"Many of these young financiers dreamed of leaving Ukraine. So did many of the students I met at a university. There were three themes they repeated. First, they wanted an independent Ukraine. Second, they wanted it to become part of the European Union. Third, they wanted to leave Ukraine and live their lives elsewhere. It struck me how little connection there was between their national hopes and their personal hopes. They were running on two different tracks. In the end, it boiled down to this: It takes generations to build a nation, and the early generations toil and suffer for what comes later. That is a bitter pill to swallow when you have the option of going elsewhere and living well for yourself now. The tension in Ukraine, at least among the European-oriented, appears to be between building Ukraine and building their own lives."

Read more: Geopolitical Journey, Part 6: Ukraine | STRATFOR

This disconnect, or lack of integration, or split in modern living & persons is symptomatic of something much more frightening. People want Utopia, but are not willing (themselves) to sacrifice even an iota to make something better for someone else. But this was the entire basis of "civilization", not merely as understood during the Dark Ages or the Christian Era, but even in ancient Rome or Greece. He who died freely for his fellows was the hero, and the State modeled itself after him. Today, we laugh & call such sacrifice stupidity.

remit novarum studiosus

"Composure, here characterized as well-formed spiritual attitude, glowing inwardly with passion, but outwardly hard as hammered steel, gloriously concealing the measureless, seems necessary to me. When I look at my state, that symbol of infinity and all that is finite, but to me an especially visible symbol for others, which I always carry in my heart, as the saints carry the name of Christ, then it appears completely strong and great and perfectly formed, yet teeming within with a multitude of movements and the colorful play of forces." Baron Evola

"The most fearful consequence of the despotic government to which the South is now subjected, is not the plundering of our goods, nor the abridgment of privileges, nor the death of innocent men, but the degrading and debauching of the moral…sensibilities and principles of the helpless victims. The weapon of arbitrary rulers is physical force; the shield of its victims is usually evasion and duplicity. Again: few minds and consciences have that stable independence which remains erect and undebauched amidst the disappointments, anguish, and losses of defeat, and the desertion of numbers, and the obloquy of a lost cause. Hence it has usually been found, in the history of subjugated nations, that they receive at the hands of their conquerors this crowning woe—a depraved, cringing, and cowardly spirit.

The wisest, kindest, most patriotic thing which any man can do for his country, amidst such calamities, is to aid in preserving and reinstating the tottering principles of his countrymen; to teach them, while they give place to inexorable force, to abate nothing of righteous convictions and of self-respect. And in this work he is as really a benefactor of the conquerors as of the conquered. For thus he aids in preserving that precious seed of men, who are men of principle, and not of expediency; who alone (if any can) are able to reconstruct society, after the tumult of faction shall have spent its rage, upon the foundations of truth and justice.

The men at the North who have stood firmly aloof from the errors and crimes of this revolution, and the men at the South who have not been unmanned and debauched by defeat—these are the men whom Providence will call forth from their seclusion, when the fury of fanaticism shall have done its worst, to repair its mischiefs, and save America from chronic anarchy and barbarism; if, indeed, any rescue is designed for us."

RL Dabney

If you’re Jewish, it’s called History.
If you’re Asian, it’s called Culture.
If you’re African, it’s called Pride.
If you’re European, it’s called Racism.

A friend of mine once argued to me that the British Empire began the Modern Age. The French & Indian War, of course, was a crucial turning point. Now along comes this:

Bernard Bourdin, "The Theological-Political Origins of the Modern State: The Controversy between James I of England and Cardinal Bellarmine" (trans. Susan Pickford; Catholic University of America Press, November 2010):

http://cuapress.cua.edu/books/viewbook.cfm?Book=BOTP

Publisher's description: "Contemporary understanding of the modern state is so bound up with the development of liberal democracy that it may appear anachronistic to identify the origins of the modern state in a theological-political configuration of events. Yet in European history, the sovereignty of the people arose from the divine delegation of royal sovereignty to the temporal and spiritual orders – a theory that the Holy See could not countenance. The controversy that erupted between James I of England and Cardinal Bellarmine following the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 is a striking illustration of this political and ecclesiological dispute over who ultimately holds absolute sovereignty by divine right – the king or the pope? In this work, Bernard Bourdin clearly sets forth the political thought and theology of James I as an early intellectual foundation for the modern state. He offers a comprehensive examination of James's intense dispute with Bellarmine, a controversy that sent shock waves throughout Europe and had a lasting impact on the rise of the modern state."

