are parts or stages of one intellectualnand spiritual quest. A reader of Camusnshould balance his reading of ThenStranger and The Myth of Sisyphusnwith a careful reading of The Rebel.nThis will help him perceive the chronologicalndevelopment of his thought.nIn The Rebel the second basic conceptnis elaborated: revolt, Camus usesnthe word in a special way, not in thengenerally accepted sense. This can benmisleading. When he speaks of revolt,nhe does not mean political revolution.nUnlike the usual concept of revolution,nhis idea of revolt is centered on limitation,nnot absolutism; it preaches moderation,nnot extremism. In its social andnpolitical aspects it is a form of humilitynwhich recognizes that the fight againstnhuman suffering and injustice is inevitablenand can have no end. The booknprovides a critique of the major revolutionarynfigures and movements of modernntimes, and is particularly criticalnof Marxism.nThe criticism of the prophetic elementnin Marx and socialism is perhapsnthe most valid part of The Rebel. Onencritic refers to it as “one of the mostntrenchant critiques of communistnthought and action ever written fromnthe viewpoint of moral philosophy.”nDespite this critique, Camus’s unrealisticnconviction that the underdog isnalways right (a conviction shared bynmany of his epigones) caused him tonhesitate in siding with Western capitalismneven though he perceived the sinsnof communism. That hesitation disappearednafter the Hungarian Revolution,nwhich caused him to see clearly thatntyranny was on the left and the Sovietsnand their Western advocates were thenmenace. He could be very harsh on thenleft, as in this statement from Resistance,nRebellion and Death:n”We must admit that today conformitynis on the left. To be sure, the rightnis not brilliant. But the left is in completendecadence, a prisoner of words,ncaught in its own vocabulary, capablenmerely of stereotyped replies, constantlynat a loss when faced with thentruth, from which it neverthelessnclaimed to derive its laws. The left isnschizophrenic and needs doctoringnthrough pitiless self-criticism, exercisenof the heart, close reasoning andna little modesty.”nBut he could never fully disassociatenhimself from the left, probably becausenof the circumstances of his life, whichnLottman recreates with such abundantndetail—the time, the places, the influencesnexerted upon him at crucial stagesnin his development. Asked in the lastnyear of his life if he was a “left-wingnintellectual,” he said he was not sure ofnbeing an intellectual but “I’m for thenleft, despite myself and despite it.”nDespite this affinity for the left, muchnin Camus’s work can be admired fromnother areas of the political spectrum,nincluding the conservative. He displayedncourage and honesty in his attempt tonmake sense of what appeared to him ansenseless world. He fought a gallantn(if at times naive) battle for reason,ncompromise, sanity and reverence fornlife in an absurd universe, in an absurdnpolitical situation. He was pagan rathernthan Christian, but he asked the rightnquestions, the kind that constrain Christiansnto evolve ever more satisfactorynanswers for them. He distrusted abstractionnand ideology. To no idea doesnhe want man to abandon himself, fornbehind such commitment he sees lurkingnthe spirit of extremism (comparenPaul Elmer More’s Demon of the Absolute).nAgainst such rationalism he wouldnpit tolerance, search and classical restraint,nCamus’s ideal man puts somendistance between himself and his world,nnot in the neutral sense of Descartesnand his successors, but in order nevernto forget in his state of involvementnthe limits placed upon man by nature.nHis concept of “moderation” expressednin The Rebel (and unfortunately nevernfully elucidated) is not dissimilar fromnthe law of measure and the inner checknadvocated by Paul Elmer More andnnnIrving Babbitt.nWh en seen as a whole and with allnof his writings taken into consideration,nCamus’s view of life does not differ innsubstance from the views of the classicalnhumanists of the Graeco-Roman andnEuropean traditions. The values he unveilsnin his concept of revolt are borrowednfrom the Christian-humanitarianntradition. He believes that freedom isnthe highest value and tolerance thengreatest virtue. He demands humanenessnand decency in politics. He givesnthe highest place to respect for life andnhappiness and denounces the senselessnessnof ambition and conquest. But hentried to establish such values withoutnrecourse to any form of transcendence.nThat such a thing can logically be accomplishednis highly dubious. This leadsnus to consider the limits of hisnachievement.nCamus found that few can follow thenabsurdist logic to its final conclusions.nHope slips in, sometimes in disguise.nHe drew the wrong conclusions fromnthis. He saw it as evidence of humannweakness, a cowardly resorting to transcendence,nthe existence of which henfirmly denied. Though he eschewed absolutes,nhis refusal to acknowledge thenpossibility of some kind of transcendencenis absolute. Common sense and hisnknowledge of history, philosophy andnhuman nature should have told himnthat the irradicable element of hope isnevidence of something in man beyondnnaturalistic explanation. Notwithstandingnhis wariness toward rationalismndominating actual human experience,nhis own rationalism flies in the face ofnhuman experience attested to in allnages—in fact, in the face of his ownnexperience. One of his friends wrotenof him in a letter in 1936: “Camus continuesnto think despair, even to write it;nbut he/weJ-hope.”nHe was determined to root his ownnethics exclusively in experience. Thentrouble is that his concept of experiencenis too narrow. He once said, “I can feelnMarch April 1980n