Although somewhat overshadowed by the allegory of the Cave, the myth of the ring of Gyges, and other powerful images found in Plato’s Republic, the account of the ship of fools is still memorable and compelling. While Socrates—the Athenian philosopher and mentor of Plato—is discussing with his young friends the nature of justice and the ideal [...]
As Edmund Burke began to wind down his very long letter—that which would become 1790’s Reflections on the Revolution in France—he returned to the question of first principles and right reason, especially in regard to the nature of the human person. At his best and most natural, Burke argued, men understood themselves as spirited and [...]
The libertarian theory of constitutional law is clever and undoubtedly well-intentioned, but it is unsound from an originalist standpoint. It is historically untenable. It requires doctrinal leaps of Olympic caliber. Instead of increasing individual liberty, it would destroy the republican form of government by concentrating power in one branch of government. Debates regarding the role [...]
What ought to take primacy when carrying out research and interpreting seminal books: the text itself, or the context? A known critic of historicism and contextualism, Leo Strauss published his seminal essay, ‘What is Political Philosophy?’ in 1957 in the Journal of Politics and introduced a problem with the field: Modern academic obsessions over positivism [...]
By the beginning of the Mexican war, even famed newspaper editor John L. O’Sullivan began to doubt his own expansionist infatuations. What would America do, for example, if she tried to incorporate not just Mexico but actual, honest-to-God Mexicans into the republic? Standing with his father as they watched the Battle of Bunker Hill in [...]
No matter how conservative intellectuals try, they just do not seem able to escape John Locke. Jonah Goldberg’s well-received Suicide of the West proudly called America’s Declaration of Independence “echoes of” the great English Enlightenment philosopher John Locke, saying U.S. history was “more Locke than anything Locke imagined.” He inspired “a government but not a state”: a government with power [...]
Viktor Orbán discovered his roots in a tradition devoted to family, country and Christian values. Though he submits to democratic elections and legal restraints on his power, in order for his right-wing populism to survive he must exercise greater authority than is his by law... On June 16, 1989, 200,000 Hungarians filled Heroes’ Square in [...]
Virtue is what the good city aims to achieve as part of the common good. Since humans are social animals and creatures of actions, the call to cultivate virtue within civil society is a fundamental aspect of the good society and the good regime... Today’s offering in our Timeless Essay series affords our readers the [...]
Contrary to popular belief, the more violent Leftists are not fanatics drawn to an extremist ideology who see themselves as its foot soldiers. They are souls full of emptiness, inhabiting a world of chaos and darkness. More often than not, they will end their lives with nihilistic fury and flourish… The rash of violence leading [...]
Civil division and its conquests are the true makers of America and continue to shape its national progress—or threaten its undoing. Indeed, the very founding of the United States advanced the principle of civil conflict over all others. Our very identity, from the start, was framed as triumph over the “other.” We cast them out, [...]
Since I was a little boy, I have been taught that it is a sacred duty to vote. That if you don't vote, you have no right to complain—that true patriots care enough to vote, even if for a lesser evil. But how is it that the same system that dishes out the same unworthy [...]
We study history to learn from it. If we can discover what worked and what didn’t work, we can use this knowledge wisely to create a better future. But when propaganda is the goal, accuracy is the victim. Cornelius Vanderbilt Capitalism Worked, But We Were Told It Didn’t We study history to learn [...]
Many Americans fear the dysfunction in Congress and the rise of an “activist” Supreme Court. Both worries are misplaced, at least in relationship to the larger problem at hand: the growth of presidential imperialism. Albert Jay Nock was an important literary and social critic of the first-half of the twentieth century. Part scholar, part pundit, [...]
I have noticed that my liberal friends have been very depressed lately. I used to think that my conservative pals and I were the ones who were constantly bemoaning the decline of Western civilization, but we just can’t match the moaning of our left-wing acquaintances in the time of Trump. […]