Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 $5.50 An ideal Distributism is only improbable. Even an ideal Communism is only impossible. But an ideal Capitalism is inconceivable. —G.K. Chesterton The 29th Annual G.K. Chesterton Conference Talks Are Here!

Dale Ahlquist (President of the American Chesterton Society) “In Praise of Jones” Qty

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James Woodruff (Mathematics Instructor at Worcester Academy) “GKC and Edmund Burke: The Mistake about Conservatism” Qty Regina Doman (Author)

Tom Martin (Philosophy Professor at University of Nebraska-Kearney) “The Evangelization of the Imagination”Qty “The Mistake about the Social Sciences”Qty Fr. Ian Ker (Theology Professor from Oxford University)

James O’Keefe (Independent Video Journalist) “Chesterton and Newman” Qty “The Mistake about the Social Services”Qty Fr. Peter Milward (Professor Emeritus from Sophia University, Tokyo)

Dr. William Marshner (Theology Professor at Christendom College) “Chesterton and Shakespeare and Today”Qty “The Mistake about Theology” Qty Nancy Brown (Author and ACS Blogmistress) “The Woman Who Was Chesterton” Qty 3 Formats: CDs: Single Talk: $6.00 each OR order the Complete set The American Chesterton Society of CDs for $60.00 (save $12) 4117 Pebblebrook Circle, Minneapolis, MN 55437 MP3 Format: Bundle: 12 Talks in MP3 format on 1 disc: 952-831-3096 • [email protected] $50 www.chesterton.org DVD VIDEO: Single Talk: $12 each OR Conference DVD Bundle: 12 DVDs for $120 (save $24) SHIPPING AND HANDLING: $3 for 1st disc, plus $1 for each additional disc; conference bundle $10 ❏ CDs ❏ MP3s ❏ DVDs # Single # Sets

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Great Location! Great Talks! Great Arguments! Great Fun! : Ta b l e o f C o n t e n t s : Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010

4 |:Tremendous Trifles: The Church and The Libertarian Tony Shalhoub: He’s the guy! bOOK REVIEW By RICHARD ALEMAN by Chris Chan 5 |:Lunacy & Letters: The Guild Idea, 40 |:The Signature of Man: 7 |:EDITORIAL: The Guild Possibility by G.K. Chesterton Stained Glass What’s Wrong With The World by G.K. Chesterton by Dale Ahlquist An Interview with Dr. William E. Fahey 41 |:Chesterton University: 9 |:SCHALL on CHESTERTON: by Richard Aleman Windows on the Past The Risky Adventure and on the Present by James V. Schall, S.J. Distributist Education by Dale Ahlquist by Ryan Grant

10 |:Miscellany of Men: The D-PAC 42 |:Fear of Film: The Smell of Danger by Richard Aleman Red Riding Trilogy (2009) by Dale Ahlquist Reviewed by Chris Chan 31 |:Rolling Road: Notre Dame 44 |:the Distributist MarketPlace: by Dale Ahlquist

45 |:the Ballade of Gilbert: 32 |:Tales of the Short Bow: Americanisation Superstition by G.K. Chesterton by John Peterson 12 |:Outlining Sanity: 46 |:Chesterton’s Mail Bag: What’s the Use of Having The Christmas Caper James G. Bruen, Jr. Stuff Anyway? 48 |:News With Views: by Thomas Storck

35 |:Book Review: 50 |:Letter to America: Distributism and Marxism The Tudors A Postscript on Liberty by Donald P. Goodman III Reviewed by Dale Ahlquist by G.K. Chesterton Toward a Truly Free Market bOOK REVIEW By RICHARD ALEMAN 36 |: the Detection Club: Alias Mel Kirby Understanding Subsidiarity by John Peterson by David W. Cooney Chesterton’s Bloodthirsty Heirs A Distributist Banking System Brief Reviews of the Contemporary by John Médaille Mystery Scene by Steve Miller

Make Your Backyard The Captain Nicholas a Forest Garden Nicholson Casebook by Bill Powell by Steve Miller Cover Illustration by T. SChluenderfritz

Publisher: Dale Ahlquist, President, ACS EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Sean P. Dailey art DIRECTOR: Ted Schluenderfritz LITERARY EDITOR: Therese Warmus COPY EDITOR: Susan Meister

Senior Writer: John Peterson Contributing Editors: Richard Aleman, David Beresford, Nancy Carpentier Brown, Joe Campbell, John C. Chalberg, Christopher Chan, David Paul Deavel, David W. Fagerberg, Kyro Lantsberger, Art Livingston, Robert Moore-Jumonville, James V. Schall SJ “News with Views” Editors: Nathan Allen, Mark Pilon, Larry Pavlicek, Ted Olsen subscriptions: (See Coupon Page 6) Credit Card Orders: call 1-800-343-2425 or fax 1-270-325-3091 Letters and Articles: Gilbert Magazine, American Chesterton Society, 4117 Pebblebrook Circle, Minneapolis, MN 55437 [email protected] www.gilbertmagazine.com Letters to the editor may be edited for length or clarity.

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Copyright ©2010 by The American Chesterton Society.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 3 : T r e m e n d o u s T r i f l e s : by Sean P. Dailey

t has been confirmed, by no less than American Ches- terton Society president Dale Ahlquist: the 30th Annual in the wake of his successful and contro- G.K. Chesterton Conference will be held August 4-6, 100 versial book, What’s Wrong with the World, 2011, in St. Louis, Missouri, at the Sheraton Westport years ago G.K. Chesterton was asked by T.P. O’Connor Lakeside Chalet. The theme of the conference is “Poet to write an article entitled “What is Right with the Iand Prophet.” Speakers scheduled so far are: Christopher World” for the Christmas Number of T.P.’s Weekly. It Check, Pasquale Accardo, Robert Moore-Jumonville, Carl turned out to be one of his most sublime essays, includ- Hasler, Redd Griffin, Tod Worner, Eleanor Donlan, and Dale ing not only the quote that appears on the ACS coffee Ahlquist. Leah Darrow will also appear. (Why would a beauti- mug (“Daybreak is a never-ending glory; getting out of ful young woman featured on the reality TV show, America’s Next Top Model, speak at a Chesterton conference? Could bed is a never-ending nuisance.”), but several jolts of it be because she is the great-great grand niece of Clarence life-affirming wisdom: “The most dangerous thing in the Darrow, who once debated Chesterton?) There will be talks world is to be alive; one is always in danger of one’s life. on Lepanto, The Ballad of the White Horse, William Butler But anyone who shrinks from this is a traitor to the great Yeats, Winston Churchill, vampires, and Chesterton as a scheme and experiment of being.” Franciscan Thomist (or is that a Thomistic Franciscan?). And there will be a performance of Chesterton’s play Magic! He authored the book The Vocation of Business, co-edited More special events are in the works as well. Please stay Economic Liberty: A Profound Romanian Renaissance, tuned to the ACS Web page for more details. and most recently published Toward a Truly Free Market: ¶¶Speaking of the American Chesterton Society Web A Distributist Perspective on the Role of Government, page, we have revamped, retooled, and remodeled it. It Taxes, Health Care, Deficits, and More. has all the features you love and expect—quotations, short Ryan Grant is a native of eastern Connecticut. He received essays and snippets of Chesterton, Chesterton 101, and his bachelor’s degree in philosophy and theology at Fran- plenty of books and other merchandise for sale—now it also ciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, and also studied has original, Web-only essays, updates, and best of all, an at Holy Apostles Seminary. He currently teaches Latin in interactive feature, allowing for comments. Stop by at www. Post Falls, Idaho, where he resides with his wife and two chesterton.org and tell us what you think. children. ¶¶Welcome to our special issue on Distributism, where Thomas Storck is the author of Foundations of a Catholic we delve into that most difficult of Chestertonian subjects Political Order, The Catholic Milieu, and Christendom as never before, with book reviews and articles on guilds, and the West. His work has appeared in various publica- a Distributist approach to your back yard, subsidiarity, tions including Homiletic and Pastoral Review and the banking, material goods, loads of Chesterton quotations book Beyond Capitalism and Socialism. Mr. Storck is a on Distributism, and more. Our guest contributors for this former contributing editor of New Oxford Review and issue hail from The Distributist Review. Here they discuss Caelum et Terra, and serves on the editorial board of The the ins and outs of the only economic system that con- Chesterton Review. forms with and has been inspired by Catholic Church social ¶¶The revolution continues: for the Chestertonian who teaching. They are: has everything, a cookbook. Gilbert Magazine publisher David W. Cooney is originally from southern California and Dale Ahlquist writes, “Here is one that is as bizarre and now lives with his wife and two children in Western Wash- wonderful as anything I’ve encountered. A Chesterton ington state where he works as a network administrator. cookbook in Italian! It’s called The Kitchen of The Flying Inn (La cucina dell’Osteria Volante).” The announcement Bill Powell owns Wineskin Media, a graphics design com- came from the book’s author, Luisa Vassallo. Dale adds, pany in Front Royal, Virginia. He has designed book covers “There is going to be a big event introducing the book, and for such notable authors as Mark Shea, Warren Carroll, Race Mathews, and Brad Birzer. Vice President of the Italian Chesterton Society will be in attendance.” If you can read Italian, find out more, includ- Donald P. Goodman III is a practicing attorney in the Com- ing ordering information (16 euros), at www.ancoralibri. monwealth of Virginia and a graduate of the William and it:80/Catalogo/ProductID/6640/evtID/269. Mary School of Law. He also graduated from Christendom College with a degree in history and a minor in classical ¶¶Parting Trifle: The month-long staging of Magic by the languages. He is married to Catherine Goodman, also a Washington (DC) Stage Guild received a generally positive graduate of Christendom College, and has four children. review in the Washington Post, despite that newspaper’s backward views of Chesterton. (The article described John Médaille is an adjunct instructor of Theology at the Chesterton as a man “whose faith fluctuated at points in University of Dallas, and a businessman in Irving, Texas. his life.”).

4 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : L u n a c y & l e tt e r s : from Gilbert Magazine Readers

got my first Gilbert yesterday. Read Yet no ruse will change the truth: parts during girls’ bath time. Oh The right to life is the foremost social I boy. Finally! A magazine I will prob- justice issue in the United States, ably read cover to cover. (It’s been and one day we voters will have to years, since I shelled out the cash for stand before Jesus—Himself once Harvard Business Review in grad an embryo—and answer for how we school.) I feel like I should write a treated the defenseless unborn, those Colwell then falsely accuses me thank you note. who were, without a doubt, the least of “quarrel[ing],” “name-calling,” and Sarah Reinhard among us. of using “bitter” and “hateful” words— Plain City, Ohio Don Himmelspach without offering a single example from Corunna, Michigan ; ; ; my text. This, of course, is the stan- dard ploy of people who can’t win the ; ; ; was amused by Pat Colwell’s cri- debate: if you don’t agree with them tique (GM July/August, 2010) of my you’re a hater or a bigot or you have a wanted to say that the recent Gilbert response (GM June, 2010) to Cindy I phobia of some sort. They accuse you Magazine (July/August, 2010, art Wineburgh’s letter (GM March, 2010). of a vitriol that never existed and then issue) is absolutely stunning; beauti- However, I wasn’t surprised. One I pretend to take the moral high ground ful! I am tempted to cut out the pages expects such criticism when speaking by preaching about love. It’s the straw and frame them! the truth about abortion. man on steroids, a ruse unworthy of a Ellen Finan I’ll answer Colwell’s claims in the Chestertonian. Cortland, Ohio order they appeared: 1. I stand by my assertion that Wineburgh and her fellow liberals are Chesterton for Today unmoved by abortion. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have needed to “vent [her] ;;America is sometimes offered to ;;Let us cross-examine ourselves, as frustration about conservative Catho- us, even by Americans (who ought if preparing for a confessional, about lics who vote pro-life,” and liberals to know better), as a moral example. exactly how much there is of anything wouldn’t continually support politi- (Illustrated London News, Feb. 5, 1927) worth calling Democracy in the welter of wealth and poverty and wage-slavery cians who defend the butchering of ;;I do not think that our present prog- and world-wide worship of millionaires, children. ress is approaching truth by trial and that goes to make up the fashion and 2. I stand by my assertion that error. I think it is getting further and public opinion of our time. (Illustrated abortion doesn’t seem real to liberals further away from truth by hustle and London News, May 25, 1929) for the same reasons. Fr. Frank Pavone hysteria. (Illustrated London News, Jan. 28, 1928) has often said, “America won’t reject ;;Either the Catholic civilization must ;;The weight of wealth disturbs the abortion until America sees abortion.” be restored or it must be scrapped. balance of the world even when it is Thus, in addition to the Silent Scream So I do indeed call for a revival, a not being actually used against it. (Illus- video (www.silentscream.org), liberals common sense revival, in defence of trated London News, Jan. 2, 1926) should view the pictures of aborted justice, freedom, property, and the babies on the Priests for Life Web site ;;A really successful and satisfactory family. (“The Revival I Want,” 1933) (www.priestsforlife.org). machine for saving labour would be a 3. The Church teaches that voting machine for sacking labourers. (G.K.’s for pro-abortion candidates is “remote Weekly, Mar. 2, 1929) material cooperation with evil,” and so I stand by my assertion that those ;;The Wage System exists because who do, jeopardize their souls. When a small number of people have a lot Colwell writes, “Wineburgh may have a of the money and a large number of different view of what it means to vote people want a little of the money. In pro-life,” I’m reminded of a former short (or, rather, in long, for those president who said, “It depends on who like long words), it arises from what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is.” the present distribution of economic 4. Colwell uses anecdotal evi- power. (New Witness, Jan. 13, 1916) dence to impugn all pro-life voters and ;;The big store makes the shop mon- justify his embrace of Wineburgh’s strous but the street monotonous. (G.K.’s straw man claim, so that requires Weekly, Aug. 3, 1929) no further response.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 5 : L u n a c y & l e tt e r s :

fter listening to some stories about ongoing dislike of public school educa- is fantastic, and the articles are an exhibit in the National Portrait tion. Each issue seemed to bring with eclectic and wonderfully written. AGallery in Washington, DC, which it casual references to the pernicious It looks like I’m going to be a life- depicts ants crawling on a crucified evil of public education. Being an time subscriber! WELL DONE! Christ, I needed reassurance about the English faculty member at a public Norm Drouin state of art in our culture, and rein- college, I found your stance peculiar, Bellingham, Massachusetts forcement that we have not fallen off wrong-headed, incomprehensible. ; ; ; the cliff and into the abyss of cultural Who, honestly, could be so opposed to destruction. I sought refuge and con- public education? Better we shouldn’t lthough this letter is consid- solation in the wonderful July/August educate the masses? erably “after the fact,” I still issue of Gilbert Magazine. I was not Then of course it hit me—Chester- Afeel strongly regarding your disappointed. After reading the articles ton was English. In England, the term article in the March, 2010, issue a few times over a number days, I “public school” is used to describe what on page 12, “A Miscellany of came to re-appreciate the beauty, inspi- we in America would call a private Men,” about Eric Gill. Consider- ration, creativity, and positive aspects school. When Chesterton rants against ing the baseness (to put it mildly) of art based on beauty, values, and public school education, he is opposed of his behavior, I don’t think he inspiration as opposed to “popular art,” to what we in America would call a even deserves to be written about which seems based on hatred, disre- private school education. The term or remembered, but especially spect, and inanity. “public” refers to the idea that anyone, not in a Christian publication. From the front cover to the last, regardless of the location of his resi- The words of St. Paul in one of again I was able to savor these repro- dence, could attend. To this day public his letters to some new Chris- ductions from truly gifted human schools are seen by many in England tians tell us not to even mention beings. Chris Chan in his article, “Do as promoting a wealthy upper class or discuss such things. I had We Know Good Art? Do we Even Know which rules to its own benefit, and not just purchased a subscription for What We Like?” (page 38), states: to the general benefit of the people. my college-age daughter to your “There is a great disconnect between Public schools there are for the rich. publication, and was quite upset what the public wants and what the I believe that many of you may by this particular article. I can public gets.” Thank God we have Gil- have been misreading Chesterton for only hope that in no future issues bert Magazine to help correct the vast decades. such subjects will be discussed. disconnect. James Hallemann Otherwise, thanks for all the Dennis V. Sinclair Fenton, Michigan other and many good articles, for Medford, Oregon the things you do to lift our sad ; ; ; society back up the moral ladder. ; ; ; Lisa P. Evans was given a subscription to your n Gilbert Magazine you do not disap- Everett, Washington magazine, and while I enjoy parts point. This issue (my first) is superb ; ; ; I of it, I could not understand your I(July/August, 2010)! The artwork

