The Character of Man by Emanuel Mounier (review)

98 BOOK REVIEWS aspects of the Messianic hope, must we conclude to the position of the author as to the intention of Jesus in choosing the term? I think not. With respect to Mowinckel's suggested source for the idea of the Son of Man, I think he has wisely stressed the fact that a refashioning of the mythical figure had to be done in accordance with the spiritual structure of Judaism itself. Future study of the sources of the Son of Man concept will undoubtedly qualify some of the author's suggestions. Dominican House of Studies, Washington, D. C. THOMAS AQUINAs CoLLINs, O.P. The Character of Man. By EMANUEL MouNIER. Translated by CYNTHIA RoWLAND. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1956. Pp. 351. $6.00. Mounier who died in 1950 has written several books of which the Traite du caractere, published in 1946, is one of the most important because it summarizes the author's ideas on man, his nature, and his destiny. The original work of some 800 pages has been abridged considerably in this translation, in fact, reduced to about one third. On this and on the translation in general some words will be said below. Mounier is known as the initiator and leader of a movement which he termed "Personalism." His Personalist Manifesto has been made available to the English-speaking world several years ago, and so also his volume on Existentialism. His standpoint is, indeed, somehow akin to that of the " existentialists " inasmuch he, too, is concerned with individual man. He distinguishes, however, his position sharply from that of individualism. "Personalism," he wrote in a note supplied to Lalande's Vocabulaire, "is sharply distinct from individualism and underscores the collective and cosmic insertion of the person." The term " insertion " is reminiscent of expressions which recur in the writings of the existentialist thinkers: engagement , being-with, being-in-a-world. Mounier's personalism has been labelled, not unjustly, as "political"; in his conception the interaction of individual man and society plays a much greater role than it does with the existentialists. The present volume, however, deals chiefly with man as a person or, as the author says in his Foreword, with" all that it means to be a man, and a man of his time." The book, Mounier remarks, is " intended to be scientific " (" scholarly " would have rendered his idea better) . And it may deserve this name inasmuch as it assembles a multitude of facts, presents them in an organized form, and endeavors to take account of all sides of human nature. Never- BOOK REVIEWS 99 theless, the book is essentially that of a dilettante, if this term is taken in a non-pejorative sense, or, if one prefers, of an eclectic, who starting from definite notions makes use of whatever seems suitable to support his thesis. A consequence of this procedure is that of a certain lack of critique; one comes across occasionally references to sources which can hardly be viewed as reliable. Also some statements are given interpretations in a sense which is not that of the original author, because these quotations are taken in isolation and without consideration of the context in which they occur. Monnier's own views, in fact, do not need to be supported by those of others so that one feels that the book would have profited had its author tried less to make it into a traite. Three chapters have been omitted; they deal with the " background," that is, the societal and biological factors determining or influencing man's character. This omission is justified, since in these fields so much work has been done in the last ten years, that some of the references are rather obsolete. Less fortunate is the exclusion of many remarks on contemporary and older art and literature; this has been done because these things are but little known to the American public. But this circumstance does not render the references less pertinent or less interesting. Also omitted are the numerous passages in which the author makes use of the typology proposed by Heymans, the reason being that the reader should not be confused by alien ideas to which he is not accustomed. But when...