A Proposal for a Citadel of the Permanent Things
VII. The Smallholding
All lasting work begins first within the self and then within the home, as I have outlined imaginatively in the first of these essays. Where next ought we build our Citadel? My first instinct is to move to the matter of education, and discuss the whole issue of the transmission of culture. However, there is a certain right and logical order to be observed. If we begin reformation in our homes, where next? Well, for some of us the discussion must immediately turn to educating our children, but we must stop ourselves short. What about our own education? And if we recognize a deficiency in our own education, where do we turn?
Those of traditional instincts rightly despair at much they
see in “the world”, but despair is no answer to pressing practical questions.
“Politics is the art of the possible”, and so is the maintenance and rebuilding
of tradition. What can be done? What are we to do if society is for the time
being adrift, wandering from the Permanent Things, and even poisonous to their
maintenance and enjoyment?
Building a citadel in the midst of a barbarous people means
constructing a city in its midst; it means building a “parallel polis”. We must
cultivate forms of corporate life that in turn cultivate the Permanent Things,
like a polytunnel for the Soul – we need Permanence embodied in grave exchanges
of ideas, in healthy orthodox churches, in networks of fellowship. But, if we
are to be God-trusting optimists, patiently waiting for the day that Fortuna
turns, we must do more than build the polytunnel and hunker down – we must
prepare to plant when the frosts and clouds clear. We must build not just in
parallel, but, like a British minority party, “in shadow”, preparing for government,
ever dogging the steps of the failing hegemony. We must always be ready to step
forward, vindicated by hard experience, to provide for the nations out of our
storehouses; we must build a shadow society, ready to emerge from germ or
seedling into full growth and flower.
What is needed for a shadow society, never abandoning the rotten
husk body, but patiently developing and strengthening in readiness for the
Promised Day? We imagined the Citadel Home in the last essay; let us imagine
the Citadel Society now.
The indispensable feature of a healthy public life is a
healthy leadership class, and an unbending requirement of a healthy leadership
class is that it has access to networks and institutions of intellectual and
moral sympathy and edification. No matter how great the heart, a degree of
withering is inevitable where there is no sympathy around it; no matter how
great the mind, if unedified it resembles rather the block of rough marble than
the finished statue. These institutions and networks are the founding places of
momentous friendships, of persons of shared inclination and conviction, who, in
Lewis’ phrase, discover each other there and say: “What? You too? I thought I was the only one.” Indeed, we may even
say that these places are where great rivalries can be founded, where reactive
elements may touch one another in a “controlled environment” and in their
explosion create new, worthwhile compounds. These bodies are what the Shadow
Society must build.
Now, I do not claim no such bodies exist now; it is
heartening to see that they do, and they multiply apace. This is especially
true relating to educational bodies. However, a coherent vision of the whole we
must build would still be of great value, and that is what I aim to offer.
I will not address educational bodies or the workplace here;
the remaining four numbers of this series will do that. Rather, this essay will
both demonstratively and imaginatively portray the institutions and networks we
must build that make up “social life” – those connective, mediating bodies,
formal and informal, which spur and protect intellectual and community life.
There are three in particular that come to my mind: churches, clubs, and
periodicals.
***
***
I will not discuss churches in great specificity, but I will
define my term and offer examples. By churches I chiefly do mean ecclesial
institutions of the Christian faith, the spiritual lifeblood of Western
civilisation; even my readers who do not share my own religious convictions
have much to gain from a quickening of the churches. By a process of
extrapolation, of course, other religious bodies might be implied by the term “churches”
here – particularly the remaining synagogues and other institutions of the
Jewish people remaining in our land, long-oppressed, even now under pressures
of different sorts, but nonetheless a community which has existed in both
Europe and America since the advent of Western Man. Moreover, there is a reason
we sometimes call Western values “Judaeo-Christian values” – there is a natural
closeness between the peoples of the two Covenants, exemplified rather than
disproven by the vile treatment sometimes meted out by Christians to Jews.
Now, an example. The church in view might be a whitewashed
Grace Baptist chapel with large and light windows facing south, or it might be
a Tridentine Roman church replete with statuary. Indeed, as the two represent
deep wells of the Christian spirit – Citeaux and Cluny, if you will – the existence
of both in a nation strengthens rather than dilutes the solution. The battle to
demonstrate the truth of the propositions each hold in contrary is a fuller’s
fire, not a destroying deluge.
What is necessary is that the church in view is
theologically and spiritually serious; that it does not fail to “contend for the faith that was once for all
delivered to the saints”; that it is morally stern, and therefore deeply joyful,
enjoying the good things of God, extolling the values of Permanence; and, for
our immediate purpose, that it produces a social hub for its wider community,
not being a nuclear bunker for the faithful to hide from the Culture Bomb, but
rather some Italian mountain city like Urbino, a hub of civilisation and a
protector of the whole region (this does mean, yes, our churches need their
Federico da Montefeltros).