Bernard Bourdin is Professor of Theology at the University of Metz, France.

Now, while I don't share many people's enthusiasm for upward-linear history (in a sort of "Time brings novelty & progress" sort of way), and in fact think that this idea reeks of Hell, I do concede that it is important to trace lineage, both psychosocial and intellectual. In this case, I do think that Modernity began to enter the picture in a rather new way when France and England concluded their centuries-long struggle for power.

Certainly, the soul ought to voyage, quest, & discover, but it is important to remember that what the New World explorers found was "themselves all over again". Which is what makes America so interesting. And, of course, the Norse had already done it. So novelty is really relative to what is absolute.

More Summation

I want to address modern probable-ism a little more. Someone (who was otherwise very intelligent) on the Spengler Forum once argued that "we now know that communism was a bad idea, thanks to the experience of Russia". It seems to me that generally and virtually all modern arguments are justifications of ad hoc experimentation in this manner. It seems to me (on the contrary) that anyone with any worldly wisdom (let alone spiritual insight) could have quite easily anticipated what orgies and disaster and despair would ensue from going Red. In fact, there are a great many literary and historical records of those who "could see" predicting just that. We now (as the master Don Colacho remarks in 2287) have three generations of reaction: 1) Warnings (Burkhardt, de Tocqueville, Burke, Vinet, etc.) 2) predictions (Dostoevsky, Melville, Henry Adams, etc.) 3) Proofs (Ledhin, Solzhenitsyn, etc.). What else would he say of this argument?

"The left does not condemn violence until it hears it pounding on its door.

Escolios a un Texto Implícito: Selección, p. 371

Nothing is easier than to blame Russian history for the sins of Marxism.
Socialism continues to be the philosophy of shifting blame onto others.

Escolios a un Texto Implícito: Selección, p. 371"

Yes, the ad hoc experimentors have a foolish argument, and it is quite (even quintessentially) modern. So very up-to-date it doesn't recognize its own supremely Satanic heritage. Another person (the same Forum) once asked rhetorically (Leftists enjoy rhetorical questions) if people (then) should just resign themselves "to a life of toil & suffering as they wind down to the twilight of death and oblivion, resigning themselves to an afterlife alone"?

This is one of those false dichotomies that dying civilizations (in which Kali Yuga has been awakened) wallow in, fogs of chaos & confusion of their own making. The afterlife (here) is conceived as "after", literal, separate, unknowable, as if there was no connection with something intangible (which of course, the Past is also). There is only the immediate, sensate Now, the tangible visceral sights and sounds and smells of the sweat of the moment. In such environments, it is next to impossible for all but the most stalwart to get any sense of where they are at vertically in the Cosmos. Individualism and empiricism (here) have wreaked havoc with spiritual values and sensibilities, which often are not even suspected of any real merit or "value" (a contemptuous word).

Progress, you see, is not just a verb, but a noun with a capital letter, a God with a destiny, an avatar with an agenda. One need only point out, here, that it is not a question of "going back" to ancient Sparta, early America, Victorian gaslight England, puritan France, or any other past time. Only a "literal minded fool" would conceive or construe the argument to be about such, condemning all concern with the past as nostalgia (for the Leftist, this is the only possible mode of apprehending the past). The real question is "what is the nature of the (obvious) link between past, present, future"? This is a metaphysical way of asking, what is our duty? What is the nature of real piety? Or, conversely, why is the Left unable to establish meaningful intercourse with the Past? And what does this tell us about their ability to usher in the Future? They are unable to parse the invisible world, which is the only (and primal) ability to differentiate man from the beasts. And this is insulting to beasts, because even they obey their destinies.

The world (as Ron in Harry Potter says) is "mental". It is not linear or fundamentalist or literal. It is complex, a circular spiral which only moves upward if people collectively liberate their nous from the fetters of sensation. The terrible, simply, false, but clear idea of Progress is that the world automatically progresses on its own, like a machine, and that we can clearly see what it is doing, no matter how idiotic or ignorant or foolish or enchained with passions which we are. First came the war against Culture/Kultur, and now comes a war against civilization itself. It will end in blood.

