The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.
18th Century statesman and essayist Edmund Burke, arguably the greatest Irishman to have ever lived. I wonder if Tony Blair or Dave Cameron have heard of him, or read him?
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Samizdata quote of the dayApril 1st, 2006 |
 12 comments to Samizdata quote of the day |
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I notice that the first Wicki quote is about forbearance ceasing to be a virtue.
Well now, I always regard forbearance as being the Septic Isle’s mortal vice.
Push it to the limit. Walk along the razor’s edge, don’t look down just keep your head or you’ll be finished. O_O
When we were at the primate stage, it was simple. The strongest and most aggressive male bullied all the rest, got all the girls, and had first dibs on the best food. Straight from the reptilian brain by way of mammalian social organization—no moral dilemnas, or morals at all for that matter.
Then the glimmers started. A series of grunts that meant more than get out of the way. A quizzical look at the moon, lightening, the sunrise, a newborn baby.
Questions. Patterns. Wonder. Terror. Curiosity. Slowly, bit by bit, a search for answers that continues to this very day.
When it came to political power, social control, while the patterns remained, a self-conscious being needed reasons, preferably morally correct reasons, why this one should rule, that one should submit, the visions and dreams of A should overrule B and C.
And so the great alliance was born, a symbiotic relationship between those who held the spear, and those who communed with the spirits. Each feared and envied the other.
The spear carrier had no visions, even if he pretended he did. He had only his muscle, his desire to rule—he did not know the spirits’ minds. But as long as he held the spear, the visionary would fear him, and the rest would follow.
The visionary was weak, helpless before the power of the spear. He had only the voices which spoke to him, the pictures that formed in his mind, in his sleep, in his trances. As long as he knew he was in contact with the other world, the spear would fear him, and the rest would be awed by a power they did not understand.
The delusion? It was always the same, even if the words and pictures were different, or the names and songs varied, or the images and demands ranged from the mundane to the insane. The right to rule always came from the OTHER—from the gods, the blood, the lineage, the spirits.
But never from those fools groveling there in the dirt. Oh, no. They might be the source of food, of warriors, of children, of gold, of oil, of wine, but never power, never the right to rule.
And then some men said, “When, in the course of human events…” and “We, the People…”, and all the spirits howled, all the spears were raised high, and the delusion ended.
Sometimes an idea is incandescent, and burns away the fog. Human beings should live in the light.
… Rather ponderous. How about a cut to the chase…..
When people don’t feel secure to provide for their families, they will riot in the streets to keep their liberties. If they earn their bread by their own hand, they will distrust the narcotic nostrums of the apologists for government redistribution schemes.
When people feel that they have enough; TV, money, food, stuff .. they get lazy and let the elites take their liberties. But they will riot in the streets to maintain the redistribution of wealth from the productive segments of society to themselves.
It is the rare few who when satiated, will still be jealous for their liberties and the liberties of their neighbour.
Burke was indeed a great mind. He is also (give two or so centuries) my fellow townsman.
On my wall, as a partial guard against vices of which I am not totally innocent, there is from him:
“The wise determine from the gravity of the case; the irritable from sensibility to oppression; the high minded, from disdain and indignation at abusive power in unworthy hands.”
Best regards
Umm… George Bernard Shaw? James Joyce?
George Dunning?
Well, as my Grandfather I would not be here today were it not for him making him my personal favorite Irishman.
WGI: Lunchtime O’Booze.
You might want to add Samuel Beckett, W. B. Yeats and Oscar Wilde to that elementary list of ‘greatest Irishmen’, Steven Den Beste.
(Incidentally, is being censored in their own country a prerequisite for literary greatness for the Irish? All the named author’s share, I believe, that rather dubious distinction.)
Yeats was never censored in the Free State. He was a senator.
I do not know whether every great Irishman has a had a difficult time with the power that be in Ireland, but Burke was no fan of the Junto in Dublin Castle.
The Fiztwilliams may have been great Anglo Irish landowners, but even they could not Catholic emancipation into effect.
As for Burke – he (unlike his wife or mother or many of his kin) did not accept the authority of the Bishop of Rome over these islands – but he spent a lot of his life trying to get rid of the Penal laws (partly successful),
And trying to prevent violence between the three forces of Established Church people (like himself) Roman Catholics and Dissentors.
He failed – but then who could have managed to prevent it?
Tony Blair probably thinks Edmund Burke wrote Burke’s Peerage: the book our dear leader is so keen on enlarging in return for soft loans.