Now, in ultimate terms God will make His decision between
Trent and Geneva, but that is not immediately to our point. What we are seeking
is this: institutions that are geographically and socially integral to their
local community, without partiality for class, providing vital social adhesive
and a community hub; and which, in their activities, defend and extol the
Permanent Things as prescribed in that revealed truth accepted in Western Civilization
for 1700 years. Whether we see Polish widows clad in black heading down a
darkened aisle to an icon of the Virgin to light a candle for their husband, or Anglian squires sitting in a box
pew alertly feeding upon the preached word of God in a sunlit temple of
whitewash and dark wood, the immediate effect is the same: the protection of
the Permanent Things by their reification in the life of the believer.
***
Now, what of clubs? Clubs of any sort are necessarily more
selective in one sense than churches; there is a necessary partiality in the
club. The church is open to all who would come – the only qualification
necessary is an earnest desire to be there, and a consequent willingness to
submit to the church’s ordinances. The club selects for specific interests,
specific backgrounds, or specific talents, and there is no injustice in this
partiality. It would be grossly inappropriate for a church to require musical
ability in the penitent seeking God, but it is absolutely vital for the orchestra!
To put it differently, when we consider the building of institutions, we must
consider their proper respective ends. The Church is the people of God come to
Him for mercy, adopted into a new family. By definition no merit is required
for entry. The orchestra, on the other hand, aims to produce transporting art –
it serves God, knowingly or not, precisely through its excellence. Its members must at least have raw talent.
There are any multitude of forms the clubs of the
Shadow Society might (and must) take. It would not be at all out of place for
orchestra and theatre companies to form in explicit allegiance to the Permanent
Things – certainly rather that than yet more tiresome pseuds announcing their
latest wheeze to efface and humiliate Beauty. It may be that such artistic
clubs provide some of the best “evangelistic” efforts for the Shadow Society.
However, what I have more directly in mind are clubs with less specific aims,
but rather a general sort of dedication to the sympathy and edification I
mentioned above. Because these bodies must be specific to a situation, rather
than trying to offer a single abstract definition of them, let me provide three examples.
The first, and most modern in form, is what we’ll call the
Slack Channel Club. A group of intellectual compadres offer their thoughts in
the channel, upload drafts of essays, share news articles they’ve seen that
deserve comment, and generally chew the fat. It is a time-delayed body – there is
no need for immediate attention or response. The channel is a continual digest
of the concerns and interests of a group of a certain sympathy. This is in many
ways the easiest “club” to set up now, and it is a signal proof of the utility
of the Internet to the Cause of the Permanent Things. Find some people of a
common mind on Twitter, or connect with those one or two friends from
University who shared your instincts, and create a text channel so that one is
never far away from succour for the soul and sharpening for one’s mind: “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens
another.”
The second, and a relative of this, is perhaps the oldest. We
need old-fashioned Clubs again – dining clubs, social clubs, conversation
clubs. Socrates had his Club, who managed the particular miracle of apparently dining
out in every other dialogue at someone else’s expense! There are still a few of
these organisations left, as outdated and rejected as they are. The most famous
are those like the Carlton Club of London or the Yale Club of New York, with
physical properties, but I have known similar clubs in multiple universities.
Some common and half-arbitrary bond unites such a club – it might be vague
Toryism (as with the Carlton), or alumni identity (as with the Yale), or a
common interest (whisky or art, for instance). This arbitrariness has itself a
purpose – it creates a bond and loyalty within the club, and promotes common
goals.
But aren’t these institutions outdated? Aren’t they hives
for dipsomania and cronyism? Well, perhaps in some cases, but this needn’t be
the case. Private, selective clubs which provide a social hub for men or women
of shared values and conviction are a crucible for ideas and a hothouse for shared
convictions. Though one should circulate widely, having a place where one can hide
away, read a paper in peace in an old armchair, test ideas over dinner at a
long oak table covered with heavy linen of a simple brocade – this is an
almost-literal Citadel. (The problem with “safe spaces” is not that people
should not have private, secure spaces, but in the absurd idea of creating such
spaces in every public fora in the explicit interest of particular groups.)
Even the alleged cronyism can be a natural and healthy
product of such clubs. These clubs can produce pools of men or women of proven
character and conviction, trustworthy for tasks; if I need a collaborator on a
project but know no-one suitable personally, where better to turn than to the
Club? This is an absolutely inevitable feature of social life anyway. We always
use the networks we have to find fellow travellers for our causes. Why reject
institutional forms of these networks?
These Clubs ought to be chiefly physical in their meeting. A
phonecall from a friend may be encouraging, but it can never replace the
pleasure of old cronies sitting in a half-lit room drinking decent wine and
listening to good music. The Slack Channel Club cannot replace the silent
reading room with leather chairs, or the parlour with its buzz and the
occasional sally at the piano in the corner. No Zoom call can reproduce the
vitality of the conversation of the dining club at some cheap, rough Italian
restaurant, where the wine comes in carafes. It is hard, as Esolen says, to lie
about biology when the cow stands mutely yet immutable in front of you; and so it is much easier to
connect, to affirm, when one is physically present with one’s allies.
If we wish to build a Shadow Society, we will need these
disseminate institutions, private in character but connected to a wider
project. We will need our new St Olave’s College Dining Club (Alumni Welcome),
our Reactionary Women’s Institute, and our Kirk Club ensconced behind the unassuming
facade of a red brick hall pushing pieces on a situation map depicting the War
Of Permanence Against Chaos.