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6 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : e d IT o r I a l : What’s Wrong With The World (and How to Fix It)

by Dale Ahlquist

When GM publisher Dale Ahlquist was invited recently to Notre servile nation by a bureaucratic class, centralized; which Dame (see page 31) on the 80th anniversary of G.K. Chesterton’s visit of course, means a centralized financial control.” and the 100th anniversary of What’s Wrong With The World, he was The liberal few and the conservative few want to con- asked to speak on Distributism. Here, to serve as the introduction to trol property and capital. Both use each other and even this special issue, is a condensed version of that talk. –Ed. depend on each other. Big Government has its hands on Big Money. Big Money has its hands on Big Government. ost normal, carefree people would rather avoid Hilaire Belloc described this as the Servile State, and arguing about politics and religion. They fall in Chesterton says, “The Servile State uses Socialists and love and get married and, in the normal course Anti-Socialists alike as its tools.” of events, have children. Then they begin There is something desperately wrong with the world thinking about two things: the world in which when something so basic, so traditional, so universal, so Mthey are raising their child, and the soul of their child. normal as the family has to be defended. The family In other words, they start thinking about politics and is the strength of any strong society. It is what passes religion. the culture from one generation to the next. It is what Unfortunately, most people with families don’t have lasts in any lasting society. It is what thrives in any the time and money to become political activists. Most thriving society. of the people who do have the time and the money to Chesterton calls the family a tiny kingdom that be political activists don’t have families; creates and loves its own citizens. The the laws these people lobby for with great family will do a better job of protect- success represent special interest groups, The vast majority of ing, nurturing, educating, and helping but they do not represent the interests people than any outside official agency of that general interest group, the family. the population are or any hired servant. Everything As a result, most laws are very much either wage slaves about the Servile State undermines anti-family. the family. Big Government tries to Liberals are always defending the or bureaucrats. A replace the authority and functions of rights of various oppressed minorities. clerk sitting at a desk the family. Big Business breaks up the Many people are oppressed and need to family by pulling both the father and be defended. But unfortunately Liberals does not know the the mother out of the home and reduc- tend to defend rights that are not rights at difference whether ing them to wage slaves. all. They are wrongs, such as abortion and he is working for a It has come to pass that working- same-sex “marriage.” men have been surrendered, all isolated Conservatives are always defending large corporation or and helpless, to the hard-heartedness of free trade, but there is nothing free about employers and the greed of unchecked it. It is very expensive and thus reserved a large state agency. competition...A small number of very rich for the realm of the very rich. Conserva- men have been able to lay upon the teem- tives are always defending less government ing masses of the laboring poor a yoke and lower taxes. And indeed, government is too big little better than that of slavery itself. and taxes are too high. But the rich pay too many taxes These are the words of Pope Leo XIII in his 1891 only because they make too much money. Poor people Encyclical Rerum Novarum, which is the basis of Catho- don’t pay enough taxes because they don’t make enough lic Social teaching and is also the basis for Distributism. money. G.K. Chesterton says, “It is a bad economic sign In order for the family to have its proper authority in the State that masses of our fellow-citizens are too in a society, local government must be more influential poor to be taxed.” than state or federal government. Local government In general, the Left represents Big Government and means neighbors who are accountable to each other. the Right represents Big Business. In general, the Left “When politics were more local,” says Chesterton, “they represents Socialism and the Right represents Capitalism. were more truthful.” The State should fulfill no more In general, the two are the same thing because both are than its minor role in our lives. This is the principle against the widespread distribution of private property. known as Subsidiarity that speaks of what the higher Chesterton says, “Socialism and Capitalism are today orders owe the lower orders. The most important fundamentally the same. They both aim at control of a

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 7 : E d it o r i a l : decisions must be left to individuals, formed that unholy alliance, the Ser- our society because they both under- to families, to local communities. The vile State—big government propped mine the family. central government’s only responsibil- up by big business, and big business Catholic social teaching is about ity should be to provide those services propped up by big government. protecting the family; all the social which cannot be provided otherwise-- We see examples of the Servile encyclicals reinforce this. But the most and that should be a short list. State everywhere: the military-indus- important Catholic document defend- Government should not provide trial complex; the state and federal ing the family in the modern world for needs, including humanitarian and highway system that supports the came in 1968, Humanae Vitae. Pope educational needs that traditionally automobile industry; a news industry Paul VI saw the dangers of contracep- were served by religion. Religion pro- that has a mutually parasitic relation- tion at the time, but the destruction vided these things because religion has ship with the government. A huge today is even more pervasive than he a higher purpose. When the State pro- bureaucracy that is supported by the foretold. A contraceptive mentality is vides them, there is no higher purpose regulation of industry; an industry raping the earth. It is the contracep- and the things become ends in them- that is supported by huge government tive mentality that is responsible for selves. State support of the arts leads contracts. And government bailouts the “the myopic nature of modern to art for art’s sake. State support of of banks and insurance companies. economics.” More wealth actually health care leads to health for health’s We have an economy that is brings more misery, engendering sake. State support of education leads largely based on exchange rather than fruitless, self-serving desires that can to the vanity and dead end of knowl- on production. Our main industries never be fulfilled. An economy based edge for knowledge’s sake. A large, are Health and Education, which on the philosophy that bigger is better purely secular state will be empty at are also big branches of government can never be satisfied, because there its core and will collapse on itself; it (which is why we are moving toward can never be “enough”; there can only simply cannot be sustained, certainly national health insurance to match a be “more.” not when the only thing left to sustain national education system—to prop The contraceptive mentality also it is sheer coercion. The state that is up another huge industry that cannot leads to the notion of lending, that supposed to defend our freedom slowly support itself). is, of building endless debt and never destroys our freedom, which is why Farming has become industrial- paying for anything. Take the pleasure Chesterton says, “We do not get good ized and so is subsidized. In every and run. But a consumer-driven soci- laws to restrain bad people. We get town there once was a public square, ety that is buying but never paying is good people to restrain bad laws.” a free, open area, not only for buying headed for collapse. This is the same The word liberal has to do with and selling, but for talking and yelling mode of insanity described by Chester- freedom. The word conservative has and arguing. Now we have shopping ton when he talks about the modern to do with keeping tradition. Freedom malls, which are private places for world that “exalts lust but forbids and tradition are good things. But buying and selling, where people are fertility.” It cannot be sustained. freedom means responsibility, not herded along and kept in line, and Yet, anyone who talks about irresponsibility. And conservative does these giant commercial spaces are restraint is vilified, whether it is not mean leaving something alone; it underwritten by the State through tax restraint in “free trade” or “free love.” means we have to work hard just to increment financing. But the truth is that neither trade nor keep things the same. If we want a The vast majority of the popu- love are free. Both require responsibil- white post, we have to keep painting it lation are either wage slaves or ity and discipline; both require limits. white. bureaucrats. A clerk sitting at a desk It is the idea of limits that the modern Nevertheless, it is useful to remind does not know the difference if he is world finds so repugnant. Freedom is Liberals and Conservatives about the working for a large corporation or a mistakenly understood as the throwing meanings of the words they use to large state agency. off of restraint. But true freedom exists describe themselves. It is not liberal Both Liberals and Conserva- within the rules. Freedom, which is to have compulsory education, com- tives have gotten it wrong. One self-government, means self-control. pulsory insurance, and compulsory side emphasizes freedom without The essence of Distributism is temperance. It is not conservative responsibility (or rights without self-government, self-control, and when the small businesses are not responsibility). The other empha- self-sufficiency. The foundation of conserved, when local shops owned by sizes the responsibility without the Distributism is ownership. The heart our neighbors are not conserved, when freedom. Which side does which? of Distributism is the family. The State small farms are not conserved. It depends on whether you’re talk- and the marketplace must serve the While Liberals and the Conserva- ing about sex or money. Liberals family; not the other way around. We tives bicker about who has the better want sex without responsibility and must make government and commerce system, the real problem is that we Conservatives want money without more local and more accountable. are living under both systems right responsibility. The liberals’ liberal- Where do we begin? By hating now. Socialism and Capitalism are ization of sex and the conservatives’ the world enough to change it, and not at war with each other--they are conservation of money are both loving it enough to think it worth in cahoots with each other. They have gigantic moral problems that damage changing.

8 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : S CH a l l o n CH e s T e r T o n : that in itself does not enable him to Timely Essays on Chesterton’s Timeless Paradoxes resist the temptation to do wrong. Moreover, is any law a good law that prevents us from doing wrong? Again Chesterton is amusing. “A law to cut off all our heads, for instance, would certainly prevent us from doing wrong for a considerable time after the experiment. Sewing up all our mouths would prevent us from telling lies.” The Risky Adventure So Chesterton questions the by James V. Schall, S.J. unthinking principle that the M.P. advocated. The law is to prevent crime, but not just in any way. “A n April 27, 1912, almost a of ordinary family life. We do not see public man who says such a sentence century ago, G.K. Chesterton that the greatest “revolutionary flame” as that on a platform is behaving wrote a column in the Illus- is involved in founding and keeping quite as irresponsibly as if he were trated London News entitled, a family. drunk on a platform.” “The Silliness of Educated Chesterton had great fun con- Chesterton understands what the OPeople” (CW, V, XXIX). No academic trasting the silliness of the learned man probably wanted to say but did can afford not to read an essay with with the practicality of ordinary men. not take time to think through. He such a title! Chesterton distinguishes The latter talk with “point and even intended to say: “In so far as any law the educated and the uneducated, wit of things that they understand; prevents a man from doing wrong, it not a distinction between the smart and they do not talk of things they do is in that respect a good law, though it and those who are not. Chesterton, not understand: a rare and real mark may be a very bad law in hundreds of like Aristotle, had a healthy respect of having a mind.” The mark of other respects.” for the practical wisdom of ordinary having a mind is to talk of things we “[These examples] are simply people. A doctorate does not neces- understand, not of those we do not. evidence that the educated people sarily prevent a man from being silly. Educated people often speak in have struck thinking, just as the Chesterton did not think that illogical ways. Chesterton gives exam- uneducated have struck working.” The ordinary people were silly. “The ples. One clergyman said at Clacton educated class should be the “salt ignorant mob, it is said, used to be that “if we all made each other happy, of a society. It should even have the dangerous by its turbulence; it is now the world would be a pleasanter bitterness of salt; it should supply the rather dangerous by its apathy.” He place.” This is nothing else but saying national self-criticism.” But it cannot adds: “A passive and un-enterprising the same thing twice. What we need do this without thinking. populace is not a strong foundation to hear from clergymen is how to go We must know that human life for a State, either in the problems about making each other happy. “If itself is a risky adventure. Men and of population or of war.” These are everyone were good, no one would be women require a “revolutionary flame” remarkable words. The major worry bad.” But this is not helpful. even to confront things so horrible of modern Western states is that they Many of the silliest things, Ches- and so heroic as “birth and death.” no longer have a population willing terton thinks, come from people with to reproduce or defend themselves. letters after their names. He cites a The present populace are now used certain M.P. who said: “Any law which to being taken care of by the State. enables a man to resist temptation by The enterprising people come preventing him from doing wrong is from elsewhere. a good law.” St. Thomas does say that Courage to be, to take the steps a good law would prevent evildoers to assure one’s heritage, is something from doing some evils. But if law pre- that everyone needs. “Human life vents the act, it does nothing about itself is an adventure as risky as the inner temptation. The temptation hitting a policeman. And men and remains. The crime-doer is just pre- women require some touch of the vented from carrying it out. revolutionary flame even to affront In examining the M.P.’s principle, things so horrible and so heroic Chesterton found it “unreasonable.” as common birth and death.” We Why? “If you prevent a man from see today that a good part of our doing wrong, you do not enable him common discourse is precisely over to resist temptation.” You just prevent birth and death. We have talked and him from carrying it out. It is all right legislated many out of the adventure to prevent him from doing wrong, but

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 9 : m I s c e l l a n y o f m e n : Dear Mr. Noman, does it ever strike you, The more we see of you, the less we The Smell of Danger like you? Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953) Pale Ebenezer thought it wrong to fight, by Dale Ahlquist But Roaring Bill (who killed him) thought it right.

ust as the four Evangelists are truly good. This man has made Epitaph for a politician— differ in some details about the the greatest fight for good things of Here richly, with ridiculous display, Gospel account, leading some all the men of my time. The Politician’s corpse was laid away. Biblical critics to question their In addition to being a great talker, While all of his acquaintance sneered veracity, the eyewitnesses and Belloc was a great writer. Though he and slanged participantsJ in the first meeting of wrote less on philosophy and theol- I wept: for I had longed to see him G.K. Chesterton and Hilaire Belloc ogy than Chesterton, he matched him hang. give varying reports of time and place, with the same astonishing variety of leading Maisie Ward to speculate that history, biography, economics, social And who can forget his charming future scholars will conclude that the criticism, travel, fiction, and poetry. Christmas greeting: two of them never met at all. Belloc actually wrote more books Past scholars are guilty of the than Chesterton: 153 to Chesterton’s “Noel, Noel, Noel, Noel, opposite mistake. They seem to think 100. While Chesterton wrote more May all my enemies go to hell.” that Belloc and Chesterton were some- journalism than Belloc, it is safe to how the same person, or that their say that Belloc wrote at least a ton And Belloc did have his enemies. meeting was a kind of nuclear fusion. for every two tons that Chesterton He criticized many things about the Among present scholars, the mistake contributed. The reason that Belloc modern world, stepping on the toes has been generally to ignore both wrote so much was simple: he had to of the rich and powerful. In addition writers, or to give a grudging nod to support a family—he and his wife and to criticizing politicians, Belloc was Chesterton but hate Belloc to the point five children. He called all his writing himself a politician for a while. He ran of denying his existence. hackwork. He claimed he wrote all his for a seat in Parliament, because he What no one will admit is the books only for money, except for one really did want to change the world, obvious truth: that they were both that he wrote for pleasure. And that to give the poor man his dignity, to intellectual and literary giants, as book was perhaps his most famous: protect family and property rights, to thinkers they were utterly different The Path to Rome. It is not, as some though they happened to agree on suppose, a book about conversion, for politics and religion, and they were the Belloc was a lifelong Catholic. It is a best of friends. wildly entertaining and provocative According to Chesterton, the account of his adventures literally two first met in a Soho restaurant. walking across Europe, from France Belloc wore a straw hat over his eyes, to Rome. In addition to being a talker, and his pockets were stuffed with he was also a walker. He even holds French Nationalist and French Atheist the world record for walking from newspapers. Sussex to London in something like He entered like a man armed, and eleven hours. In addition to being a as with a clang of iron. He brought walker, he was also a sailor. He knew with him news from the fronts of his- what it was like to face both the hills tory. What he brought into our dream and the sea. In short, he was not only was this Roman appetite for reality a man of words but of action. and for reason in action, and when He is well-remembered for his he came into the door there entered with him the smell of danger. He comic poetry. His Cautionary Tales remarked that he was in low spirits. and Bad Child’s Book of Beasts give His low spirits were and are much hilarious accounts of what happens more uproarious and enlivening than to naughty children—little boys who anybody else’s high spirits. He talked are eaten by lions, and little girls into the night, and left behind in it a who perish from slamming doors. He glowing track of good things. When was also a master of bitingly witty I say good things, I mean things that epigrams:

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Belloc wrote three of the key creation, the sacredness of mar- textbooks of Distributism: The Servile riage, the family as the foundation of State, The Restoration of Property, society, and the Catholic faith as the and Economics for Helen. courier of truth. Belloc defended Distributism The other thing they always merely because he was defending defended was each other. When a the Catholic concept of moral and critic went after Belloc, Chesterton economic justice, just as he always would calmly and patiently explain defended his Catholic faith. He also where the critic was off base, usually defended the Catholic view of history. having to point out that the fellow And for this he suffered. In spite of his had obviously neglected to read the prodigious intellect and mastery of the Belloc book he was attacking, oth- language and letters and facts, Belloc erwise he would not be trumpeting was denied a chair at Oxford for the such a dreadful misunderstanding simple reason that he was Catholic and of it. But when someone went after did not embrace the official “Whig” Chesterton, Belloc did not take it version of history. According to the calmly. Just ask the “Remote and Whig historians, the English Reforma- ineffectual Don…Don poor at Bed preserve a historic English culture that tion was a popular movement against and worse at Table, Don pinched, was fading away due to international the oppressive institution of the Catho- Don starved, Don miserable…” influence. But at his very first cam- lic Church. Belloc, however, stood for While we may not realize it at paign meeting, many of his supporters the idea that the revolt against the first, there is a sense of beatitude were worried about one thing. While Church came from the aristocracy, about Belloc. “Blessed are the meek” they liked many of his political ideas, and was led from the top down. The does not come to mind, but “blessed they wanted to make sure that he kept common people were devout Catholics. are those who hunger and thirst his religious ideas to himself. Belloc They were not the ones who seized the for justice” certainly does. That is stood up and took his rosary out of his monasteries. It was princes and nobles perhaps the essence of Hilaire Belloc, pocket and proclaimed: “Gentleman, I and merchants who stole the Catholic who painfully suffered personal injus- am a Catholic. As far as possible, I go faith from the English people. Belloc tice, but who also suffered on behalf to Mass every day. This is a rosary. As argued that it was the Catholic Church of others. That is what makes him so far as possible, I kneel down and tell that built Europe and the Protestant dangerous. But less noticed is that these beads every day. If you reject Reformation that began the process there is also in Belloc the beatitude me on account of my religion, I shall of destroying Europe. He said that of those who mourn. Although he thank God that He has spared me the Catholic Europe represented all the was uproariously funny at times, indignity of being your representative.” “beauty and right-living and tradition there is still about Belloc an enor- Imagine one of today’s politicians which inspired and maintained Chris- mous sadness and longing. In his taking such a stand. tendom: the soul of the West.” He said writing he longs for the lost Catho- Belloc won the election. But his famously, “Europe is the Faith, and the lic England and the lost Catholic experience in the House of Commons Faith is Europe.” A lot of people hate Europe. was an unpleasant one. He became that sentence. They hate that idea. Belloc’s personal life was also very disillusioned with the hypocrisy But they have also watched the steady ridden with tragic loss. His beloved and the sheer dullness of Parliament, decline of Europe through the last few wife Elodie died quite young, leav- as well as with the corruption in both centuries, as Catholicism has steadily ing Belloc to finish raising their five parties. He realized first hand that disappeared from it. Belloc bluntly children. One of his sons was killed Big Government does not work for warned, “Europe will return to the in World War I. Another was lost in the people; it works for itself. He did Faith, or she will perish.” World War II. And then there was not run for re-election. Imagine one Belloc and Chesterton could Chesterton, the man beside whom he of today’s politicians not running for always be counted on to defend the battled the modern world and with re-election. same things, which is why George whom he laughed and drank and It was Hilaire Belloc who suggested Bernard Shaw suggested that their sang for more than thirty-five years. the term “Distributism” during a long thinking was so much alike that When Chesterton died, Belloc wrote debate with like-minded reformers that they were not two people, but one several tributes to him. But the most included Chesterton, Maurice Reckitt, four-legged beast called “The Chester- touching story comes from the day William Titterton, and others. They all Belloc,” one of many examples of Shaw of the funeral itself. After the proces- agreed it was a cumbersome, easily being funny, but wrong. Chesterton sion to the cemetery in Beaconsfield, misunderstood term, and yet it was the and Belloc were different, but they Belloc was nowhere to be seen. He best one to describe both the root and defended the same things because they was finally found at a local pub, liter- the goal of the movement. The root is both drew from the same well of truth. ally weeping into his beer. Blessed Rerum Novarum. The goal is justice. They both defended the goodness of are those who mourn.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 11 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : External goods are necessary for survival and for human living; we need them not for themselves, but for their use. We don’t need shoes to stick in our closets, for example, but to wear. There is a rational relation between these external goods and human need. We can use only so many of them and at some point we simply don’t need more. Even storing them becomes a What’s the Use of Having problem. We have only so much closet or bookcase space. How does the U.S. Stuff Anyway? economy stack up with regard to this? by Thomas Storck Does it produce pretty much what we need or does it produce a lot of One would think, to hear people talk, that transcend the merely material level at junk, stuff that we have to throw away the Rothchilds and the Rockefellers were which other animals live. just to make room for new junk? And on the side of property. But obviously they Now the way God created us does the commercial spirit that our are the enemies of property; because they requires that in order to obtain the economy fuels keep us satisfied with are enemies of their own limitations. They things we need, both for mere survival what we need for the twin purposes of do not want their own land; but other and for truly human life, generally we the economy that we’ve been talking people’s...It is the negation of property that must do work. Even in climates warm about? Or does it make us ever less the Duke of Sutherland should have all the enough that food and shelter are there satisfied, even though we may have farms in one estate; just as it would be the for the taking, should their inhabitants much more than we’ll ever need? For negation of marriage if he had all our wives in one harem. —G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong want to make musical instruments or some people, shopping has become With the World anything else to enhance their lives, recreation, and consumer spending they must exert at least a little effort of constitutes around three-fourths of the f we look at the animal called man their own. total economy. we might notice certain things The kind of activity we engage in, One of the reasons the economy is that we don’t observe in the case both for survival and for living fully, stuck in the recession, so we are told, of the other animals. We share a is what we call economic activity. By is that people aren’t buying enough. lot of characteristics with those approaching economics as we just did, In some cases this means that people Iother animals. We all need nourish- we’ve already come to see what its aren’t getting what they truly and ment and shelter, we all reproduce to purpose is, what it is for. Economic reasonably need. But I’m afraid in continue our kind, and some, such activity exists to provide what we need other cases it means that people aren’t as ants or bees, even live in complex for survival and for living our lives in buying the latest gadgets or newest aggregations and build rather remark- a more human way. It’s for the sake of clothes for the season or this year’s able dwellings. But there is one big human life and therefore subordinate car, things that likely serve neither our difference. to human life. Economic activity fulfills neeed for survival nor a reasonable Bees and ants do what they do to its purpose only when it helps us to standard of life. For surely we have create conditions for their survival: survive and to live as rational animals a wrong idea of human good if we food, shelter, continuation of the spe- whose ultimate purpose is to live for- think that it consists in having more cies. We do that too, of course. But ever with God. and more stuff, rather than in having much of our activity is devoted to Some might think that this is enough that we may enjoy life with other ends. Ants work and sleep; we obvious. What else would economic our families and friends, read good work and sleep, but we do all sorts activity be for? But I think that if we books, give thanks to God. If someone of other things besides that make consider carefully what this purpose invented a machine that turned out ten our lives really human. God created implies, we’ll be able to say a lot about pairs of shoes every minute, sooner or us in such a way that we need food, the rightness or wrongness of our own later we’d have to stop the machine or water, shelter, and clothing just to economy. Does it do a good job of ful- be smothered in shoes. It’s irrational to survive. But to live in a human way, filling this purpose, that is, providing at make or buy more than we can reason- to fulfill our natural needs for family least the minimum for survival and the ably use or reasonably store for later and social life, we need other objects, enhancement of life in a human way? use; at some point the acquisition of things for recreation and education, That might seem like a silly question. more stuff no longer serves its purpose. things of beauty. Without all these our Of course, it does--don’t we have all Similarly, it is irrational to expend lives would be lacking, even if we had kinds of cheap goods and abundant effort, to do work, to produce more enough simply to survive. For although food, too? I’m afraid that if we look than we can reasonably use or store for human beings are animals, we are more closely we might find this judg- the future. But our economy promotes rational animals, and as such we ment is not quite accurate. such a spirit of acquisition that we are

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not satisfied with what we need. We The chief reason our economy immune? And if this arrangement want more. We have developed the art requires that people buy more and has such an effect on average people, of promoting dissatisfaction, of making more, without reference to any is it a healthy way of conducting our people feel the need to buy, to such reasonable need, lies in its separa- economic affairs? a degree that even when it doesn’t tion of ownership from work. Those If we want a “productive society,” convince someone to buy the product who own the means of produc- as Belloc termed it, then the surest advertised, the experience tends to tion generally do not do the actual way of achieving it is an economy in leave an impression of want. work of making things. And so, “as which, as much as is feasible, owner- The following words from G.K. the interest of a man in things ship and work are not separated, Chesterton’s friend, Hilaire Belloc, diminishes, his interest in abstract and producers are related to their from “An Essay on the Nature of wealth—money—increases.” products as more than salesmen, Contemporary England,” hint at When producers see their role taking pride in a product well-made. the implications for our present as simply providing the goods that The commercial spirit, the end- economic systerm. human society needs then production less desire to buy and sell, would has a natural limit. There is no need no longer be fed by our economic But wealth obtained indirectly as profit out of other men’s work, or by to persuade people to buy something, system. Expecting to provide for process of exchange, becomes a thing because they already know their their needs by means of their work, abstracted from the process of produc- needs. And the producers themselves producers would feel less desire to tion. As the interest of a man in things tend to limit their own desire for accumulate more and more without diminishes, his interest in abstract wealth to what they need to survive relation to their actual needs. wealth—money—increases. The man and live in a truly human manner. When we pay attention to the who makes a table or grows a crop When our economic activity becomes purpose of a thing only then can we makes the success of the crop or the an end in itself, and we produce judge whether that thing is doing its table a test of excellence. and sell and buy only for the sake job. When we examine the purpose The intermediary who buys and of gain--getting more stuff--then the of an economy, I think it becomes sells the crop or the table is not economy has been turned against its clear that our current system does concerned with the goodness of table or crop, but with the profit he makes real purpose. It has turned on itself a poor job. But Distributism offers between their purchase and sale. In a and turned on those it is supposed a way of restoring the balance and productive society the superiority of to serve. Should a few individuals subordinating human economic the things produced is the measure of claim that they themselves are largely activity to its purpose again. If the success: in a Commercial society the immune to the blandishments of human race is to escape from its amount of wealth accumulated by the the commercial society, can anyone many present difficulties, then surely dealer is the measure of success. honestly say that most people are that is a good place to begin.

between them, is at best philosophi- Distributism and Marxism cally myopic. by Donald P. Goodman III The first fundamental precept of Marxism, its critique of capitalism, oo often Distributism is accused capitalism; second, its philosophical does share some similarities with Dis- of being a species of Marxism. It background, which is dialectical mate- tributism’s critique of the same. Marx is hard to imagine an accusation rialism; and third, its specific brand held that capitalism involves the domi- further from the truth. Dis- of proletarian revolution, leading, its nation of the bulk of the workers (the tributism has nothing in common partisans say, to collective ownership proletariat) by a minority (the owners, Twith Marxism beyond the fact that and the abolition of private property. or the bourgeoisie). Marx opposed it’s not capitalism. Sadly, that fact is Various forms of Marxism—Leninism, the commodification of labor, as sufficient for many capitalists to attack Trotskyism, and so forth—differ accord- Distributism opposes it. He held that Distributism as some strange brainchild ing to details, but any system that does it rendered the worker politically and of Engels and Lenin. But Distributism not embrace the philosophies in these economically powerless. At that precise specifically opposesall the primary three fundamental tenets cannot accu- point, however, the similarity between tenets of Marxism; indeed, it could rately be called Marxism. Marxism and Distributism ends. be accurately described as the anti- Distributism can only be Distributism’s critique of capital- Marxism, fundamentally opposed to the described as adhering to one, and ism, like Marx’s, does indeed begin most significant points of Marxism. even then only tenuously; it is so dif- with the observation that capitalism Marxism is primarily composed of ferent from Marxism that equating the concentrates productive property into three basic tenets. First, its critique of two, or even ascribing a real relation the hands of the few. The solution

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Distributism offers, however, could not Darwinian evolution. Religion likewise of history, and of the genesis of social be more different. is false, the “opiate of the masses”; it theory more at odds with Marxism Distributism argues that ownership is just another tool of the bourgeoisie than that of Distributism. of the means of production by the few in a futile attempt to prevent the inevi- Finally, Marx advocated a proletar- makes economic independence and table communist revolution. ian revolution to overthrow the current freedom from undue political influence Distributism is precisely the system of ownership of the means of for the many, who are non-owners, opposite of this. Distributism is, in production and to socialize the owner- impossible, or at least unreason- fact, founded solidly on religion, ship of same. Distributism has nothing ably difficult. The solution to this is arising out of the philosophical and in common with such nonsense. While to encourage wider distribution of religious principles argued throughout Distributists have advocated many dif- productive property among the people. the Christian era, and first authori- ferent ideas in many different places As G.K. Chesterton famously wrote tatively expounded by Pope Leo XIII for transforming capitalist societies in The Uses of Diversity, “Too much in his encyclical Rerum Novarum. It into just ones, these ideas all have two capitalism does not mean too many acknowledges no inevitable progress in things in common: they are gradual capitalists, but too few capitalists.” history. Chesterton mocked the very and they are peaceful. There is no Marx, on the other hand, held idea in The New York Times Magazine sudden revolution, no barricades, that even the few private owners of as “prefer[ing] Thursday to Wednesday no violence; there is the conscious productive property are too many; he because it is Thursday.” History will transformation of society peacefully, intended that the means of produc- through the rational action of the tion not be distributed among persons members of society themselves. The but rather owned solely by the state, notion of solidarity briefly described making all the people non-owning categorically excludes anything like workers. Distributism’s complaint Marx’s proletarian revolution. Yet against capitalism is that the means again, it’s difficult to conceive of a of production are owned by too few; system more opposed to Marxism than Marx’s is that they are owned by too Distributism. many. Thus Distributism disapproves It is not difficult, on the other of Capitalism for the right reasons, hand, to imagine a system that con- Marxism for the wrong ones. This forms in many particulars to Marxism. mutual disapproval is, as I noted above, Indeed, we can name it: capitalism. the vaguest correspondence between Like Marxism, capitalism ensures that Distributism and one of the essential the bulk of society will be composed of elements of Marxism, but serves amply workers, laboring for a wage, unlikely to distinguish between them. to ever become the owners of produc- Secondly, Marxism is based on a tive property. Like Marxism, capitalism philosophical outlook called dialectical ensures that the bulk of these workers materialism. Space alloted does not will never have any significant political permit a full exposition of this theory, not help workers, Distributism main- power, because they will never have but in brief, dialectical materialism tains; workers must help themselves the economic independence which holds that human history is the story and each other, preferably guided by will grant them an influence on the of class warfare. Society gradually the principles of social life established political process even remotely similar struggles upward through progressive by the Creator. The state will not, as to that of the owners of productive stages of development, from the slave in Marx’s utopian nightmare, simply property. Like Marxism, capitalism societies of antiquity, through the “wither away.” Rather, the state is an ensures that society is strictly defined feudal societies of the Middle Ages, to essential part of human society that into two classes, those who control the the capitalist societies of Marx’s day. always will, and must always be, pres- use of productive property and those Inevitably, in each stage the prole- ent to assist and guide all subsidiary who don’t. Like Marxism, capitalism tariat gains more and more freedom corporations and individuals within ensures that those who belong to the and brings mankind closer and closer that society toward the common good. first group have the bulk of the power, to the ultimate goal: the proletarian This unity of goal of all members of including power over those who belong revolution, the abolition of private society, individual and corporate, goes to the second. property, and the establishment of the by many names, most recently solidar- One of the greatest of the early communist society, in which the state ity; it fundamentally rejects the notion Distributists certainly said it best, in will simply “wither away” because its that different parts of society should his aptly titled work What’s Wrong coercive force is no longer needed. be at war with one another, instead with the World: “I do not object to This history is materialistic: insisting that all parts of society are Socialism because it will revolution- there is no God, no abstract principle members of the same body politic ize our commerce, but because it will guiding society. It simply is, a fact and must work for the same end. It is leave it so horribly the same.” of nature, the societal equivalent of difficult to imagine a vision of society, Praise be to Christ the King!

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The author suggests certain steps needed to achieve a free Seeking the Distributist Solution market. Corporate tax subsidies must be eradicated so that the collectiv- izing of production and the strong Toward a Truly Free Market: A Distributist and the ‘economic’ question are, in political power of corporations can Perspective on the Role of the State, reality, one question.” Any attempt be eliminated. The federal budget— Taxes, Health Care, and More to separate them results in an unbal- which consumes approximately By John C. Médaille anced economy, which, “will either twenty percent of our Gross Domestic Wilmington, Del.: ISI Books, 2010 fall to ruin, or to ruinous government Product—will also have to be curbed 256 pp. $21.56 attempts to redress the balance.” and slashed and, most importantly, Reviewed by Richard Aleman Indeed, as Professor Médaille our economy must be transformed reveals, the Enlightenment’s wall of into a political arrangement of distrib- rom the beginning Distributists separation of the “moral question and uted ownership. Only a decentralized have been the victors in the the economic question” compelled economy holds the key to a sane tax moral debate against socialism civilization to flirt with capitalism, structure, material stability for all, and and capitalism. Rarely, how- socialism, Communism, Keynesianism, a legitimate free market. ever, have they presented a mercantilism, and even laissez- Toward a Truly Free Market is an Fcase as compelling from an economic faire. And this last has, unfortunately, evenhanded, meticulous analysis of our standpoint. Endeavors to present the replaced the “free” in free market with economic system, its crisis, a critique Distributist solution in economic terms excess and fiscal libertinism. of capitalism and socialism, and a have been, at best, incomplete and Absent distributive justice, we brilliant look at the ideas and eco- untried since Hilaire Belloc’s landmark cannot speak of supply and demand. nomic foundations of the Distributism book, An Essay on the Restoration Isolated from the external proofs of solution. With chapters dedicated to of Property. the higher sciences, science is insuf- the fictitious commodities of money, That is, until now. ficient and disconnected from truth. labor, and land, the proper exercise of John Médaille’s new book, Toward “Liberate” our economy by shriveling government, taxes and economic rent, a Truly Free Market, is as refreshing away government—an objective the and an entire chapter devoted to the as it is groundbreaking. Médaille traces capitalist Friedrich von Hayek and real answer to health care, Médaille the root causes of our economic crisis communist Karl Marx both shared in has written a masterful follow-up to his and explores the Distributist blueprint common—and we generate the oppo- impressive The Vocation of Business. needed to regain what civilization has site effect: the growth But perhaps the book’s lost: the political economy. of government. Indeed, “Building an Ownership Consider this. More than ninety this “free” market Society” will be the percent of economists failed to predict called capitalism is a most appetizing chap- our recent economic crisis…and the system of privatized ter for Distributists. crisis before that…and the crisis before profits and socialized The chapter includes that one. What’s more, few if any losses. Deregulatory the trade, agrarian, authors, television personalities, or and “free” market banking, and indus- highly paid academics have responded policies have led us trial reforms needed to the crisis by asking the pertinent to higher debt, more to rebuild the local questions about the sources of our centralized economic economy and restore “boom and bust” economy, and even power, and larger subsidiarity. fewer are able or willing to reassess government. John Médaille’s their basic assumptions about how What about tax Toward a Truly Free our economy works or how it should cuts? Surely tax cuts Market is the book move forward. make good sense and Distributists have been Why? result in growth. waiting for. The way Since the Enlightenment econo- Tax cuts cannot to fixing our economy mists have suffered from “physics resolve our debts, as government is begins with understanding, and this envy.” “What is” was divorced from forced to borrow money to reallocate book will be necessary reading for “what ought to be.” What was once a the burden, which “represents an effec- layman and academic alike. As satisfy- humane endeavor dependent on the tive tax increase, since borrowing is ing a read as the author’s previous moral law is now a concocted “physi- taxing too, but a tax shifted on to the effort, this explicitly Distributist work cal” science, independent of ethics, next generations.” Is the answer the is bound to present a challenge to dividing economic equity from eco- flat tax? Fair tax? According to Médai- skeptics who have doubted the viability nomic equilibrium, to the detriment lle, these are impractical tax reforms. of Distributism, educate those unfamil- of both. And herein lies the problem. So what is the Distributist solu- iar with it, and present a long-awaited Médaille writes, “The moral question tion? What is a genuine free market? opus for its supporters.