This has become a common religious belief in the West. One might even say that it is heresy to deny it, or even to hold doubts. There is no mental courage in the idea that whatever is, is right. It is lazy cowardice of the first order. More and more, it is implicated in its own web of lies, lies that "all evil will be overt" or that tyranny comes only in robes of darkest black.

"Leftist attitudes toward justice (i.e., the insatiable moloch of "social justice") essentially result from a deformation of this pre-existing truth, as they enforce their idea of justice in fundamentally unjust ways -- i.e., racial quotas, income redistribution, attacks on private property, class warfare, etc. All forms of modern leftism are essentially dishonest appeals to truth, unjust appeals to justice, unfair appeals to fairness, coerced appeals to generosity, etc. Again, it's the container that is so destructive, since it damages even "good" content, i.e., charitable impulses.

Please note that the omnipotence of the fantasy -- the end -- justifies the means required to attain such a beautiful thing, which always requires the coercion (and implicit violence) of the state"

This must be destroyed. Voldemort will not come as an ethnic white, Inquisitorial, masculine, brooding, dark villain. Rather, in the modern world, he-who-must-not-be-named will come as a "Temple of Tolerance", with shades of pink. Satan will take the throne in the name of Freedom, Justice, Equality for all.

The one thing which could always be said for the most autocratic and brutal hierarchies of the past was that, no matter what their content (for instance, Ivan the Terrible), the Form was preserved inviolate. The container was more important than the perverted message. The image of God had been marred, but the prime icon was unbroken. It was possible to appeal to Justice in hierarchical societies through the sacrifice of the Hero, who came to save the weak and helpless. Boris Godunov, Michael, Joan of Arc, the heroes of Lepanto - these men stood for eternity, but they were also eternal.

In the new, tolerant societies, Justice is put upon the throne, but the form is gone. When inevitable decay ensues, it is impossible to restore the body. Until terrible effusions, undramatic and purely tragic, have epurated the disease from our blood, and the West against abandons materialism to reclaim the Imperium and the Telos. Not only of politics, but of destiny and the invisible worlds, which are numberless and prime.

A Journey by the Soul

the ability "to grasp one part of reality brilliantly while being oblivious of the other things that human minds are capable of can be more opposed to the truth than the perceiving of all things equally dimly." - Bolton, traditionalist (france)

Homo Americanus & the Left Hand of Darkness

Homo Americanus is the precis of George Parkin Grant's work Technology & Empire, as well. Relativism plus technocracy = a terrifying Future.

Alex Kurtagic's book Mister is getting mixed reviews:
Dieses hervorragende Buch könnte man als einen Nachfolger von 1984 bezeichnen. George Orwell hat nicht ahnen können, was seit seinem Roman noch an teuflischen Dingen das Leben der Menschen in Europa zusätzlich vergiften und zu einem wahren Alptraum machen würde. Hierzu zählen vor allem die sog. "Multikulturelle Gesellschaft" und die "Politische Korrektheit". "Mister" ist ein gelebter Alptraum, der den Roman"helden" durch Chaos, Gewalt und eine verdeckte Diktatur führt. Bewußt überzeichnet der Verfasser alltägliche Situationen und Erlebnisse, um deutlich zu machen, wo der multikulturelle Zug hinfährt. Jeder erkennt hier Szenen, die er selbst schon erlebt hat - nur nicht in dieser Dichte und Dramatik. Das Buch ist ein Plädoyer für die Freiheit und die Selbstbestimmung der indigenen Europäer.

The golden thread connecting Past with Present Future is "race" in the Spenglerian sense, which includes culture. If one assumes a stable & homogeneous demographic (not in the abstract, but based on what is "now", not what we "want"), then the problems of the future become addressable. As TS Eliot says, it is not those problems we cannot solve (no civilization worth the name can solve all its problems) that will doom us, but perhaps the ones we choose not to see or acknowledge. The issue of Race could top the list here.

America is attempting to be "raceless". Suffice it to say that this is impossible. Exactly like the lie of democracy, something worse than "race" will come in the back door. We are already seeing what Dystopia will look like. Get used to unemployment, high prices for energy and food, and civil disorder. It is the price of "Progress". And it will climb. Even the Serbian Church is being impacted by the global pro-Western revolution. This revolution is not about Diversity, but about the Monolith & its Monotony, interspersed with wars and rumors of War. These people hate real differance.

