Order, the First Need of All, cont.

There are more nuggets of good information in chapter one that I don't want to skip over.  Again, it is Kirk's ability to put into words concepts and truths which immediately ring true, that I admire so.

There are two kinds of order in society, civil social order and moral order.  The inner moral order of the soul is intimately linked with the outer order of society.  The civil social order includes the performance of certain duties and the enjoyment of certain rights.  Kirk will trace our legacy of order (institutions, customs, ideas, and beliefs which nurture order in the individual and the republic) back to its roots which will begin with Jerusalem in the next chapter.

Stating that a good society is marked by a high degree of order, justice, and freedom, he stresses the primacy of order.  It necessarily precedes justice and freedom, for justice is unenforceable without a tolerable civil social order at minimum, and freedom is no more than violence without order.  He shares the story of a man who lived in Russia during its revolution of the early 20th century.  This man fled to a city on the Black Sea, Odessa was its name, and discovered it was in complete anarchy.  Apartments were invaded for a loaf of bread, murdering the occupants in the quest.  Pedestrians were shot for sport by youth roaming the streets.  This man experienced first hand the necessity of order before justice and freedom could be known.

Once a revolution is successful at demolishing an established order, the revolutionaries are quick to decree a new order (often more harsh than the previous one).  They understand they cannot govern long by sheer force.

No order on earth is perfect, and for some, it is tempting to think they can create a more perfect order.  The problem with that is, a newly created order does not have the inner moral order of the individual, or the long roots of experience to under-gird their idea.  People are only willing to accept that which has been tried before, a previous experience of mankind, as proof of an idea's soundness.

I was validated, but also saddened, to read that Kirk believes like I do, that our days are similar to that of Cicero in the closing days of the Roman Republic.  Disorder is increasing all about us.  About this phenomenon, Cicero wrote:

"Long before our time, the customs of our ancestors molded admirable men, and in turn those eminent men upheld the ways and institutions of their forebears.  Our age, however, inherited the Republic as if it were some beautiful painting of bygone ages, its colors already fading through great antiquity; and not only has our time neglected to freshen the colors of the picture, but we have failed to preserve its form and outlines."

Is that not true of the U.S. today?!  Our universities are partly responsible for this. One example:  Imagine the people, affectionately dubbed "the Greatest Generation," being described as self-serving wealth-seekers.  Criticized for a work ethic that sought material gains following their endurance of the Great Depression and then, their fighting in (men) and contributions to (women), World War II.  This generation is being impugned.  "They shouldn't have been so concerned with trying to make as much money as they could."  "They should've focused more on the needs of society."  If those spouting such nonsense were to experience the same hardships that generation successfully stared down and gave their lives for, I don't imagine many of them would be so quick to criticize and judge.

And they're missing an important truth — by working hard and seeking a better life they were seeing to the needs of society.  What better way to help the lower social classes but by increasing the wealth of everyone in society. That is the beauty of capitalism in its purest and most honorable sense.

Instead of admiring the Greatest Generation, gaining wisdom from them, and emulating them, we are turning out classes of young adults who believe themselves wiser and who stand in judgment of them.  In Cicero's words, "our time has neglected to freshen the colors."

When a leader seeks to "fundamentally change" the country, including its "... history, and its traditions ..."  we begin to sense a disorder when those long-held traditions are nullified.  But, the higher kind of order declares the dignity of man; it affirms G. K. Chesterton's 'democracy of the dead,' which recognizes the traditions of men and women who have come before us and are unwilling to toss those aside for the ideas of someone walking around today.  Chesterton's full quote is this:

“Tradition means giving a vote to most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our father.”

I think part of the problem with professors' and leaders' ideas about the proper ordering of society is that they are promoting ideas that have been tried many times in the past and even up through the present.  Yet they have never successfully produced a better, freer society for the largest number of people.  Unfortunately, a large number of young people don't know this history and are willing to support those ideas, while the other, smaller group of folks who do know this history, fear the loss of their Republic in the tradition that it has been.