Edmund Burke For the present is the point at which time touches eternity.-C.S. Lewis[1] It was in 1939, in The Idea of a Christian Society, that T.S. Eliot defended what he called “the permanent things” against a world that appeared drunk on the politics of revolution and “change.” Eliot’s purpose was not a [...]
There certainly were dragons in our recent past, but they moved around too swiftly to be painted onto a medieval-style map for the sake of public safety. I refer to the human variety of dragon that often carried an umbrella and a handbag (Periculosum Humana Draco). Until quite modern times they patrolled every street and [...]
In response to an earlier post on The Imaginative Conservative, a valued colleague asked me if I would clarify how I understand the relationship between my attraction to so-called “postmodern” thinkers, like Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida, and my conservative “orientation,” as I earlier put it. What I offer here is one gesture in the [...]
Individualism and community are the opposite halves of the American character. For every myth of the self-made man, there is the image of the closely knit New England small town. For every lone cowboy on the frontier, there are the social, political, and cultural groups that Americans have formed since the beginning of the Republic. [...]
One of the few relatively good things about listening to National Proletarian/Public Radio is the insight it can give one into why our culture is dying. Case in point: a recent story on All Things Liberal/Considered on a study regarding whether children “make us happy.” It seems that researchers asked a group of working men [...]
A guide to the paths that remain open when “tradition falls out of existence.” The position this paper will attempt to illustrate, if not demonstrate, is that once lost or weakened the tradition of a society can be restored only by a creative and even radical reconstruction of the tradition itself. The problem to which [...]
I have been reminiscing lately, probably a sign of my age, but I came to recall an episode in my earlier life before I returned to St. John’s College more than 20 years ago, when my second son announced: “Dad, I’m willing to talk with you about my college choices, but I’m not going to go [...]
In the 20th century, only two presidents shaped new governing coalitions that outlasted them. They were the only two men to appear on five national tickets. The first was FDR, who rang down the curtain in 1932 on the seven decades of Republican hegemony since Abraham Lincoln that had seen only two Democrats in the [...]
Homeric Moments: Clues to Delight in Reading the Odyssey and the Iliad Featured Book: Reading Homer’s poems is one of the purest, most inexhaustible pleasures life has to offer–a secret somewhat too well kept in our time. The aim of this book is to tell anyone who might care–first-time, second-time, or third-time readers or people who [...]
Jane Austen In the most recent issue of The Atlantic film critic Christopher Orr asks the question, “Why are romantic comedies so bad?” His answer reveals much about the current state of our cultural decline: “…there’s more at work here than the vagaries of stars or studios. It’s not just them; it’s us. Among [...]
The central myth of the sixties was that [its] wretched excess was really a serious quest for new values.–George Will I. The Tragic Vision of Life I confess to believing at one time or another nearly all the pervasive and persistent fantasies of the sixties. In the words of Joni Mitchell's anthem for the Woodstock [...]
A Review of William H. F. Altman’s Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche: The Philosopher of the Second Reich (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2013). In this imaginative and refined commentary on Nietzsche’s political thought, Altman provides an incisive critique of the achievement of Nietzsche, as well as his limitations. The work is the third volume of a trilogy on German [...]
Liberty itself must be limited in order to be possessed.—Edmund Burke Anarchy, Freedom’s own Judas, the vile prodigal License who steals the gold of liberty.—Oscar Wilde In an age that seems to believe that Christianity is an obstacle to liberty, it will prove provocative to insist, contrary to such belief, that Christian faith is essential to liberty’s [...]
Ideas Have Consequences by Richard Weaver Ideas Have Consequences contributed significantly to the philosophical coherence of contemporary conservatism. Frank Meyer went so far as to say that “the publication of Ideas Have Consequences can well be considered the fons et origo (source and origin) of the contemporary American conservative movement.” For Mr. Meyer, what was adumbrated [...]