Until What Was, Must Be. & Then it will not be the proud and the powerful who will thrive, but the little people and the lucky. Those who are still human, which is to say, those who have not been deracinated, and remember what it is like to have family, kind, race, nation, & brotherhood with all men, not under the banner of god-hood, but of creatureliness and its attendant and legitimate patterns, rhythms, and idolatries.

Summing "It All" Up

Aidan Hart's work

I know I've promised various thoughts on various subjects, so I mean to try to do some summing up...

Ancient stories about saints, in which they are purported to have repelled Loch Ness monsters, ordered ravens around, or predicted death sound strange to us, and I admit I have no absolute verification that such happened. The same technology which would render such events recordable also help to destroy the immediacy in relation to Nature & Super-Nature which might have set the magic chain of Being vibrating down Jacob's Ladder. So, does one pray to the saints or not? Does one ice-bathe & fast, or not?

I am not sure it is essentially mattering very much what we "believe" intellectually about all this. The heart accepts and ratifies what the mind finds dubious or hard to understand, perhaps preposterous.

Ancient customs, among which I have wandered this Long Lost Last Dark Night of My Soul's Museum, are often more confusing than the rumors which reach us as mere legends:
Here (for instance!) is how many theological/philosophical debates go ~

Understanding Plato

Basil Lanneau Gildersleeve (1831-1924), quoted by John A. Scott, "Gildersleeve the Teacher," Proceedings of the American Philological Association 56 (1925) xxii—xxviii (at xxiii):

Platonic scholars, with rare exceptions, are roughly to be divided into two classes, those who can understand the thought but not the Greek and those who can read the Greek but cannot understand the thought...

Cf. John Burnet (1863-1928), Humanism in Education, in Essays and Addresses (London: Chatto & Windus, 1929), p. 109:

I would not, however, give two straws for any one's opinion on the criticism or interpretation of Plato's text unless he can write tolerable Greek prose...

It is always dangerous to imitate genius, opines Richard Mitchell. Here, as in theology, we often find the Fathers and the Ancients in exact, diametric disagreement. Then, why bother? One is forced to read them, in order to accurately measure one's self against a perfect standard, for certainly our day can provide none. It is misshapen and disproportionate at best. The "Ideal" of God and His God-men may not exist (or have existed) but the music of their deeds reaches us through the ears of the soul, which hears better than it sees. In aspiration, we can reach for an ideal which should exist, and which can exist absolutely, for "God is the truth of all Illusions".

Agreed that Tradition itself is not intrinsically Perspicacious nor Holy nor One nor True. However, it is the inevitable and endless and necessary portal to any approach to these things we could possibly make. The imagination demonstrates the truth of this proposition to us, for if God does not exist, anything is permitted, and the imagination is oriented to the Good, and rebels against this Chaos. What quivers in the wind or the cold stars, it is increasingly felt, is the whisper of truth.

All truth must die and be reborn. If there is to be Unity, there must be a final Death, both for man and perhaps for the Cosmos. We see through the Mirror darkly. But, as we travail and climb, the mirror sometimes clears and we come to see more. To do more. To become more.

This is the only Christianity worth dying for.

For, as has been already said, every soul of man has in the way of nature beheld true being; this was the condition of her passing into the form of man. But all souls do not easily recall the things of the other world; they may have seen them for a short time only, or they may have been unfortunate in their earthly lot, and, having had their hearts turned to unrighteousness through some corrupting influence, they may have lost the memory of the holy things which once they saw. Few only retain an adequate remembrance of them; and they, when they behold here any image of that other world, are rapt in amazement; but they are ignorant of what this rapture means, because they do not clearly perceive. For there is no light of justice or temperance or any of the higher ideas which are precious to souls in the earthly copies of them: they are seen through a glass dimly; and there are few who, going to the images, behold in them the realities, and these only with difficulty. There was a time when with the rest of the happy band they saw beauty shining in brightness-we philosophers following in the train of Zeus, others in company with other gods; and then we beheld the beatific vision and were initiated into a mystery which may be truly called most blessed, celebrated by us in our state of innocence, before we had any experience of evils to come, when we were admitted to the sight of apparitions innocent and simple and calm and happy, which we beheld shining impure light, pure ourselves and not yet enshrined in that living tomb which we carry about, now that we are imprisoned in the body, like an oyster in his shell.

Phaedrus

We are not "imprisoned in the body", but note that Saint Paul probably quoted this tradition, in "seeing through a glass darkly". Time to resurrect the Cambridge Platonists.