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| The wanderer above the sea of fog (1818) by Caspar David Friedrich |
This is the final refuge of the conservative who has lost all political and religious hope. To him, a thousand years are now small change; he bets on the cosmic cycles. Some day, Paraclete will appear, Emperor Frederick Barbarossa will rise from his enchanted sleep and step forth from the mountain. ~ Ernst Jünger, Eumeswil [1]
Last month we published a short piece on our political, or more accurately, apolitical stance (See Apoliteia). As a monarchist living in a non-monarchical society, this was inevitably going to raise some eyebrows and cause more than a little confusion. So we’re taking this opportunity to clarify and expand on some of the ideas we briefly touched upon in that post.
Criticized as a “pessimist,” “alarmist,” and, my favorite, a “depressing old windbag,” I apparently came off as too dour and cynical, to some. Perhaps they don’t understand my position or, more likely, they understand all too well and are too afraid to admit what is coming our way. A realist, I resigned myself to our fate a long time ago, and dispassionately accept the grim future and the challenges it presents. Sorry, but at this point, our civilization is so far down the rabbit hole that nothing short of divine intervention will be able to reverse the devolution of Western society.
I’m no seer, but I think it is safe to say we won’t have the flying cars, matching silver jumpsuits, or colonies on Mars once optimistically envisioned by the bourgeois any time soon. The time, energy and resources squandered on sating the dregs of society, instead of properly managing them, and the boundless avarice of the plutocrats have utterly derailed that possible future. Instead, I foresee unbridled decline and flux. Rampant despotism, mass hysteria, enmity, violence and ignorance based on progressive lies will make Mike Judge’s semi-portent and mildly humorous comedy Idiocracy (2006) seem like a utopia. [2]
There is no political solution, of this I am certain. The system is irrevocably broken and the political class is unmitigatedly corrupt and untrustworthy. Liberal democracy will continue to progress towards totalitarianism and tyranny. The modern state needs to come crashing down—and hard. However, I don’t subscribe to revolution or accelerationism to hasten the foundering of our ailing society; the breakdown will take place in due course and certainly doesn’t need any help from saboteurs.
Contrariwise, I’m convinced we the faithful have a moral obligation to follow God’s laws and do our best to persevere through the collapse. Unwilling to compromise ourselves, we need to bypass politics altogether. Instead of wasting our time bemoaning our fate or adding to the misery, our vital efforts should be focused on creating pockets of civilization and traditional values rooted in spiritual power to see us through the twilight.
Navigating through the ruins won’t be easy, but detachment from politics (apoliteia) and an interior life will be necessary to survive. In the sage words of Joseph de Maistre, “What is needed is not a revolution in the opposite direction, but the opposite of a revolution.” [3] And as we all know, the opposite of revolution is order, and order comes from above. Legitimate authority (Altar and Throne) is derived from Divine Law, which the Godhead made known to man through revelation. This is why any attempt at restoration without spiritual ideals is doomed to fail
Far from the “disheartening” and “pessimistic” accusations levied against me, mine is actually a message of hope. If I were truly a prophet of doom, I wouldn’t have faith and confidence that the cycle of civilizational decline and rebirth would come to pass. As Augusto del Noce, [4] citing French metaphysician René Guénon, points out:
According to his thought, mankind has never been so far from “earthly Paradise” as it is now. However, it is precisely this distance that keeps us from giving in to despair, because the end of a cycle coincides with the beginning of a new cycle, so that the darkness of the present contains the possibility of a rebirth. [5]
My sentiments exactly. Once the fall happens, the remnant of traditional civilization will emerge from the catacombs and restore the abjured aristocratic and religious principles that truly made the Occident great and begin the slow climb out of the muck again. If that’s not being positive and constructive, I don’t know what is.
~ By Giovanni di Napoli, January 31st, Feast of Blessed Maria Cristina, Queen of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies
Notes
[1] Eumeswil, Ernst Jünger, translated from the German by Joachim Neurgroschel, Telos, 2015, p.67
[2] Idiocracy is director Mike Judge’s 2006 dark comedy about a foreseeable dystopian future resulting from dysgenic breeding.
[3] Joseph de Maistre (1 April 1753 — 26 February 1821) was a Savoyard Counter-Enlightenment philosopher, lawyer and diplomat.
[4] Augusto Del Noce (1910-1989) was a prominent Italian philosopher and political thinker.
[5] The Crisis of Modernity, Augusto del Noce, edited and translated by Carlo Lancellotti, McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2019, p.229