@koyote.com>