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existence when several families live near each other. The different levels Understanding Subsidiarity of government come into existence when there is a need to address some by David W. Cooney concern that is beyond the ability of just one family, like the defense of a hile Distributism primarily clarify the different levels of society region or state, the establishment and focuses on the economic and which of those levels constitutes enforcement of laws, or the establish- aspects of society, it is the most basic level; the level on which ment of diplomatic relations. However, founded on a philosophi- all other levels depend. the family can exist without any of cal view that addresses all Capitalism is founded on a view these other levels. Therefore, the Wof life. Indeed, differing economic that the most basic level of society family must be the most basic level of theories and the conflicts between is the individual, however, capitalists society. All other levels of society only them ultimately stem from the phi- don’t argue that capitalism can exist exist to fulfill the needs of families losophies that underlie each regarding with a man who lives in isolation. living in community—that is, as larger the nature and structure of society. Indeed its adherents would readily orders organized in higher levels Therefore adherents of one theory will admit that capitalism cannot even of society. consider the positions of the others to exist without society; otherwise, to Another important aspect of these be false; each has the responsibility of whom would the individual sell? Can views is how each perceives power presenting and defending his particular the individual be the most basic unit within society. This can be seen in the view, as well as exposing flaws in the of society? Society is, by definition, various arguments each makes about other views. an interaction or relationship; the what government should or should not Distributists use the term “subsid- individual cannot be the most basic do, and why it should or should not iarity” to describe the basic functions unit because the individual cannot, do it. Capitalists frequently complain of society. The prime definition of by himself, constitute a society--if about government interference in subsidiarity comes from the encyclical humanity were reduced to one person, free enterprise and how government of Pope Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno: it would soon cease to exist. Society should be limited. Socialists frequently “A community of a higher order should may be constituted of individuals, but complain about how government not interfere in the internal life of a no individual can constitute a society should strictly regulate businesses community of a lower order, depriving by himself. and even individuals through legisla- the latter of its functions, but rather Socialism in its various forms is tion and taxes. We must understand should support it in case of need and founded on a view that the most basic the underlying philosophies behind help to co-ordinate its activity with the level of society is the state. We have these complaints. activities of the rest of society, always already seen that humanity’s very exis- The philosophy of capitalism with a view of the common good.” tence is dependent on the existence views the individual as the source of This definition is sufficient for of some semblance of society. Is that power within society. The power of explaining what subsidiarity is, but it elemental level of society the state? No, the government is only that which the does not present the argument for why clearly humanity can continue to exist individuals collectively agree to give people should accept the idea of sub- without a state. States exist to protect it. All capitalists agree that govern- sidiarity. We cannot simply offer this one group of humanity from other ment must have certain powers by its definition to a society that has long groups; they are, as Augustine wrote, nature, and that the power of govern- been trained to accept a different view, an evil, but a necessary one. The ment is derived from the will of the and then declare, “We have enlight- existence of the state is dependent on people. There is disagreement within ened you, now come join us.” The the existence of other levels of society capitalism, however, on what should be obvious response to such a declaration which can come into some sort of con- the extent of that power. In the United would be, “Why should we accept your flict. Therefore, the most basic level of States, these disagreements frequently definition as the proper ordering of society cannot be the state. surface as drives to submit unpopular society over the view we already hold?” Distributism is founded on the actions of government to public vote. This is the question Distributists view that the most basic level of soci- The philosophy of Socialism posits must answer. ety is the family, for the family is the the state as the source of power. All The answer to this question is unit of society that fulfills the human socialists agree that individuals and important, for it establishes that there need for continued existence. It is a groups have rights, but these are is intent and purpose in the various society in itself. It is also that unit of derived from society as a whole, and levels of society. Once we understand society on which all other units depend society—the state—gets to define what why different levels of society exist, we for their existence. Various associa- those rights are. Regardless of the have a foundation for determining the tions and groups come into existence beliefs of the majority, socialists look proper authority and powers of those when members of families work to various levels of the government to different levels by virtue of their exis- together or have common interests establish which rights exist and should tence. To start this process, we must and concerns. Community comes into be enforced. In the United States,

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adherents of Scocialism regularly their increased resources, moreover, This is the essence of subsid- appeal to the courts to overturn the higher levels share a responsibility to iarity. Higher levels of society exist results of the public vote. assist lower levels as needed, as long to fulfill those needs and functions The philosophy of Distributism as that assistance does not involve that cannot be met by lower levels. holds that authority in each level taking authority away from the lower Higher levels must not usurp the of society is derived directly from level. The essential aspect of this view functions of lower levels. The the need that level exists to fulfill. is that authority is neither granted scope of authority decreases as Progessively more organized levels from below (the people) or above (the the level of governance increases. legitimately exist only to meet needs state), but from outside. The estab- Authority within each level of gov- that cannot be sufficiently met by lishment of a given level of society ernment is not derived or granted those that are lower. It is disruptive bestows upon it the level of authority from other levels; it is inherent to and unjust for a higher level to assume appropriate to its nature according itself by virtue of its existence in authority over a need that is more to the moral and natural law, which accordance with the moral and properly met at a lower level. Due to comes from God. natural law.

loans. The practical effect is that a A Distributist Banking System continual extension of credit is built into the economy, whether or not the by John Médaille economy—that is, the real economy of goods and services—needs the funds. omewhere, some wit observed against which checks may be written. Sooner or later the needs of the real that the crime of robbing a Nearly all of the money in the United economy and the financial economy bank is nothing compared States is created by the banks as must diverge, with a credit crisis as to the crime of starting one. loans; that is to say, money creation the result. Henry Ford found our system has become a private monopoly of the Money is a representation of the Sof money creation so appalling that banks. circulating wealth of a nation, that is, he said if people understood how it the goods that are for sale at any given worked, there would be a revolution The Impossible Contract time. We do need both the finance and before breakfast. What did Ford find When all money is interest-bearing money creation services that banks so repugnant? Simply this: before you debt, then each new issue of money supply. An expanding supply of goods sign the mortgage to buy your home, (that is, each new loan) requires a requires an expanding money supply, the note to buy your car, or the credit further issue of debt to repay the and finance is necessary, because slip at McDonald’s to buy a hamburger, first note, because while the first loan there is always a gap between the the money to buy the home, the car, injects the principle into the economy, sowing and the harvest, between open- or the burger does not exist; it comes it does not inject the money to pay the ing up a production line and the sale of into being in the very act of borrowing interest. For example, a $1,000 loan a product, a gap that must be financed it. In other words, the banks create at 10 percent simple interest for a year for business to procede. But do we money, and they create it as interest- requires a repayment of $1,100. But need banks in their present form to bearing loans. while the loan creates the $1,000, it supply us with new money? When the The popular notion of banking is does not create the $100 to pay the banks create new credits, they do not that we deposit money with them and interest. Paying the interest presumes create any new wealth; they merely they lend it out at interest to share that someone else borrows the $100 create the power to command exist- some of the profits with us. Nothing and sets it loose in the economy. But ing stocks of wealth. To illustrate this could be further from the truth. The the second loan requires a third in point, compare a bank loan with the banks do not lend your deposits; these the amount of $10, which requires a case of a farmer who borrows some they keep as reserves against losses fourth in the amount of $1, and so on. seed-corn from his neighbor. The bor- and for day-to-day cash needs. Rather, This creates an impossible contract in rowed corn represents his neighbor’s the banks lend out a multiple of their which there is never enough money work and wealth, and no one would deposits as loans, through what is to repay loans without making more deny the lender the right to demand at called fractional reserve banking. If loans. The higher the rate of interest, harvest time not only the return of his you deposit $100,000 with the bank, the more “impossible” is the contract. corn, but some additional corn as well they use that as a reserve to create Again, the first loan can never be in reward for his labor (which the corn $900,000 of new loans. This $900,000 fully liquidated without an infinite represents) and for the risk he took. suddenly “appears” in the economy number of future loans; every new loan But suppose that instead of going as new money in the form of credits requires an infinite series of further to his neighbor, the farmer goes to the

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 17 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : bank. Unlike the neighbor, the banks credits, and grocers in the form of disperse it to businesses and entre- have neither corn nor money to lend. store coupons. But most businesses do preneurs. In return, the bankers have Rather, they “lend” credits which they not want the trouble or risk of issu- a right to participate in the profits themselves create, credits which have ing their own money, and they prefer gained from the money they lend. This the power to command the wealth of to defer the privilege to some public also increases both the money supply other men. These credits represent power to create a currency that can and the supply of goods which back no work, but only the power of the purchase anything that is for sale. the money. Further, it gives the public legal monopoly that we have given to Nevertheless, it is important that busi- treasury a way of participating in the the bank. Yet the financial power the nesses and communities have the right commercial growth of the country and monopoly represents will be greater to create their own money. Indeed, decreases the need for direct taxation. than the power of any of the farmers, the right of money creation is a right It may happen, and likely will because the farmers can only create of any goods-producing community. from time to time, that governments wealth through their work, whereas Note that I said “community” rather will issue too much money, causing the bank can create a simulacrum of than “government.” The government inflation. However, in such cases, the wealth by pressing a few buttons on is a community, and hence has the cause of the inflation will be well the computer, and create it a lot faster rights of a community, but it does understood and the responsibility will than the farmers can create corn; the not have these rights exclusively or it be easily established. Those who had men who make real wealth cannot displaces all other communities. Fed- the responsibility for creating too much compete with the men who manufac- eral governments take to themselves money (or too little) will have both the ture, ex nihilo, financial wealth. a monopoly right of money creation knowledge to fix the problem and the Further, the banks have a tendency (which monopoly they then delegate incentive to do so. to create too much money in good to the banks), but it is not necessary But what ultimately disciplines any times, thereby driving inflation, and for them to do so. Since the govern- currency is the presence of other cur- too little in bad times, thereby choking ment can declare its own currency the rencies. If people suspect that a given off a recovery and driving deflation. only acceptable one for the payment of currency is going bad, they will cease The great trick in issuing money is to taxes, and since we all pay taxes, their dealing in that currency and demand ensure that the amount issued accu- currency will always have preeminence payment in alternate currencies. It is rately reflects the stock of goods and as long as it remains sound. the very freedom to create any cur- services, which the money represents. rency that guarantees all currencies. Since this stock varies from day to A Distributist Money Supply The current money system saddles day, the supply of money can never us and our children with absurdly high be perfectly matched to the supply of How would a Distributist money debts and absurdly high taxes, since goods. The best method is to ensure system work? Let’s look at a national the interest on the debt must be paid that money is largely lent for produc- system, since that is most important with taxes. But worst of all, it enshrines tive purposes. But the banks can today, but bear in mind the principles usury at the heart of our economic increase their own profits by providing apply to any community. The first system. By usury I mean wealth with- consumer loans (e.g., credit cards) or thing a supply of new money repre- out work; the banks create no wealth loans for financial speculation. Hence, sents is a conscious decision by the and provide no work, yet under our they generally create more money than government. The government issues present system are entitled to a return new production requires, while at the its own money to fund capital projects, they have not earned. There is an same time, creating an institutional such as roads or dams. Presumably, almost comic absurdity about borrow- bias for speculation and consumerism. these projects help to create new ing from an entity that has no money, wealth, and the goods for sale grow only a monopoly of power that we Money and Community with the new money. Further, the fed- the borrowers have given them. And eral government may act as banker to it is even more absurd to pay interest All this leads to the question, “If state and local governments, lending on this debt. Further, such a system the banks shouldn’t create money, who them money for their capital projects both guarantees periodic collapses should?” Something is money if I can for an administrative fee. and grants the people who cause these easily use it to purchase other things. Note that the new money is cre- failures the power to virtually black- This tells us who should have the ated by the government, not borrowed mail the state into “rescuing” them power to create money: anyone who from private parties with the power with generous drafts from the public produces goods and services for which to create credit at interest. Hence, purse. Money—and economics—is not the money can be exchanged. In one there is no increase in the national a “neutral” science; bad ethics equal sense, every producer does have this debt, no passing on to our children the bad economics; bad morals equal bad power, for when a merchant extends expenses that we ourselves incurred. money. Usury and monopoly are exam- credit to his clients, he creates money The federal bank may also lend money ples of bad morals and bad economics. to that extent, money backed by the to the private banks at a modest inter- Henry Ford was right: we do need goods he offers for sale. Airlines create est, so that they in turn can combine a revolution before breakfast—a Dis- money in the form of airline mileage it with their depositors’ money and tributist revolution.

