Category: Reflections
The Renaissance and Political Realism
“In them for the first time we detect the modern political spirit of Europe” – Jacob Burckhardt, ‘The Renaissance in Italy’ Via the Renaissance, allow me to concisely consider the birth-throngs of modernity: the ur-aesthetic-political-conceptual conceits and peculiarities its victims...
Is the Irish Constitution Still Fit for Purpose?
Irish liberals love to take pride in the fact that Ireland – by remaining democratic throughout the twentieth century while much of Europe was upended in conflict – is one of the longest surviving democracies in Europe. However, given the...
The Ideals of Sarsfield’s Jacobitism do not belong in Modern Ireland
The following first appeared on the substack 'Creeve Rua' and is syndicated with the permission of the author. All those appreciative of Gaelic history and culture should naturally rejoice at the recent news that the remains of Jacobite hero Patrick Sarsfield...
Review: The New Puritans: How the Religion of Social Justice Captured the Western World
Andrew Doyle’s The New Puritans: How The Religion of Social Justice Captured The Western World begins and ends with America’s Salem Witch Trials. In between, he has twelve chapters, each of whose titles has a religious connotation and all of...
Aristotle on TikTok: The Radical Right and Digital Rhetoric
The twenty-first century has, to date, presided over a period of rapid development in the capabilities of digital software. There have been a variety of social, political, and cultural repercussions derived from the vast network of communication services provided by...
Modernists Against Ethnos: Towards a Proper Study of Irish Nationality
“If Ireland were in national health, her history would be familiar by books, pictures, statuary, and music to every cabin and shop in the land—her resources as an agricultural, manufacturing, and trading people would be equally known—and every young man...
Civilisation vs Culture and the Mystery of St Maurus
History has shown us that there exists an antithesis between two traditions; that of ‘civilisation’ and ‘culture’. Civilisation, which resides in the hearts of the French, the Americans and the English, embodies the notion of ‘progress’; the betterment of humanity...
Liberalism is a Sin: Absolutism Fights Back
Doctor Don Felix Sarda y Salvany was a popular priest in Spain in the late 19th and early 20th century who was considered exemplary for the firmness of his principles and the clarity of his apostolate –centred upon charity and...
Exiting History: The Myth of the Bipolar World
The ‘End of History’ has been postponed. Fukuyama, its author, assures us that ‘the spirit of 1989 is not dead…and is being reawakened’ by the Ukrainian conflict'. The End of History and the triumph of liberalism is still there. According...
The Greasy Till: DP Moran, Yeats and Ireland’s Emergent Catholic Bourgeoisie
Introduction “As regards Ireland, our feelings were curious… We intended as good Protestants and Loyalists to keep the papists under our feet. We impoverished them, though we loved them, and their religion by its doctrine of submission and obedience unintentionally...