The Club is necessarily elite in its selection. However, as
the Shadow Society pushes its tendrils into every overgrown courtyard and rotting
parlour of the Husk Culture, this form of association must find its counterpart
in ordinary communities. I know to my own pleasure the residuum of these still
survive, though now very much on life support: cricket clubs whose membership
does not, on the whole, play cricket; Working Men’s Clubs where the whole
family spend Saturday afternoon; Catholic Clubs where one’s precise knowledge
of the latest encyclical is never tested. One might even include organisations
such as the Scouts in what I intend here, whatever the moral degradation of
those bodies.
The key thing is that there should be places for pleasurable
mixing and learning for the ordinary member of any community. This latter activity
is now largely lacking, with the death or gentrification of the Institutes.
This is what we must begin to plan to rebuild when money or power is at hand:
whether they are Workers’ Institutes of the 19th century type,
re-envisioned by Simone Weil for her nation, or whether they are something new.
What we need for our third form of "club" are Institutes of Everyday Permanence.
Imagine that we buy the half-derelict pub in our small town,
the one on the corner of the road, and renovate it with the three traditional
rooms and an upstairs lecture hall. Of course it can never turn a profit, not
how we’ll run it, at cost or near enough; we will need wealthy benefactors and
membership dues. I reluctantly accept that there will need to be lager on tap,
and that I may be mocked for drinking ale whenever I sit in the saloon to watch
the football. Families will be welcome in the lounge at any time, as well as in
the spacious garden (with a wooden climbing frame!). The snug will be dark with
heavily padded benches and chairs. Contra Orwell – as lovely as the Moon Over
Water has been upon my every visit – we will serve more than doorstop
sandwiches and scratching, but only at weekends, for the hordes of children we
prophetically desire in our community.
The hall upstairs will not host the quizzes and dodgy tribute acts – we’ll
shuffle them into the saloon and lounge – but rather be where we offer free
violin lessons, and Toddler Music sessions, and a painting class. There will be
lecture series, perhaps ill-attended at first but conducted in a popular style,
injecting the Idea of Permanence into the community one reluctant attendee at a
time, cultivating healthy, balanced intellectual and social aspirations. There will be a reading library in a side room beyond the lecture hall, and furtive aspirants will sneak in to open the storehouse of years. You say this is all fanciful? Mass literacy was fanciful; cheap editions
of good books were condemned as unrealistic. We have done it before. It can be
accomplished again.
***
***
My final overall category is the periodical. There are good
traditionalist periodicals, and it is again something the Internet has
facilitated – some very good papers, such as the University Bookman, are now strictly electronic, which reaches a
wider audience than ever and cuts costs considerably. However, the very
advantage the periodical gives means it cannot be over-replicated, if the
content is worthwhile. The periodical is a platform for ideas; it provides a
regular reiteration of a manifesto, if it has courage and clarity; it
disseminates good ideas and good books and good poems to its audience. Is there
anything more civilised than sitting in the windowseat on a windy Saturday morning
reading an erudite quarterly? Even the stickiness of the glossy pages that you
have to almost pry apart seems somehow elevating when your effort reveals an
illuminating Diary from a country you have never heard of, or an exposé of a
crooked system.
I personally intend to begin a periodical as part of my
service as a builder of the Citadel. It will be print-only – not in contempt of
online efforts, but as a declaration of the stubborn unchangeability of the
real world. I want the 30 or 50 initial subscribers to have a tome in their
hands, delivered every six months with a satisfyingly material thump on the
doormat. I imagine stiff card covers with a contents listing on the front; the
whole thing should be text only, so it constantly refers the reader’s memory to
certain early and serious journals. There will be essays arguing for ideas
about politics and culture and religion; reprints of fine old writing; original
poetry observing old canons with new vigour; reviews of actually good books; overviews
of fine art and music, because we all need a better education; and, the best or
worst of all, pieces in Latin. I am haunted and heartened by the story of C.S.
Lewis and the Italian priest – the priest had read The Screwtape Letters in
translation, but not knowing English, and Lewis not really knowing Italian, the
priest wrote to express his thanks in Latin. There followed a correspondence spanning
many years in the scholarly tongue of Pliny and Bernard and Calvin. Of course,
English is the universal language now, perhaps to be followed by Mandarin – but
turning to Latin (and Greek) for a universal language reminds us of the need to
rehumanise the humanities, and of the incalculable debt to the Great Tradition
we all owe.
These are four examples. There are others that you may
quickly furnish from your imagination. The point now is to concretise
imagination, to make real these foundations and supporting beams of our
Citadel. There is work to do.
In closing, let us summarise the purpose of the Shadow
Society in the words of that old hypocrite, Auden:
Defenceless under the night
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.
Our world in stupor lies;
Yet, dotted everywhere,
Ironic points of light
Flash out wherever the Just
Exchange their messages:
May I, composed like them
Of Eros and of dust,
Beleaguered by the same
Negation and despair,
Show an affirming flame.
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