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have many advantages. They can’t escape and trample the neighbor’s Make Your Backyard petunias. They can survive a little longer without a drink. And unlike a Forest Garden cows, pigs, and chickens, gardens are almost never illegal. by Bill Powell But annual gardens are still a lot of work. After all, they’re annual. Every If we were really besieged in this garden, live that vision, he makes a desert. He year, you do the same digging, plant- we’d find a hundred English birds and English berries that we never knew were clears a space, and raises gigantic rows ing, and worrying. Some people are here...I bet you’ve never examined the of cages, shrunk with scientific preci- great at it; others find that the slight- premises! I bet you’ve never been round sion to the absolute minimum space in est little thing, whether it’s a virus or at the back as I was this morning… —G.K. which a hen can continue to breathe. a vacation, will wipe the garden out. Chesterton, Manalive] More hens mean more eggs. Either way, you’ll have to start all over Those hens get hungry and thirsty, again next year. magine your backyard was a minia- so the businessman buys water and So I propose a new project for the ture food forest. In this forest, you feed. Millions of eggs need to be aspiring Distributist with a small back- could find apples, grapes, plums, delivered, so he buys trucks. Those yard: the forest garden. pears, figs, kiwis, oriental persim- hens breathe air that is thick with the Think about the forests in your mons, flowers, herbs, lettuce, mint, stench of their own excrement, which life. How much human maintenance Istrawberries, blackberries, blueberries, is not always conducive to health, so do they require? Do you see rangers raspberries, mushrooms, and even a he buys antibiotics. And so on. anxiously weeding among the trees? small pond or two. How much space In the short term, he can sell a Does the forest die if you forget to do you think you’d need for all that? In dozen eggs for two bucks, and still water it? And doesn’t it seem like trees Greensboro, North Carolina, Charlie make a profit, because he sells by the will grow practically anywhere, even on Headington gets all that and more— truckload. He has major output. Prob- the smallest strip? from one-tenth of an acre. lem is, he requires major inputs from For most of my life, I thought of “Three acres and a cow,” runs the outside his land. The slightest glitch plants mainly as food, and farming old Distributist mantra. Today, you’re in his supply of water, feed, trucks, mainly as work. Without huge tractors, lucky if you have a backyard. So what antibiotics, or cheap labor—any one of or at least constant weeding, we could can you do with just a backyard? More them—and the entire system collapses. never wrest food from the miserly than G.K. Chesterton ever dreamed. He never noticed the system in the earth. Take a long, Chestertonian first place. He only wanted eggs. Meanwhile, all that time, as I was look at that backyard. Do you have Permaculture is system design. growing up and (mainly) being shut- any ground? Do you have any sun? You start with the system. Instead of a tled back and forth along Interstate-95, That’ll do. vision of millions of eggs, you look at what flourished along the highway “Three acres and a cow” remains the actual land. What system is already shoulders, unplanted and unweeded? a good motto for food self-sufficiency. there? How much rainfall does it get? Trees. Lots of plain, ordinary, drought- But just because you can’t produce all What is the soil good for? What could surviving trees. Perennials. Permanent your food on your own land, it doesn’t you use the wind for? You begin with plants. mean you can’t produce anything. the natural inputs, the resources you Now, the skeptic might note that Even if you have those three acres, you get for free. if I had leapt from my parents’ car might have other things to do besides, You’ll need some outside inputs, into this overlooked Eden, my feasting like milking a cow every day. Oddly of course. But because you’re starting would have centered on acorns and enough, so did Chesterton and Belloc. with what you already have, outside those maple seed helicopters. So we Farming is hard work. And you can’t inputs are minimized. The fewer out- come to the garden in forest garden. farm in the average backyard. What side inputs you need, the more stable You need to plan your little forest. you can do is permaculture. You can your system. I don’t mean an orchard. An make your backyard the most produc- Back to our backyards. If you’ve orchard is usually a whole lot of one tive place you know, and the loveliest, ever had a secret longing to fry up kind of fruit tree, a lot of grass and and yet incredibly low-maintenance. eggs gathered this morning, you’ve dis- poison ivy, and that’s it. Not that I Permaculture means “permanent covered the most expensive input you don’t like orchards. But a real forest agriculture.” It is the opposite of will need: you. Your time. Your work. has far more than just trees: you can today’s contemporary farming. And the conundrum of how delightful find shrubs, bushes, ground cover, and In contemporary farming, you it would be to have your own milk, and animals—a whole system of different focus on the product. Take a business- what a pain it would be to get it. creatures that flourish together. man who wants to sell eggs. He is Many people do manage to have So what does a forest garden enraptured by his vision, like some annual gardens in their backyards. have besides fruit and nut trees? If solitary mystic in the desert. And to Maybe you’re one of them. Gardens your neighbors aren’t completely

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 19 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : insane, your forest garden may have plant themselves—well, not where you But if you already have an annual a few animals, like chickens. Anyhow, want them. garden, why not think ahead, and it can definitely have bushes. Bushes The hardest part is the learning combine it with a forest? You’ll still may not sound so exciting, but it is a and designing before the spade hits have plenty of space for your annu- scientific fact that some bushes grow the grass. You could just buy a bunch als. And once those five years go blueberries. Others grow raspberries of fruit trees and pop them around the by—wow! or blackberries. yard. And if you go out and do that, let And if you’ve been frightened There’s also room for herbs and me know, because it’s a splendid idea, off from gardening at all because other small plants. There are sunny and better than nothing. of the extra work, this is a perfect spots, especially while the trees are But I want to get this right. If I just fit. You don’t commit to a lifetime of growing up, so you can grow sun-loving throw in some trees, they might not work. Instead, you do a big one-time plants, too. Perennials are good, but all fruit so well. Maybe I didn’t think project of planning, purchasing, and if you have time, you can make room to plant “insectary” flowers that would planting, and then luxuriate in a for your favorite annuals, like tomatoes attract the pollinating bees at the right lifetime of fruit, nuts, berries, greens, and peppers. And there’s also a whole times. Maybe I put the fast-growing edible roots, and herbs. You wouldn’t world of little-known shade-tolerant tree to the south of the slow-growing have that backyard if you didn’t know food plants awaiting your discovery. tree, and I’ll only notice the shadow in how to work in the first place. So go You can get perennial roots, tubers, five years. use it. Who needs three acres and a greens, and more. That’s a scary side of forest gar- cow? All you need is a backyard. How much work do you think it’ll dens. Mistakes are in years. And so are For more information, start with take to maintain this forest garden? the benefits. You have to make a big the Edible Forest Gardens site. They Because it will mimic the natural investment of time and money up front, have a nice introduction at www. forest structure as much as possible, and you don’t see serious returns on edibleforestgardens.com/about_ it’ll need a lot less work than you the trees for four or five years. gardening. think. The closer the growing condi- tions are to how the plants grow in the wild, the less work they’ll need to help them along. I began by examining Charlie Headington’s forest garden, and the long list of crops he gets from his 0.1 acre backyard. Guess how much work he does in it? About 68 hours per year—ten hours a week for a couple of weeks in spring, and another two weeks in the fall. Then, during the growing season, an hour a week, By William Cobbett “The Apostle of Distributism” mostly for the annuals. I don’t know about you, but to me, 68 hours a year William Cobbett, known to Chestertonians as “the Apostle of sounds like a steal. Distributism,” was a keen observer of his time. He documented And on top of that, his backyard is the economic and social shambles of an England caught in the a gorgeous little forest, with different throes of the Industrial Revolution and where distribution of nooks and spots to relax in. capital ownership was becoming increasingly concentrated. In What’s the catch? Setting it all up. The Emigrant’s Guide, Cobbett offers his prescription: Go to This may be a good time to reveal America. In early 19th century America, almost anyone could be- come an independent owner of capital. that I myself do not yet have a forest garden. I’m currently working through Cobbett’s 1829 manual for new Americans describes American volume one of Edible Forest Gardens, life from a perspective that complements Alexis de Tocqueville’s the definitive, intimidating, expensive, Democracy in America. This edition from Economic Justice Media includes an extensive foreword adapting the principles of but amazing and readable two-volume distributism to a modern economy. set by Dave Jacke and Eric Toensmeier. (You’ll find Charlie’s garden described To Order on p. 54ff.) The art of backyard forest The Emigrant’s Guide (240 pp, ISBN 978-0-944-997-01-7) is available for $20 from Amazon.com and BarnesandNoble. gardens isn’t something you get as a com, as well as by special order from local bookstores. For bulk/ kid with History and Geometry, and wholesale orders (10 or more copies at a 20% discount), e-mail there’s a lot to learn. [email protected]. So I’m writing this article as much to myself as to you. Setting up a forest garden is a big job. Trees won’t

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freedom to carry out those interests, then it follows that abortion, drugs, Telling It Like It Is consensual sex of any kind, slave labor, or even child labor will never be The Church and the Libertarian Christians in this country, along comes prohibitive. And, while many Christian by Christopher A. Ferrara a new book to set things straight: libertarians distance themselves from Forrest Lake, Minn.: The Remnant Press, 2010 Christopher Ferrara’s The Church and the implications of Austro-Libertarian 383 pages, $25.00 the Libertarian. Ferrara’s vast critique economics, they cannot deny them of Austro-Libertarianism includes a without being disingenuous. Reviewed by Richard Aleman fresh review of the moral and eco- No attempt is made to recon- nomic errors found in this particular cile the so-called “objective laws” of “What was the matter with the doctrine of school of thought. He successfully economics with Catholic Social Teach- laissez-faire was not that it believed that argues that libertarianism, whether ing because libertarians cannot. For liberty could preserve equality, where Left or Right, is incompatible with the Austrians like Friedrich von Hayek, there was none to preserve. It was that Gospels and Catholic Social Doctrine, economic laws were truths found it preached liberty, or rather license, to increase an inequality that was already the founding principles and documents in nature, and his mentor, Ludwig hopelessly unequal.” —G.K. Chesterton, Some that inspired Distributism. Von Mises argued that the Church’s Distinctions and a Distributist Not only are they in opposition, opposition to the truths in economic both social and fiscal libertarianism Liberalism (capitalism) should be .K. Chesterton and the early are dependent on the divorce of eco- abandoned, including her teach- Distributist League opposed nomics from the ends of man in order ings regarding the role of the state, Fabian Socialism, but they also to categorize it as a value-free and usury, voluntary trade associations, challenged Manchester Liberal- empirical science. Yet a “free market” living wages, and similar matters. For ism, the laissez-faire economic that eliminates the intellect and the Mises, socialism was a product of the Gprinciples advocated by the Manches- principles of Christianity isn’t free at Catholic Church. ter School of economics. Chesterton all, any more than “free love” may The resistance which the Church dismissed the policies of unbridled be properly understood outside of an has offered to the spread of liberal capitalism as the lunatic’s attempt orthodox theological context. Instead, ideas prepared the soil for the destruc- to bring about order through chaos, the “free” market produces the servil- tive resentment of modern socialist usurping the state’s valid authority, ity libertarianism thought. But if and solidifying the strength of the decries, destroy- this is not enough, plutocracy over the masses. ing morality while Mises also believed The Austrian school of economics strengthening the that Christian resis- (the libertarian “chirping sectaries” relationship between tance to liberalism as Russell Kirk called them) is at the corporations and made Christians forefront of laissez-faire these days, government. It enemies of society: gaining the support of conservative makes greed and “For the Church, and progressive Christians who are lust good. Indeed, Catholic as well as disenchanted with the economy and isolate the economy Protestant, is not the growth of government. But what from the political the least of the fac- exactly is Austro-Libertarianism and is will and, as admit- tors responsible for it compatible with the Christian faith? ted by prominent the prevalence of For Austro-Libertarians, the Austrian scholar destructive ideals economy of any nation is built upon Murray Rothbard, in the world today.” the “natural” self-interest of man and the market inevi- Perhaps one propelled by “market forces,” a “free” tably leads to the of the most salient market left to its own devices for the commoditization of facts in the book determining of society’s provisions, everything, includ- is that, by their and governed by its own “objective ing children, just as own admission, the laws” without any interference by any it has for abortion. libertarian “free” intellect. In other words, any govern- And the legalization of abortion is an market is illusory and never existed ment intervention in the market is obvious outcome for any nation that in human history. Even the pro- viewed as a wrench in the machine; would adopt the core Austrian teach- capitalist Milton Friedman concluded an unwelcome ingredient that could ing of limiting government’s purpose that “the Hayek-Mises explanation of have incalculable consequences on the to the protection of rights, theft, and the business cycle is contradicted by “spontaneously organizing” market and fraud. If man is “free” to bear out his the evidence,” and the famed Austro- the economic well-being of the nation. own interests with disregard for his Randian-Libertarian Alan Greenspan, Just as Austrian economics has eternal purpose, and the state exists once the Chairman of the Libertarian- slowly begun to get a foothold amongst solely for the benefit of defending his opposed Federal Reserve, conceded

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 21 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : that, “those of us who have looked science, but a social or moral science, work. Part refutation of the Austro- to the self-interest of lending institu- the pontiffs are indeed competent to Libertarian position and defense of tions to protect shareholders’ equity, speak on such matters with the full the Catholic Church’s social teaching, myself included, are in a state of weight and authority of their office. it also offers solutions to our current shocked disbelief.” This has been reiterated by pope crisis, including an entire chap- Regarding the Catholic Church’s after pope, perhaps most adamantly ter devoted to Distributism as the competence in economic matters, by Pope Pius XI in the encyclical practical alternative to libertarianism. Ferrara sharply points out that the Ubi Arcano Dei Consilio, where Mr. Ferrara has written a 383-page Church refrains from entering into he warned that social modernism instant classic, filled with arguments any discussion over the mechanics of deserved no less a condemnation bound to present libertarians with economics (e.g. supply and demand than that due theological modernism. many challenges, and a capable curves, price theory). However, The Church and the Libertar- resource for families for many gen- as economics is not an empirical ian is an exhaustive and polemical erations to come.

will, an artificially limited competi- tion. The object is perfectly simple: The Guild Idea, that it should remain a competition, and not merely turn into a combine. The Guild Possibility Capitalist competition, which started avowedly as unlimited competition, has by G.K. Chesterton only been running freely for about a hundred years, and everywhere it has he word Guild is a word the industry in this way. But the Middle turned into a combine. I use the word moderns and not the medievals Ages were extremely unfortunate in combine as a polite convention; for, of use in a romantic and irrational many other ways; and not least in course, we all know that it involves no way. Anything in the world may being ultimately unable to develop equality of combination. The true story be called a Guild nowadays: a it. But if anybody says that I merely of the thing is that when all the shops Tsociety for picking up orange-peel may behold, as in a dream, ideal crafts- are let loose to compete anyhow and be the Guild of the Golden Gleaners; men in coloured garments carving everywhere, by any method good or or a company of pierrots performing exquisite masterpieces, or happy bad, one shop swallows all the rest. To at Margate and Ramsgate may be the apprentices dancing round the may- speak more rightly and worthily, one Guild of the Ghostly Guitars; or a pole or distributing the Christmas man swallows all the rest. It is very movement for muzzling cats as well as ale, then he is a hundred miles away often, by the nature of the competition, dogs may be a Guild for Equal Rights from the point at issue. The case for the worst shop and the worst man. for Four-Footed Friends. But whenever the Guild has nothing to do with the Now the Guild method is no more we, who are accused of this mysteri- romance of medievalism; nothing medieval than it is modern, in so far ous medievalism, happen to say a word whatever. as it is a principle apart from time. in favour of the Guild idea, nobody The theory of a Guild, as distinct The best proof is that it does still exist seems to imagine for a moment that from socialism as generally defined in a practical profession with which it is really an idea. Now, as a matter and capitalism as at present practiced, we are all acquainted. The doctor, the of fact, it is an idea, and in that sense is simply this. The men working in a ordinary general practitioner, whom nothing less or more than an idea. particular trade remain independent most of us know and to whom many of It is an economic and ethical tradesmen; in the sense that they are us owe our lives is a typical example theory for the construction of certain independent and therefore up to a of the member of a Guild. He is not parts of society; and it has nothing in point competitive. Each is working a socialist official; he is not a state the world to do with the romance or for himself, with his own capital or servant; he is an example of private ritual externals or picturesque costume machinery, and in that sense each is enterprise. That is to say, he owns his of that society. To say that you believe working against the others. But each own lances and stethoscope; he has in Guilds is like saying that you believe has entered into an agreement with to buy his own practice; he does in a in Trusts, or in State Ownership, or in the others, that he will not compete certain degree compete with the men Syndicalism, or in any other definite past a certain point or work against of his own trade. way of managing certain matters of the others in certain unfair and But he is forbidden to compete trade and employment and exchange. forbidden ways. In other words, there with them by certain methods; he is In my opinion, the Middle Ages were is a competition, but it is a deliber- forbidden to drive another doctor out fortunate in having begun to develop ately limited competition; or, if you of his practice by certain expedients of

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self-assertion or self-advertisement; he better. It is not ideal; in that sense it is Victorian time, and to have been asked has to observe towards his fellow-doc- something much more than ideal. It is what had struck him as most notable. tor a certain respect and consideration. impossible; in the sense that the bulk The foreigner replied that what had He has to do this because he has of the business world would call it an really struck him as wonderful was joined a Guild or confraternity, which impossibility, if it had not been a fact. the simple inscription on a huge block exists for the maintenance of the The nineteenth century had no of public buildings, a hospital: “Sup- members of his profession as a whole. notion that there could be a fellowship ported by Voluntary Contributions.” Its definite and deliberate policy is to of tradesmen like that of trades- The facts, so far as they go, are valid keep all the doctors in existence, as unionists. It did more than deride and vivid; and they are an answer far as possible, and prevent one of such a notion; it ignored it. It could to anybody who says that a country them destroying all the rest. Once it not conceive commerce as anything cannot raise volunteers or raise volun- is admitted that a man may use any but a competition of capitalists. It is tary subscriptions. methods of advancement and adver- true that since then the capitalism has Now it would be quite possible to tisement, the chances are that about been too much for the competition. It pick a great many holes in a merely twenty honest doctors will be swal- is true that by this time the process patriotic or optimistic version of that lowed up by one quack. has ended in a combination of capital- fact; but it would still remain a fact. We know this is what has hap- ists that amounts to mere monopoly. A scholar of great erudition might pened in journalism and in commerce, But that is a modern alliance for the come upon the traces of a little-known and in any number of other things. It destruction of small shopkeepers, not nineteenth century record bearing the is also to be noted that the other side curious name of “Pickwick,” and giving of the old Guild idea, which balances an account of the medical students in this idea of preserving the small man hospitals, which would be the reverse in independence, the idea of testing of reassuring to the patient awaiting him as to his claims to such inde- dissection, which would be quite blood- pendence, is also true of the modern curdling glimpses of a barbaric age. Or doctor, as of the medieval Master. It is even if he turned to more strictly sci- often regretted that Trade Unions do entific facts and records, he might find not insist, as did the Guilds, on a stan- much to justify the same view. There dard of workmanship and finish. would be any amount of evidence, in They cannot do so under modern the experiences of people working conditions, because they exist to among the poor, of the hospitals being contend with another and specially regarded with popular suspicion or modern evil. But it is quite true that, alarm. Then the critic might go care- before the Guild protected a man from fully through all the tabulated names unfair competition, it examined him on the subscription lists and show in the mastery of his craft; and all how in many cases the charity was not that obviously corresponds to modern really virtuous, and in some cases not medical examinations and medical even really voluntary. degrees. Now a man may quite reason- In short, he would manage to find ably disapprove of this system, just as a very large number of flaws in the I, in my own opinion, quite reasonably hospital and the hospital subscription approve of it. He may say quite truly the medieval alliance for the protection list, considered as an ideal. But the that it has evils of its own. He may say of them. Anyhow, the industrial civili- Frenchman was not admiring it as an quite tenably that in his view those sation no more dreamed of guilds than ideal; he was admiring it as a real- evils outweigh the good. But his atti- of gargoyles. It was selfish on principle; ity. The fact that he was talking about tude is neither true nor tenable if he but I should be very sorry to ignore its really was a fact; that people had pretends that the case for this social virtues as blindly as it ignored all the tried to support an enormous building system is a mass of romantic rubbish medieval virtues. and an elaborate institution entirely about the perfect beauty of the Middle To illustrate what I mean, I will by voluntary subscriptions, and had Ages. He is simply making a fool of leave on one side all these medieval succeeded. If it was his experience himself when he talks of the method superstitions that I am supposed to that other societies could only work by which all the most modern surgery like, and take the sort of modern suc- with the State, it was a relevant remark is accomplished and all the most novel cesses that I rather definitely dislike. I to say that this was done without the medical theories advanced as if it were will take an example out of that very State. If anybody said: “You cannot a mere fantastic dream of bringing Victorian capitalist industrialism which build a hospital by voluntary effort,” back falconry and tilting-armour. I regret, but to which I should still try there would be a great big building The guild is a thing that man to be fair. Take such a case as this. A to contradict him. You can explain has done and man can do; but it is Frenchman or foreigner of some kind that building in detail by many stories also a thing that man can perhaps do is said to have visited England in the other than the story that it was built by

