The Coming Renaissance
By SocratesSomething is happening in our world, in this age. A sea-change; a paradigm shift; call it what you will. In any event, people seem to be aware that long held maxims and beliefs have failed, and they are receptive to “intense and impassioned conceptions respecting man and nature,” as Percy Bysshe Shelley put it in his work, A Defence of Poetry. God is working in our world and in our lives.
For decades, the “in thing” has been to break traditions, to re-write history, to “go along to get along.” Often, the only reason for this was to the effect that “those old white slave-owning men” did something a certain way, and since they owned slaves, they must have been wrong and immoral. “Therefore, we will do it another way - just about any other way will do, so long as it is not their way.” In short, the “in thing” has been to deny morality and truth, as they have been known to previous generations. The “in thing” has been to be as immoral as possible, while dropping the “icated” from “sophisticated.”
People seem to be waking up to the grave error of this sophistry, and are more receptive to the principles of our founding, and the meaning of the inalienable God-given rights to Life, Liberty, and especially the Pursuit of Happiness, as those rights were understood by the committee which drafted our Declaration of Independence than they have been at any time in this author’s brief existence on this earth. They are looking for answers and explanations. Such circumstances are pregnant with the potential for a revival of the Spirit of Independence which made this nation a beacon of hope for all mankind, and historically occur as the proverbial “turn on a dime.” We may soon bear witness to the “in thing” turn into working on becoming the kind of American which our founders would be proud to call their descendants. Folks appear to want “to Do Good,” as Cotton Mather might have said. They want to learn how to do good. In the process, it may be discovered that “Left” and “Right” is a false choice between two tyrannies, presented as part of a “divide-and-conquer” strategy - “Do you prefer cyanide or arsenic? Hanging or guillotine? Drowning or asphyxiation (as in tossed out the airlock in a space-faring vessel)? Do you prefer Communism, or Fascism?*”; that the real distinction may be more accurately described as “British” and “American.” How long can the enemy of civilization offer its own opposition to a credulous population successfully? Right up to the brink of the collapse of civilization, at least, by all present evidence. Civilizations fall because their “leaders” engage in the time-honored sophistry of offering pre-approved answers to the wrong questions, and because the people they mislead tolerate such sophistry.
*This is not intended to be taken as suggesting that every one on the Right side is a Fascist or that every one on the Left side is Communist. The point is that we know that, with very limited exceptions, the “leaders” of both sides of this divide work together and read from the same program. The late Carroll Quigley, professor of history at Georgetown University and member of the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote in his 1966 book, Tragedy and Hope, a History of the World in Our Time, “The argument that the two political parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can ‘throw the rascals out’ at any election without leading to any extensive shifts in policy. The policies which are vital and necessary for America are no longer subjects of significant disagreement, but are disputable only in details of procedure, priority, and method.” This is how we ended up with the expression, “RINO,” is it not?
Robert Heinlein observed, “Political tags - royalist, communist, Democrat, populist, liberal, conservative, and so forth - are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled (“the British” - ed) and those who have no such desire (Americans - ed).” The distinction exists as a kind of snare which catches people and engages them in an impotent division over this or that “issue” presented by an anti-constitutional faction which is international in its membership and in its reach, as the “issues” presented are themselves at best effects of the true issues, and so the possibility of a workable solution entering the discussion is minimized to virtually nil, and the positions presented by both sides ultimately serve the interests of the engineers of the disaster through which we are living and to which we bear witness, today.
“It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.”
In many ways, it seems man lives today in a golden age. We have conveniences which previous generations could only have dreamed about. We are able to communicate instantaneously with individuals all across the planet. We are able to travel nearly the entire territory of the planet, by land, by sea, and by air. We have harnessed the power of the atom to provide for our needs. We have launched technological marvels into the solar system, including instruments which have greatly expanded our knowledge and understanding of the universe, while showing us how little we truly do know, and how much more there is to learn and to discover. We have even sent human beings to the moon, and returned them safely to the earth. And while our standards of living have been in increasingly noticeable decline during the recent five or six decades, they are still considerably better than has been known throughout most of human history. Truly, the best of times.
Despite these achievements, our economy is collapsing, evidenced by those declining standards of living. The financial system is hopelessly bankrupt. What was once the greatest agro-industrial economy the world had ever seen, affording us - the United States - prestige and honor on the world stage, is reduced to fighting proxy wars against what should be one of our greatest allies - the Russian Federation. We are reduced to recognizing a successful naval blockade of a key maritime transit bottleneck, and now, apparently, the Indian Ocean as well, by an organization - not even a nation - which does not even have a Navy! We are reduced to the status of the “dumb giant” which maintains an Empire hostile to our founding, by virtue of a “Special Relationship” with Great Britain. That is, we were reduced to that status - we are not so “giant” any more, which is why our proxy wars amount only to wasted blood and treasure; it is why we are impotent to protect our shipping at sea; it is why we witness the phenomenon known as “de-dollarization” led by the BRICS; and it is how we are accused of being that very Empire around the world. Truly, the worst of times. How often do we hear about this alleged “American Empire,” issuing edicts to its vassal states, including its “most loyal lackey,” Great Britain? People can still recognize the signs and traits of Empire, even if they lack the historical knowledge to recognize the actual Anglo-Dutch (British, but this sentence does appeal to historical knowledge, including the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688, which brought William of Orange to the throne of England…) Empire which still exists, even in the twenty first century. Now that we are no longer the giant, people are interested in discovering how we could have been so dumb. There is nothing so dangerous to tyranny as an informed population capable of exercising critical thinking skills. Our own actions and thoughts are all we can control; if we wish to change the world, we must begin with ourselves. That is, essentially, the root of all such “paradigm shifts.” Living people willingly revisit, and even revise, the maxims by which they had previously viewed the universe which they inhabit. That is the essence of free will, and it is why we are blessed with that gift. Strangely enough, Michael Jackson has a relevant quote, here. “If you want to make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make a change.”
People are willing to re-evaluate the maxims which they have taken as “self-evident truths” for their entire lives. People who had been programmed to be hostile to our founding are now open to hearing a well-reasoned and well-articulated counter-argument which is actually consistent with our founding and our history.
This is a most welcome development. It must be capitalized upon. Speak of our constitutional convention, and the compromise made there regarding the institution of slavery in contrast to the original constitution of our founders never once using the word “slave” in any form, and in direct contrast to the purpose of government as pronounced in our Declaration of Independence as being to secure those inalienable, God-given rights to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness for all men. Raise the specter of Liberty in the halls and restaurants and living rooms of America. Speak of the bankruptcy - financial, intellectual, and moral - of the Federal Reserve System, and how it operates as an anti-Hamiltonian institution. Speak of the decades-long “Special Relationship” with the Great Britain which opposed our founding - a “Special Relationship” which tracks suspiciously with our decline as a respected nation in the world - and speak also of President Washington’s declaration that it is our policy to avoid long-term alliances with foreign powers. Speak of from where our founders derived a notion to an inalienable, God-given right to the Pursuit of Happiness. Speak of the sophistry displayed by both “sides” of the aisle. Speak of the ancient strategy of divide-and-conquer, so successfully employed by that ancient Empire, and contrast that strategy with our original national motto, “E Pluribus Unum.”
Speak of these things, rather than taking the bait of raising each other’s ire over this or that “issue” presented by the media. You may be pleasantly surprised, as I have been in recent weeks and months, by the responses you get.
Most importantly, have fun while you engage in these discussions! Pursue Happiness. Make sure future generations of free American citizens will be grateful for our existence. Secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and to posterity.
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