Roberto de
Mattei
Corrispondenza Romana
March 18, 2020
The most terrible figure of the calamitous 14th century was
perhaps Timur, a ferocious and implacable conqueror, called “The Terror of the
World”. He devastated Asia from Syria and Turkey, even reaching the borders of
China, from Moscow to Delhi. He came from a Turkish-Mongolian tribe in
Uzbekistan and proclaimed himself heir and continuer of Genghis Khan. He is
buried at Samarkand, the capital of his empire, on the Silk Road, the ancient
commercial route, connecting China to the Mediterranean.
The historian Paolo Giovio recounts in his Elogia virorum bellica virtute illustrium (Petri Pernae Typhographi, 1575, pp. 105-106) that Timur in the first days after
laying siege to a city, would display a white flag as a sign of pardon if
everyone would surrender voluntarily. Otherwise, in the ensuing days, his army
would have waved red flags, as a sign of death, not for all the city’s
inhabitants, but for the commanders and soldiers. Then, if the city was still obstinate in its
refusal to surrender, Timur gave orders to display the black flag, as a sign of
complete extermination, with no distinction between the guilty and the innocent,
then he would burn down the entire city.
The Corona Virus epidemic, which has been
unleashed on the world in just a few weeks is reminiscent of Timur’s white
flag. It appears to be the first warning of a terrible punishment looming over
mankind, but which might still be thwarted. Experts are studying numbers and
are making the most varied hypotheses. The epidemical curve may drop or
increase. After the summer the virus, will appear in a more mitigated form,
according to some, or in a more violent form, as happened with the “Spanish Flu”,
according to others. Nobody can predict
what’s going to happen. But already the resulting
scenario is being described. The world’s economy will collapse, while, as
Massimo Giannini writes in La Repubblica of March 17th “the
Europe of the Enlightenment and of the Ventotene
founding fathers*, just, free and solidary, is defeated by an invisible and
elusive enemy.” “We are at war”, the French President Emmanuel Macron repeated exactly
six times, rallying against “an invisible and elusive enemy” that is attacking
us. (Le Monde, 16 marzo 2020).
The debacle of the world’s economy is acknowledged with concern by all
its observers. According to Federico Fubini, “the deep markets slumps are
saying that Covid-19 is bringing global recession along with it” (Corriere della Sera, March 17th),
while Federico Rampini in La Repubblica
of the same day wrote: “The most powerful bank in the world is impotent. The
desperate moves of the Federal Reserve in order to contain the panic in the
markets have come to nothing. The global economy is crumbling. A violent recession is coming."
Are we on the eve of an economic crack? And if in some European country,
the collapse of the health system should be interconnected with a collapse of
the Eurozone, what would the consequences for the European cities be? The
scenario for the upcoming months is disquieting. It seems the hour of those “fatal moments” described
by Stefan Zweig is tolling: “hours of dramatic potential, fraught with doom”,
when “an immeasurable quantity of events are concentrated in a very short space
of time, like the electricity in the entire atmosphere on the tip of a
lightening-rod” (Momenti fatali,
Adelphi, Milano 2005, p. 12).
God is patient, and always warns first before inflicting his final
chastisements. The coronavirus seems to be a warning from Divine Providence to
render humanity aware of its errors. It
is the hour of repentance for the sins of the world, because by sinning collectively
we have deserved public chastisements, like epidemics, famine and wars, which
might well follow one after the other in rapid succession. God is infinitely merciful,
but His mercy presupposes the awareness of the sin and asking forgiveness for
it. Other painful warnings will follow, then Timur’s black flag will be
hoisted.
*Altiero Spinelli,
Ernesto Rossi and Eugenio Colorni “Isolation determined the intellectual
path of Altiero Spinelli. In
jail, he (temporarily) distanced himself from communism, as the Soviet
dictatorship was against his ideals. He was eventually excluded from the
communist party in 1937. In 1941, in the middle of the world war, he co-wrote
with Ernesto Rossi and Eugenio Colorni the famous “Manifesto for a free and
united Europe” (better known as the “Ventotene Manifesto”, the name of the
island where he was imprisoned).” https://www.thenewfederalist.eu/the-founding-fathers-of-the-european-union-altiero-spinelli?lang=fr
Translation: Contributor Francesca Romana