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angels or just men made perfect. But even at this stage as something pleas- a hospital; but he would know better. you cannot explain away that building ing. I want him to see it as something That is what may rightly be called by any stories at all. possible which many would have called being educated; whether by traveling Now what is true of the big build- impossible. If anybody says: “Trade in other ages like the medievalist, or ing called the hospital is also true of cannot be organised except on the traveling in foreign countries like the the big building called the guildhall, modern theory of unlimited competi- Frenchman. That recognition of real and of the whole story of the guilds. A tion,” he will henceforth answer: “Yes, institutions, managed by methods with man, even a learned man, might see all it can be organised quite otherwise, which we are unfamiliar, that power sorts of faults in the guild. But I do not whether or no it ought to be.” to watch the workings of things which particularly want him to see merits in If anybody says: “Commerce we should have supposed would not the guild. I want him to see the guild. cannot have any outcome except what work, is exactly the one thing that is I want him to see the guild exactly we call capitalism,” he will hence- always lacking in those who jeer at as the Frenchman saw the hospital. I forth answer, “It can.” People might the mediaevalist as if he were a mere want him to see a great big social fact have proved on paper that tradesmen romanticist. It is in the most exact as the other saw a great big solid build- would never limit their free competi- sense enlightenment; it is the broaden- ing; as something notable and new, tion with each other; as in the other ing of the mind. in that it is different from what he is case people might have proved on accustomed to assume. I do not want paper that rich men would never give (Composite essay from Illustrated London him to see it as something perfect, or up enough of their money to make News, January 5, 1929, and December 6, 1924)

An Interview with Does he actually talk about guilds or the practical arts?

Dr. William E. Fahey WEF In the essay on the Mission of St. by Richard Aleman Benedict, he speaks of the new world created by the Benedictine “school.” The pertinent bit reads as follows: “There has been slavery; there has been “Benedict found the world in ruins and arts college? After all, didn’t Bl. John feudalism; there have been multitudes of his mission was to restore it…Silent Henry Newman argue in the Idea of a small proprietors; there have been Guilds men were observed about the country, University that “knowledge was its own like the Medieval Guilds, in which trade or discovered in the forest, digging, was regulated that property might remain reward,” and that a program of liberal clearing, and building, and other distributed.” —G.K. Chesterton, “On a Tiresome studies should avoid muddying the silent men, not seen, were sitting in Word” distinction between the liberal arts and the cold cloister, tiring their eyes, and the mechanical or servile arts? eginning this year, all students entering Thomas More Col- WEF Well, it is true that Newman lege in New Hampshire will wished to argue against the utilitarians be required to join one of five of his day who would—as he said— guilds. In the the past, guilds “inform” a liberal art by some other Bwere confraternities of workers; crafts- purpose. Newman rightly stood against men of various trades shaping labor, those who lessened the nobility of the trade, and production. In order to liberal arts by making them servant to, assure quality of craft, guild members say, political struggle or money-mak- were required to complete a certain ing. Yet if you look at his University level of experience and instruction, Sketches and his essays on St. Bene- from apprentice to craftsman and jour- dict and Benedictine education, you neyman to master craftsman. find a vision of education more appro- Gilbert Magazine welcomes the priate to an undergraduate college, president of Thomas More College, Dr. which pays attention to the formation William E. Fahey, who will explain how of the whole person in virtue. the new guild program will benefit its GM Arthur J. Penty was perhaps the students. most vocal Distributist proponent of GM The guild idea seems very exciting, the guild system. But I wasn’t aware of but how exactly does it fit at a liberal Bl. Newman’s contribution to the topic. William E. Fahey

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keeping their attention on the stretch, WEF No, no. Actually, Aristotle, in the an evil effect will follow.” By which he while they painfully deciphered and famous passage from his Politics where means a person’s health and mental copied and re-copied the manuscripts he makes the distinction between ser- capabilities will become deformed. In they had saved…by degrees the vile or manual arts and the liberal arts, fact, he encourages all liberal arts woody swamp became a hermitage, a cautions against an exclusively liberal students to include a small amount religious house, a farm, an abbey, a arts education. of “useful” or “mechanical” art for village, a seminary, a school of learn- the sake of balance and practicality. GM Really? ing, and a city.” It is a lovely passage Elsewhere he talks about the need that describes the quiet transformation WEF Yes, he says the freeman should for real, hands-on, experience. In his of Europe and the creation of a new pursue the liberal arts to a certain, logical and his biological studies, Aris- civilization through a different kind of balanced degree. He actually says that totle points out that a person working education, one that brought together “if a student attends to the liberal arts only from theoretical knowledge is hand-craft and traditional studies. too closely, as if to attain perfection, bound to make mistakes and cannot

GM In A Short History of England, G.K. Chesterton vividly describes the restoration of human life as “a return to the past by men ignorant of the past, like the subconscious action of some man who has lost his memory.” So, the periods of time spent on wood-work or Why just icon painting or gardening are meant to help rebuild our civilization? study the WEF In a quiet way they may contribute to the renewal of culture, yes. More immediately, the guilds are for the Catholic renewal of the students and to bring some order to their lives. Again, I don’t want to burden our students or Tradition? the curriculum, but there is something special about Christian education here that involves balancing hard intellec- tual effort with a reminder that reality is present all around us and it includes much more than an individual mind.

GM It is a remarkable step towards self-sufficiency. In the social encyclical Caritas in Veritate, Pope Benedict XVI Experience It. wrote, “To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity.” Given these newly acquired skills, in what way will these students benefit the local com- munity surrounding the campus?

WEF We hope for the creation of music and art, not only for our campus but Study in Oxford, Join one of our Walk in the footsteps chapels within the diocese. Frankly, England, at the College’s Medieval Guilds to of ancient pilgrims the whole project is so contrary to Center for Faith and learn the principles during our semester- the speed and high-tech focus of our Culture, surrounded by of sacred art, fine long Rome program, modern society; the mere fact that the personal library of woodworking, based at a 14-acre there are students who garden, work G.K. Chesterton. baking, gardening, monastery in the with their hands, and learn how to and music. Eternal City. make things of use and beauty should become a sign of contradiction and hope for our age. Thomas More College Six Manchester Street of liberal arts Merrimack, NH 03054 (800) 880-8308 GM Would you say guilds are purely Christian?

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 25 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : approximate the approach of some- followed the Protestant revolu- Joseph and St. Dominic, founded one with the direct experience of tion, as state power increased and by Hilary Pepler, comes to mind. It nature and the everyday world. tolerance for intermediary bodies is remarkable how Pepler radically disappeared. As Chesterton said, published many fine quality book GM So, it is both Christian and Classi- “the free medieval guilds did not titles, pamphlets, hymnals, and cal to bring these together? decay; they were killed.” In England, posters using a hand press printer WEF Well, Aristotle certainly pre- the guilds were crippled through at a time when it was already scribes such a course. It is really confiscations similar to those suf- considered archaic. In what way springs from Christian theology and fered by religious communities. In did this guild influence the guild practice. Recently, Pope Benedict 1791, the French Republic outlawed program at Thomas More, directly XVI spoke to educators in Europe at guilds, and proceeded to destroy or indirectly? the Colleges des Bernadins and made them in areas of Europe conquered WEF Over time, we hope that the this point. Jewish education brought by Napoleon. College guilds will allow the stu- together manual labor and teaching— GM Trade unions are the successors dents to produce liturgical art for think of St. Paul, who was trained of the guilds and yet, doesn’t it seem chapels in the region and devo- as a rabbi but also practiced tent- as though Chesterton and the early tional use. It would be wonderful making. St. Augustine speaks of this Distributists predicted the transfor- to find an old printing press for tradition, and the Benedictines were mation of unions back into guilds? just this sort of thing. Stonyhurst pre-eminent in bringing the two—the College in England has revived its liberal and the practical—together. WEF My understanding of trade press along these lines. Perhaps in Pope Benedict explains that this unions is that—unlike the guilds— time, Thomas More College shall stems from something that Greco- they were formed to protect as well. Roman civilization lacked: the creator wage-earners through collective God, a God who does not remove bargaining. Spiritual life and crafts- GM This is very exciting. Have himself from his creation, but enters manship were absent. Trade unions you entertained the possibility of into and shapes it. Christ tells us tend to shift the center away from offering summer workshops geared his Father is “still working and I am occupational concerns to the mem- toward the general public? working.” Our Lord himself was both bers’ mere identity as workers. Karl WEF Yes, we already have been learned and—as the son of Joseph—a Marx favored trade unions as a tool doing this for those interested in carpenter. As the Holy Father says, for forging a revolutionary worker icon painting through our Way of this new vision of education brought consciousness. He disapproved of Beauty Program. Over the years— together “a culture of the word” and guilds—which had social hierarchy especially if the College can acquire a “culture of work.” In some small and did not foster a pan-class, pan- larger property—we will expand the part, that is what we are attempting. occupational movement. There have workshops. been some Catholic trade unions, GM Chesterton tells us that guilds but the modern union is without the GM It appears Thomas More College regulated trade with the objective of religious purpose or the rich solidar- is setting a welcome precedent ensuring widespread property. How ity found in mediaeval guilds. in twenty-first century education. did they contribute to economic life On the other hand, there are What would you say to the leaders in Medieval Europe? What caused the modern crafts guilds and trade of other schools and small local demise of the guild system? associations that seek to restore groups that may wish to imitate WEF The guilds provided an interme- the older notions of craft training, this important program? diate association that could operate common life, and moral edification. WEF Imitate the Carpenter. without state control in specific Certainly, men like Chesterton and vocational areas. The guild acceler- Hilaire Belloc were ated, in an organic fashion, mastery hoping for a restora- of the various arts of civilization. The tion of the guilds. Chesterton’s homage to stone masons from part four of life of guildsmen was occupational— For Belloc the his eloquent poem, “For Four Guilds,” in The Ballad of St. encouraging a high degree of quality immediate purpose Barbara and Other Verses. in one area of production—but it would be that of We have graven the forest of heaven with hands, was also deeply social and religious. “spreading the moral Being great with a mirth too gross for pride, That is, while the guild member effect of economic In the stone that battered him Stephen stands produced something and profited by independence” and And Peter himself is petrified: the production, his whole work was secondarily the rein- Such hands as have grubbed in the glebe for bread embedded in a social and spiritual troduction of the Have bidden the blank rock blossom and thrive, reality that reminded him that the artisan way of life. Such hands as have stricken a live man dead purpose of his vocation was not Have struck, and stricken the dead alive. GM Yes, the (Dis- merely to make, acquire, and spend. tributist) Guild of St. The destruction of the guilds

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ministry St. Paul declared, Tradidi quod accepi: “I handed down what Distributist Education I received.” The divorce of tradition from education also brings the divorce by Ryan Grant of a coherent philosophy concern- ing the purpose of education. We see t is often the case today that we iPod. Unfortunately, the same teachers this in the dogmatic assertion that are told we need more funding for and students who enjoy the material the Church must be so separate She education, that we are not investing superiority of modern man probably cannot be mentioned in a state school. enough in our schools. Yet America could not work out the propositions of Chesterton put it, spends more money per child than Euclid, who lived 2,300 years ago. Iany other country in the world, and In this we see the divorce of Given the modern philosophy or place somewhere around twenty-eighth education from tradition, as something absence of philosophy, education is in overall performance. handed down, without which there is turned against itself, destroying that While the statistics are not exact no science, there is no math, literature, very sense of variety and proportion they are nonetheless sobering. More or any other subject. Throughout his which it is the object of education to give...the moment men begin to care worrisome is that the solution seems to be ever-increasing regulation of schools and federal money per student. Distributism When the results of this still fail to ;;The essential idea of Distributism ;;Property is really the positive form impress, even more money is spent, is the idea of Directness. It concerns of Liberty. (Illustrated London News, Oct. 20, 1928) and rather than support education in a direct ownership, direct expression, proper sense, the consequence for the ;;It is my whole point that my solution direct creation and control. (G.K.’s Weekly, is simply human, and it is the other student not meeting the government’s July 7, 1928) set target levels of knowledge is to be solutions that are dehumanized. It is “left behind”--of course, we cannot have ;;It is not true, as some seem to my whole point that to say we must anyone neglected on the road to edu- suppose, that Distributism is another have Socialism or Capitalism is like cational utopia. Further laws requiring name for Drink. (G.K.’s Weekly, Aug. 24, 1929) saying we must choose between all more standardization and more over- men going into monasteries and a few ;;There is less difference than many men having harems. (“Apologia,” GKC as MC) sight are put in place in order to make suppose between the ideal Socialist certain everyone is going in the same system, in which the big businesses ;;As we see it, Distributism is not Dis- direction, despite all the talk of diver- are run by the State, and the present tributism; it is simply Liberty, with its sity and free thought the educational Capitalist system, in which the State normal organ of Property...Our busi- establishment prides itself on. is run by the big businesses. They are ness is not so much Distributism as Obviously, a certain degree of much nearer to each other than either simply Democracy; it is not so much standardization is necessary in educa- is to my own ideal—of breaking up Democracy as simply Humanity. But in tion, yet this ought to vary according the big businesses into a multitude of these times it needs almost superhu- to the real needs of the individual, small businesses. (Illustrated London News, Oct. man fortitude to be human. (G.K.’s Weekly, the family, and the local society, not 27, 1928) July 19, 1930) according to the arbitrary determina- tions of the state. ;;What is wrong is not that there is There is an emphasis on math and one class of property, but that there is science now paramount in all discus- another class without property. What sion of education. The arts, literature, is wrong is that this class without Latin, logic, and philosophy belong property has to hire itself out to the to the patrimony of the culture from propertied class in order to live at all. which we inherited our civilization; (Illustrated London News, Nov. 8, 1921) they are the handmaiden to math and ;;An ideal Distributism is only improb- science that help to form the whole able. Even an ideal Communism is individual toward his final end. We only impossible. But an ideal Capital- have made the gross mistake instead ism is inconceivable. (G.K.’s Weekly, Oct. 1, of minimizing the arts for the sake 1927) of math and sciences. Everything is reduced to practicality, love of learning ;;It is better to be romantic about has evaporated, and increasingly what a real thing like the land than to be is produced is a technocratic group realistic about an unreal thing like the of people who consider themselves Economic Theory of History. (“Return to superior to the previous generation the Vision,” Sidelights) because they have the Internet and an

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followed because they taught delight- This Distributist approach to edu- more for education than for religion ful truths and were useful for everyday cation has added advantages. It opens they begin to care more for ambition than for education. It is no longer a life. Algebra was unknown to them, up more opportunities. Students in an world in which the souls of all are yet today’s student with years of alge- education co-op that offers training equal before heaven, but a world in bra under his belt is the same grocery and/or apprenticeship in mechanics, which the mind of each is bent on clerk unable to figure out the change utilities, construction or computer achieving unequal advantage over without the use of a register. Do science are attractive to many exist- the other. algebra and calculus reveal truth and ing businesses seeking apprentices arouse wonder? Or are they merely who can be trained while in school, The concept of society has fallen problem-solving techniques that train in exchange for free labor, and who out completely from the school student to think and respond like may serve as regular employees after environment, and now it is focused computers? In general it seems as graduation. on the needs of the individual only in though it is the latter, which should Politically, some may argue that the sense of what kind of comfortable not surprise us because that is the Distributist educational reform would white collar job he might be able to general attitude of society and the never work and cannot be done, but attain. “What college are you going increasingly common function of the naysayers also told Bishop John to?” or “Well, if you want to go to worker within the framework of big Hughes in the nineteenth century college you need to take these classes.” business. that he could not enact Catholic “Well, you could do that but you won’t What then if one seeks to with- school reforms in New York. Yet get into a good college,” and so on. A draw from the educational oligarchy Hughes advocated for Catholics to certain level of excellence and achieve- and run his own curriculum? Scorn vote for candidates that would support ment in basic things is necessary for generally follows, with visits from public school reform and allow the a functioning educational system, but social services, criticism from friends establishment of parochial schools, after a certain level of knowledge, and neighbors, and there is, of course, which Catholics did. The thirty party which ought to be common to the the media reaction. Homeschooled candidate that year lost, but because majority of men in society, traditionally students tend to do better on stan- Catholics had supported him the the focus of education shifted to what dardized testing and score very well, Democratic candidate also lost, having the individual could do and educat- however, and this is one positive move assumed the Catholic vote de facto, ing him in like fashion. He might be towards disassembling the education and the Republicans were forced to apprenticed to a trade and put in a juggernaut. But even homeschooling, appeal to Catholic issues from that position at a young age to provide for of which I am a supporter gener- point on. himself when he is older by owning ally, has its pitfalls. Not every parent Small communities do have the his own labor. Students who did not can school well, and for two-income ability to influence large outcomes, and fall into this category still received families it is nearly impossible. Then it starts at the basic level—the family a good education in many of the there is the matter of competence. and the education of its children. basic arts and sciences so that when For example, anyone who has heard he went to university he could enter me sing or play an instrument would any of those fields. Our education agree I ought to get someone else to system at present, however, is worn teach my children music. What are out, overtaxed, and underperform- such families to do? The solution is It’s Time ing. It is focused on material ends for homeschooling cooperatives. the purposes of tax contribution, and A homeschooling co-operative to Restore not the eternal end toward which the frees-up parents from being full-time individual himself is journeying. As educators and also cuts the expenses Pius XI noted in Divini illius magistri, Our Sanity and of boarding or private school. A home- education which neglects man’s final schooling co-operative can function end is truly no education at all. The in this way, with a handful of teachers Our Property state’s educational system has fallen versed in their subjects, who provide into what Chesterton once called “the the starting basics while tailoring distributistreview.com madness of bigness.” In an attempt to their services to the needs of grow- be large enough to meet all needs, it ing children. In fact, homeschooling has become mean and narrow; the real cooperatives are capable of serving needs and the future of the individual as an outsource to public or private student are left out of the equation. schools without recourse to vocational In their educational systems, education. This practice harkens back Ancients and Medievals concentrated to education in classical and medieval on studies of grammar, rhetoric, and civilization, and provides more oppor- logic so they could explore the world tunities for students at the discretion around them. Arithmetic and geometry and direction of their parents.

28 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : significant errors. The dichotomy is quixotic. One position advocates social The D-PAC conservatism and economic Liberal- by Richard Aleman ism while the other calls for socially liberal policies and the broadest fiscal “We have formulated questions to be favor of the family no longer appears bureaucracy. Both claim to solve our addressed to Parliamentary candidates. We unlikely. social and economic problems, yet think that something can be done through In the United States, past expe- undermine the family and the cul- Parliament to make small ownership easier rience indicates that our current ture of life. These conflicts generate to gain and to hold. But we are not a Party, and our main effort must be always outside landscape makes national appeals for uneasiness among supporters already Parliament.” —G.K. Chesterton, What We Are reform a steep climb. Challenging the reluctant to identify themselves as Getting At system at the federal level seems dubi- politically partisan. Distributism today ous. This is not to say reform shouldn’t is incrementally tapping into these dis- n the United Kingdom the rebirth and may never come from the top, satisfactions and converting hardliners of Distributism is embodied by but as Chesterton and the early from various political groups. the vibrant Red Tory revolution, Distributists contended, conviction at It is reasonable to suggest that set ablaze by theologian-turned- local levels leads to broader and lasting any promotion of a Distributist agenda political sage, Phillip Blond. The change. After all, independent and will not only require advocacy of IRed Tory movement is distinguished even conventional party candidates micro-property but the emergence of by its criticism of the welfare state seem more responsive and flexible to micro-leadership. Indeed, any move- as well as the market state, and its alternatives than mainstream partisan ment worth a nickel, claiming to unambiguous campaign in favor of the leadership. Indeed, top party platforms spring from the bottom-up, will involve socio-economic ideals of Distributism. at times mirror Distributist talking the widest distribution of leadership. Phillip Blond’s influential think tank points, but do so imperfectly, and typi- In order to support and encourage this ResPublica has remarkably punched a cally combine truths with severe and leadership, a political arm made up of hole in a political landscape that has, by and large, forgotten figures like G.K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, and Usury Fr. Vincent McNabb. Blond is notable ;;The greatest asset, indeed the only Lands which have since been largely among the political thinkers shaping asset, of modern finance is debt, destroyed; the laws against usury and British politics today and his message the thing that makes men commit monopoly, undercutting and commer- helped fuel the candidacy of the cur- suicide. The whole structure of finance cial conspiracy, which have since been rent Prime Minister, David Cameron. collapses unless somebody owes some- destroyed; the Guilds protecting the ResPublica’s success in Britain has thing to somebody else. It is a gigantic small trader, which have since been even percolated some talk of bringing heap of debt, like a heap of dirt. It destroyed. (The Listener, June 19, 1935) the think tank to the United States, is a heap of debts hoarded until they ;;Though men may grow used to demonstrating that Distributism has have gone bad. It is now a heap of bad usury, and even practice it without a role to play in the global political debts which a little more bad debt will shame under the present professional arena. send toppling into the mire. (G.K.’s Weekly, standard, yet God does not grow used This could not happen at a better Aug. 1, 1931) to usury, any more than to murder or time. Outside of emerging Distributist ;;Usury existed in a limited form [in to devil-worship; and the eternal laws circles, recognizable elements of the Middle Ages] and it was every- of life itself bring down the rule of neo-Distributism are featured in alter- where denounced and forbidden. Now usurers to hell. (G.K.’s Weekly, Feb. 6, 1932) native environmental and agricultural it exists in an unlimited form and is policies, the intermediate technology ;;Just as men are much vaguer about everywhere flattered and condoned. front, and proponents of humane, usury being usury, they are also at (Illustrated London News, May 29, 1926) decentralist economics. Although the the same moment much vaguer about world appeared confident in political ;;The logic of usury is in its nature at theft being theft. (G.K.’s Weekly, June 16, 1928) centralization and economic globaliza- war with life. (“The Problem of Zionism,” The New ;;Universal usury that now holds the tion, today Greeks are questioning Jerusalem) world in a net. (G.K.’s Weekly, Nov. 14, 1931) the wisdom of bailouts, the Irish ;;The Catholic veto upon usury, as are rethinking their commitment ;;It is a lie to say that the monstrous defined in dogmatic councils, cuts to the euro, and American workers complicated accumulation of modern across all classes. (“The Church of the Servile are feeling the effects of free trade finance is essential to civilisation or State,” Utopia of Usurers) agreements. With increased concern the social and moral well-being of over the growth of Big Business and ;;Christendom did not only establish ordinary men and women. (G.K.’s Weekly, Big Government, the dawn of a new the Common Law right to be tried as a Aug. 1, 1931) alliance with the tools and power to free man. It established the Common shift the social and economic order in

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 29 : O u t l i n i n g s a n it y : policy institutes and political action this group screen new leadership, it passionate about offering ideas to committees will be necessary. would pressure incumbents to adopt improve community and problem solve. A political action committee is an Distributist policies at the local and Formulating a practical outline, a organization that plays a significant state levels by gathering support for manifesto, is not only important but role in support of candidates, election its agenda, releasing information necessary, as political context varies outcomes, and policy decisions. Politi- about candidate funding sources and according to local, regional, and cal Action Committees (PACs) are an voting records to the community. Even national interests. To increase land important aspect of American politics though PACs at times operate under ownership, policies in favor of curbing and the American electoral system. the umbrella of a policy institute, the land speculation and combating urban Although state, local, and federal regu- grassroots components of a D-PAC sprawl may be advocated. To stimulate lations vary, a D-PAC or Distributist allow for the largest or smallest team ownership and small business develop- Political Action Committee would size, dependent or autonomous of any ment, tax incentives and short-term primarily operate as an issue advo- other corpus. subsidies encouraging start-up family- cacy group, challenge social or fiscal When selecting the leadership of owned businesses and cooperative firms, referenda, raise and disperse funds for the committee, choosing advisers from neighborhood micro-credit programs, the purposes of furthering association various sectors is important. A typi- and grants to colleges or institutes goals, and support candidates embrac- cal board may consistent of teachers, for the creation of local currencies, ing a Distributist platform or initiatives farmers, urban planners, economists, strengthen the native economy and congenial with Distributist core issues, political scientists, organizers, interns, promote the growth of product and ser- whether Republican, Democrat, third homeschooling leaders, and people vice diversity. Community Land Trust Party, or Independent. Not only would who are capable of examining and associations may be given preferential treatment to help reinvigorate the agri- cultural sector, while restrictions on the Capitalism production or sale of Genetically Modi- ;;When I say “Capitalism,” I com- Socialism, which is its child. (Illustrated fied Organisms would go far to help monly mean something that may be London News, March 1, 1919) the small farmer compete regionally, stated thus: “That economic condition and provide consumers with health- ;;Half the cross-purposes about Capital in which there is a class of capitalists ier, organic foods. Of course, if the and Labour would be straightened out, roughly recognizable and relatively common man must tighten his belt, so if everybody realized that Capitalism small, in whose possession so much of should government. Candidates should is nearly as new a thing as Bolshevism. the capital is concentrated as to necessi- be interested in reducing unnecessary The whole wage system, with its mil- tate a very large majority of the citizens spending and slash extended welfare lions of employees, is itself a form of serving those capitalists for a wage.” and unemployment programs. Instead, industrial unrest, being a phase of the (“The Beginning of the Quarrel,” The Outline of Sanity) the elimination of abortion funding industrial revolution. (Illustrated London News, coupled with pro-life policies encourag- ;;Capitalism is contradictory as soon June 24, 1922) ing the growth of religious institutions, as it is complete; because it is dealing ;;Capitalism is simply the chaos which could provide free health care, with the mass of men in two opposite following on the failure of mere Indi- safe havens for pregnant mothers, shel- ways at once. When most men are vidualism. (Illustrated London News, April 19, 1924) ters to clothe and feed the homeless wage-earners, it is more and more dif- and assist the unemployed, as well as ;;It [is] of rapidity…of specialism… ficult for most men to be customers. tax credits for homeschooling families, of accumulation in which Capitalism For the capitalist is always trying to would greatly eliminate the dependence takes all its pride. (New Witness, Sept. 30, 1915) cut down what his servant demands, on Big Business and Big Government. and in doing so is cutting down what ;;The superiority of the universal Given our state of affairs we can his customer can spend. He is want- shops is a pure superstition. It does be most effective by creating the new ing the same man to be rich and poor not make for better quality in bread platform from which to influence our at the same time. (“The Peril of the Hour,” The or meat that the same shopkeeper existing and various political parties. Outline of Sanity) should be butcher and baker and The D-PAC exemplifies Chesterton’s ;;Modern capitalism is a curse—not candlestick-maker. It only means, if it shrewd strategy to challenge Parlia- because some men have capital, means anything, the provision of bad ment while remaining outside of it, and but because some men have not. A candlesticks and worse candles for the the D-PAC furthers the Distributism modern city can be a nightmare—not inspection of doubtful meat and bread. program. ResPublica is evidence of because its houses belong to those (New Witness, Jan. 13, 1916) its achievement overseas and Dis-

who own them, but because they ;;The complexity of commercial soci- tributism’s future right here in the do not belong to those who live in ety has become intolerable, because United States. For it to work, we will them. This is the real case against that society is commercial and nothing need the widest distribution of lead- modern capitalism; and it is also the else. (“Reflections on a Rotten Apple,” The Well and ership. Micro-leadership isn’t about case against modern Collectivism, or the Shallows) someone else. It’s about you.

30 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : R o l l i n g r o a d : than G.K. Chesterton, someone who had never seen a football game in his life. Chesterton would later defend Notre Dame Notre Dame against critics who said it by Dale Ahlquist cares only about football. “The world is interested in football, and because a school excels in that sport the world hen I first stepped on to of putting its own history into doubt. gives no other credit.” the campus of Notre Dame, Ironically, growth has been its But lately, even football has taken I walked through a maze biggest weakness. One faculty member a back seat at Notre Dame. The school of athletic fields, including remarked to me that Notre Dame has finds itself embroiled in a battle for its one devoted exclusively to become so big that it is not clear who soul. G.K. Chesterton would be a much Wlacrosse. It was a lovely fall morning, is running anything anymore. Admin- more controversial figure if he visited and the first person I met was Moose istrators are no longer educators; the campus today. In fact, he might Krause. Technically speaking, I only they are business executives with no even get arrested. met his statue; Moose died in 1992. knowledge of what goes on inside the In the meantime, he is, in a small His bronze likeness sits on a park classroom. There is a quest to become way at least, being remembered. While bench staring at the football stadium. a top ten school, but there is a question my talk was largely on Distributism (see To his credit, he is holding, and will of how much the university will com- page 7), I also managed to say this: always hold, a cigar. He was the former promise its Catholic identity to do so. Athletic Director at Notre Dame. He Notre Dame remains a visibly If it were G.K. Chesterton standing was also a student there once upon a Catholic place. There is a chapel in here today, instead of me, he would time, and no doubt would have been every dormitory with daily Mass. There say that there is very little hope for a on campus in the fall of 1930, when are chapels in many of the academic country that does not defend the lives G.K. Chesterton was a guest lecturer buildings. There is the magnificent of its unborn babies. He argued against Eugenics when it was very unfash- for six weeks. basilica. There is the crypt beneath it, ionable to do so. He argued against In commemoration of the 80th where Orestes Brownson, the great- Abortion when it was still unthinkable. anniversary of Chesterton’s visit to est Catholic convert in America in He warned that it would lead to infanti- Notre Dame, I had the honor of being the nineteenth century is buried. And cide, which it has already done. invited to give a talk. I did not speak there is the Grotto that is clearly a in Washington Hall, where Chesterton holy place. If anyone doubts it, read Chesterton said: “There will be gave his lectures, but I visited that the letter from Dr. Tom Dooley that is more, not less, respect for human historic building and stood on the bronzed beside his nearby statue. rights if they can be treated as divine stage from which he delivered eighteen But then there is that other form rights.” lectures on Victorian literature and of worship. Every other weekend in the The State has to acknowledge that eighteen lectures on Victorian history. fall, 80,000 people descend on campus rights are God-given, not State-given. About 1,200 students and faculty were to enter the Arena. A couple of alumni, And it begins with the right to life. In permitted to attend one series or the Chestertonians both, who showed me this matter, the State must bow to the other but not both. They had to have an around the campus, (including the Church. admission ticket to get in. Chesterton fabled locker room), explained it suc- also gave some public lectures while cinctly: “Football pays for everything.” in South Bend. I met a fellow whose That is understandable. It was foot- mother attended one of those lectures. ball that put Notre Dame on the map. She had been a student at nearby St. Catholic institutions were largely over- Mary’s. On the cornerstone of the arts looked in the early twentieth century. building at St. Mary’s is the inscription: But Notre Dame got noticed because “Art is the signature of man.” it won big football games. And once it There is no one left who saw got noticed, it became in effect, one of Chesterton on campus in 1930 (except the main symbols of Catholic identity for my buddy Moose Krause,) but in America. there remain a few tall tales told by On the day the new football people who knew people. Chesterton stadium was inaugurated in the fall would approve of the legendary nature of 1930, the legendary Knute Rockne of these stories, since most of them was the first to speak. A Navy Admiral involve drinking during Prohibition, followed. Fr. O’Donnell, the President but their historical accuracy tends to of Notre Dame, read George Gipp’s be doubtful. stirring dying speech. Then a guest of But a much more serious problem honor was introduced, and the stadium is that this great university is in danger let out a huge cheer for none other

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 31 : Ta l e s o f t h e s H o r T b o w : “A banshee,” she repeated. “You’ve heard of elves and fairies? It is said that banshees are related to them in some way. The wailing of a banshee foretells the death of someone near. Someone who hears her wail.” “But isn’t that just superstition?” Superstition Eliot said, hoping this was a leading question. by John Peterson “Is predicting the future supersti- tion, Mr. Cavanaugh?” she answered. “When we see black clouds gather over liot hesitated for just a moment tours, provided these did not take up the western hills, we know we will soon before he approached the pretty too much time. have rain.” young lady dusting the furniture. Their stay in this eighteenth-cen- Eliot was relieved to find at last He did not want to seem to be tury country mansion, now converted someone willing to defend one of flirting with her; and because into a hotel of sorts, was not his idea these nonsensical beliefs. In the States, Ehe was not on his home ground, he of fun, however. He suffered through when he confronted anyone’s supersti- did not know the prevailing attitudes the first of several bus tours of the tions—checking the horoscope column toward strangers speaking to young countryside, but he refused to join any in the newspaper, for example—he girls. further excursions. He preferred to sit never found what he would call “con- He decided to chance it. “May I in the bar parlor. If you’ve seen one viction.” People would tell him they have a word with you, Miss?” he asked. green Irish hill, he told himself, you’ve were not really serious about astrology “Why, yes Sir,” she replied. “Will seen them all. If you’ve seen one blue or black cats or spilled salt, and that it you be needing something?” Irish lake, you’ve seen them all. At was all just for fun or just a “habit.” “I was just wondering if you heard least in the bar, he had a better than “Clouds predicting rain,” he said, that awful screaming last night. Can even chance of finding a companion- “and banshees predicting deaths are you tell me what sort of animal that able drinking partner. not the same.” was?” Eliot had a reason for accepting “That’s true,” Mrs. McLaughlin Eliot was a heavy sleeper, and this prolonged stay in rural Ireland, replied, “when we see clouds in the his wife Eloise had awakened him the and that was his lifelong interest in west, there are times when it does not night before by roughly shaking his superstition. He had always heard that rain; but the banshee’s warning never shoulder. the Irish countryside was the home of fails.” “What…?” he had started to ask. the most superstitious people on earth. “But what is the cause and effect Then he heard the cry of some animal. He was looking for his chance to ques- relationship?” Eliot asked. It seemed to be in an agony of pain. tion some of these true believers. “So far as I have heard, Mr. Cava- He would have described it as some- Mrs. McLaughlin, the head of naugh, the banshee does not cause thing between the terrified scream of a housekeeping, was a large woman. She deaths. She foretells deaths.” human being and the tortured screech wore a black dress that was, in the “But how?” of some stricken beast or bird. It had severity of its lines, something like a “As for that,” she replied, “you had been the most horrible sound he had uniform. But her face was friendly. best ask the banshee.” ever heard in his life. “What can I do for you, Mr. Cavana- If I find one, Eliot told himself, I The parlor maid looked at him for ugh,” she asked with a smile, “and may sure as hell will ask her. a moment. Then she said, “I’m sorry, I understand by your name that your Sir, but at night we maids are at home people are Irish?” ; ; ; in the village. We are not given rooms “No,” Eliot said, shaking his head After a fine dinner—Eliot had no here. But Mrs. McLaughlin, the head impatiently. “People assume I’m complaints about the Hotel’s chef— of housekeeping, has a room and an Irish and Catholic and full of blar- Eloise announced that she had agreed office there at the end of that hall. She ney because of that name. I’ve often with some of their fellow guests to might help you.” He offered the girl his thought of having it changed. But enjoy a round of contract bridge in thanks, and started down the hallway forget that, Mrs. McLaughlin, and the game room. Eliot was not a bridge in search of the head of housekeeping. please answer a question for me. I enthusiast. He chose instead to see if Eliot now regretted allowing Eloise understand you live here—I mean here his new friend Charlie were in the bar to plan every detail of their vaca- in this hotel. If that’s so, I’d like to and if he could be persuaded to join tion. He had fully enjoyed Dublin, as know if you heard any strange sounds him outside in the evening air where he would undoubtedly have enjoyed in the middle of last night.” they might light up a cigar. any large European city. He loved the “Yes,” she said, “I did. It was, sad “Sorry, Eliot,” Charlie said, “but nightlife with its shows and pubs, and to say, the wailing of a banshee.” there’s a great football match tonight, he even enjoyed the daily sightseeing “A what?” and I’m going back to the room to see

32 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : Ta l e s o f T H e s H o r T b o w :

if I can find it on TV. It might not be the long stairway leading up to a large pointing at him. This was the woman, on in this remote outpost.” deck that had been built onto the top Eliot was convinced, who was making “Football?” floor of the mansion. It faced a small those unearthly noises in the night. “Oh, sorry. Soccer. There’s a big lake, and it was intended to provide He decided to put this superstitious soccer match on, and I’m hoping I can the hotel guests with a scenic view. banshee nonsense to rest once and for get it on TV here.” Charlie finished his He began climbing the wide stairway, all, and he began the long climb down, drink. “Wish me luck,” he said. keeping close to the building—for there being careful to keep the woman in “You think if I ‘wish you luck’ my was no railing—and thinking that per- view. The idea of confronting her saying it will actually give you a better haps he would find some other guests excited him; and had he not been chance of finding the game?” Eliot relaxing on the deck. surprised by a sudden and powerful asked. But there were no others on the gust of wind, he might have kept his “Huh? No, that’s just a way of deck; and as the sun set behind the balance when he stepped on a patch of speaking. It doesn’t mean anything.” hills, the fresh air Eliot had sought water on one of the steps. turned cold and had him shivering. As Eloise waited patiently for her ; ; ; Then he saw the figure of a husband’s return, the other hotel Eliot wandered about puffing on woman standing by the shore of the guests slept peacefully, undisturbed by his cigar. Eventually he found himself lake. She wore a pale blue dress and superstitious fears or by any mysteri- on the rocky plateau at the bottom of she was looking up at him. She was ous voices in the night.

“Six hundred dollars?” “In twenties, in an envelope, The Christmas Caper complete with the homeowner’s name and address on it. Got him James G. Bruen, Jr. cold. Malin’s at the precinct now, bein’ processed.” erry Christmas, Sergeant!” sergeant. “Not comin’ in.” “Oh, my,” said the priest. “Did laughed Fr. Paul Petersen “Well, then,” laughed Fr. Dan—that’s his first name, you know, as he opened the windowed Petersen, stepping into the entrance Sergeant—have any explanation?” inner doors to St. Patrick’s way and shutting the inner doors “Didn’t say anythin’. Not one rectory. “What brings you behind himself, “what brings you word. Been through this so many Mhere so early this Christmas morn?” here, Sergeant?” times, Malin knows his rights so he Snow fell lightly outside, gently “This bein’ Christmas and all,” kept silent; didn’t say one word.” covering the crèche atop the stone began the sergeant with a trace of “But those arrests were years ago, building’s portico with its series of insincerity, “I thought you ought to Sergeant,” said the priest. two arched doorways. The outer know.” “Maybe so, but nothin’s changed. arch’s wrought iron doors were “Know what?” A reformed burglar would be in open. Dressed in his winter uni- “Picked up Malin about four this church on Christmas morning form, including an insulated jacket, morning,” said Sergeant Benway. instead of sneakin’ into someone’s Sergeant David Benway stood in the “Up to his old tricks. Caught him home, right?” taunted the cop. enclosed entrance way between the red-handed.” “That’s not how your church says you doors. “Here on police business,” he The priest stopped laughing. should treat your neighbor, is it?” announced. “Red-handed?” he said. “Oh, my.” Snow drifted into the rectory’s “I assumed that, Sergeant,” “Thought he’d reformed, didn’t entrance way. The priest did not replied the priest, who was in shirt- you?” mocked the cop. “Else you reply to this. He asked, “Why have sleeves and clerical collar. “After wouldn’t have had him workin’ you come here, Sergeant?” all, you’ve made no secret of your round here these last few years, “The newspapers will be callin’ animosity to the Church. Won’t you would you?” you for comments on Malin’s Christ- come in?” “Oh, my,” repeated the priest. mas caper,” said Sergeant Benway “Haven’t been inside a church “In Georgetown. Just like the sardonically. “Figured I’d give you in thirty years,” growled the cop. old days,” chortled Sergeant Benway. a heads up. You’ll want to come up “Don’t see any reason to go in one “Same M.O. Caught him backin’ out with some explanation for why a now.” a house’s first floor window into the supposedly reformed burglar who “This isn’t a church, Sergeant,” shrubbery. Didn’t run or resist when works for your church is still breakin’ grinned the priest. “It’s the rectory— I hit him with the beam. Had all his and enterin’, won’t you?” where the priests live.” burglar tools, and $600 from the “Dan hasn’t embarrassed me “Close enough,” said the home.” or the Church,” said the priest

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 33 : Ta l e s o f T H e s H o r T b o w : abruptly. “Given his fallen nature, still stuffed with currency. “Probably homeowner’s name on the envelope. man is capable of many crimes. But should’ve turned it in at the precinct Unless I am badly mistaken, and I he also is capable of repentance and already.” He handed it to the priest, don’t see how I can be, Dan was going conversion. Dan did commit many who inspected it briefly and handed to leave that money in that house to crimes, but he served his time, and it back quickly saying, “Wouldn’t make restitution for what he’d stolen he has repented. I’ve observed him want to break the chain of custody, years ago, Sergeant. He wanted to for several years, and I’m as certain would we, Sergeant?” be right with his neighbor before he of that as I can be.” “No,” said the cop. approached the altar on Christmas.” “Priest Says Burglar A Holy Man,” “That would be embarrassing, “Breakin’ and enterin’ is still a chortled Sergeant Benway. “The wouldn’t it?” crime,” growled Sergeant Benway. papers will make toast of you.” “Yeah, I guess so.” “I doubt the homeowner would “For some, any stick is good “I think you’ll be even more prosecute if he knew the complete enough to beat the Church with,” embarrassed though, if you don’t story, Sergeant,” replied the priest. said the priest quietly. “If the Post release Dan.” “No jury would convict.” wants to ridicule me, so be it.” “Huh?” “A crime is a crime,” muttered “You have a Merry Christmas, “Sergeant, the handwriting on the cop. Father,” muttered Sergeant Benway that envelope is Dan’s. You can get “I can see the Post’s coverage: condescendingly. He turned to leave. an expert to confirm that if you Cop Kills Christmas Spirit: Man Jailed “Sergeant, before you go, I do want, but I’m very familiar with his Returning $600,” said the priest. have one question,” interjected handwriting.” “Damn,” spat the policeman, the priest. “Do you still have that “So what?” again turning to leave. “I’ll see to envelope?” “You didn’t catch Dan leaving it that Malin’s out in time to get to “Huh?” that house, Sergeant. You caught church,” he muttered. “The envelope that had the $600 him breaking in,” explained the “Merry Christmas, Sergeant,” in it. May I see it?” priest. “Dan set aside $600 in an called out Fr. Petersen as Sergeant “Oh, yeah, got it here,” replied envelope for that homeowner. It Benway went down the snow-covered the policeman, fishing inside his probably took him quite a while to steps from the rectory to the side- jacket and pulling out the envelope, save that much. He even wrote the walk.

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ChesteronAd_Feb2010.indd 1 11/15/10 2:21:07 PM 34 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : B o o k r e v i e w : Meyer has also caught a bit of wrath from those who cannot imagine that Elizabeth I was anything other than what PBS Television has portrayed her to be. The Tudors (Mr. Meyer’s book has no relation to the Showtime series) A Fresh New Look at provides a jolt: the Virgin Queen comes off as a repulsive character, childish, Some Really Old Rot vain yet horrid to look at with her whit- ened pock-marked face and ill-fitting The Tudors Mr. Meyer has an extremely effec- wigs, and a victim of her own propa- By G.J. Meyer tive technique of weaving together ganda machine (Edmund Spenser was New York: Delacorte Press (2010) the story of the Tudors. Between each on the payroll). The Elizabethan period 612 pages, $30.00 chapter of narrative, he provides a has been whitewashed by history, but “background” chapter. Thus he is able especially by Hollywood. During her Reviewed by Dale Ahlquist to get a huge amount of material to reign, the economy was in shambles, The Reformation came. Scotland went converge. It is an impressive achieve- with widespread, miserable poverty Protestant; Ireland went Catholic; England ment. In fact, there is only one thing unlike any known in the English past, went something or other. —G.K. Chesterton that could have made The Tudors the country was wasting its resources (Daily News, March 16, 1905) better: he could have quoted more on unnecessary wars (while avoiding Chesterton! important battles, like Lepanto), and t is supremely ironic that the last For instance, the parallel that heroic priests were being hunted down most visible monarchy on earth Chesterton makes between Henry VIII and murdered. The culture was in com- survives in the nation that destroyed and Macbeth: plete chaos. It makes sense that the monarchy. There are apparently only escape at the time was through Both Henry and Macbeth were origi- a few traditionalists still roam- nally brave, good-humoured men, better art. It makes sense that Shakespeare’s Iing about who would like to restore great plays were born of adversity. rather than worse than their neighbours. monarchy as the preferred form of Both Henry and Macbeth hesitated over Mr. Meyer also defies the polite government. But they have to answer their first crime—the first stabbing and version of English history with his for Henry VIII. There is no one in all the first divorce. Both found out the sympathetic rendering of the first of history who did as much damage to fate which is in evil—for Macbeth went real Queen of England, who has been as many things as this English king. He on murdering and poor Henry went unjustly dubbed as “Bloody Mary.” She was able to destroy an entire culture, on marrying. There is only one fault in tried valiantly to reclaim the Catholic cutting it off from its past in one gener- the parallel. Unfortunately for history, culture that had been destroyed but ation, turn the entire tide of European Henry VIII was not deposed. was immensely handicapped by not civilization down a path of decadence, being able to restore to the Church any Mr. Meyer paints a fascinating stoke the bizarre revolt of the rich of its vast monastic property, which double portrait of Henry VIII and Martin against the poor that still plagues us had been stolen by the aristocracy, Luther, bitter enemies who never met, today, loot a nation twice over, and kill and that had previously provided social but who ended in strange if unconfessed a bunch of innocent people in the pro- stability across the country. sympathy for one another. Chesterton cess, whether they were his enemies or In spite of its self-imposed igno- sums up the strangeness nicely: his friends. He was able to do all this rance regarding its past, England is damage only because he was a king. The debate between Luther and finally beginning to face the fact that Fuhrers, Dictators, and even Presidents Henry VIII can hardly be called a serious the stone which the builders rejected come and go, and someone usually incident—partly because Luther himself has become the head of the corner. cleans up the mess after them. None on this occasion confined himself almost Pope Benedict’s triumphant visit to has ever wreaked as much complete entirely to the most foul-mouthed per- England for the beatification of Bl. sonal abuse; and partly because Henry and lasting havoc as this incredibly Cardinal Newman demonstrated that afterwards did all he could to deserve a powerful and pathetic character. great deal of abuse. history cannot be suppressed forever. But as former Gilbert Magazine The Church of England, founded on a columnist Jerry Meyer points out in And perhaps Chesterton offers the king’s impetuous divorce, is a house his lucid and luscious account of the best single summation of the king in built on sand, and it has been sink- Tudor era, it has remained impossible question: “Such strength as Henry VIII ing and sliding for five centuries, even to condemn Henry VIII outright. Why? had was the strength of a badly trained while trying to put a good English face Because “to do so would be to bring horse that bolts.” on it. But Newman, then Chesterton, into question the English Reforma- I am pleased to know that and many others, found their way tion” and, even more importantly, “the this hefty volume is selling briskly. back to the Church built on the rock legitimacy of the people who...owned Although people enjoy seeing prevail- that even the royal vandals could not and governed the empire.” ing attitudes knocked upside down, Mr. destroy.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 35 : t h e D e t e cti o n C l u b : Mel said: “Yeah, well, he wanted Jenny to marry that Norman Fredericks “The mystery of life is the plainest part of it.” —G.K. Chesterton guy. And I think Fredericks was in it for Jenny’s dough.” “Isn’t that part of the attraction for you too?” “I’ll say this,” Mel admitted, “I make a good living, but sharing Jenny’s for- Alias Mel Kirby tune would sure as hell take the pressure off.” by John Peterson “I think I once told you this,” Harry said, “but the people who contract for el Kelly spotted his friend “Well, it concerns you and Jenny, my services—well, I never know who they Harry as soon as he entered and it is not really very good news.” are. I’ve always liked that way of doing the cocktail bar, and he stood Harry paused to take a sip of his things. Anyway, for the first time since I and waved until the other whiskey. went to work for my present employers, I man saw him. Harry was Mel had been married but that had did a little digging, and I found out who Mcarrying a briefcase and wearing a ended in a divorce some years in the the client is. It’s Aaron Jenkins.” huge grin. past. The experience had embittered “What? Jenny’s brother?” “I sold everything,” Harry said, as him toward women and romance, and “Jenny’s brother.” soon as he was seated at Mel’s table for many years he had never remarried “Who does he want killed?” and had ordered a beer. “Your stocks or even dated. That changed when he “Not to put too sharp an edge on it, and mutual funds, the house, and all met Jenny. There were two things Mel my friend, but Jenny’s kindly brother the furniture. I have the payout from liked about her. For one thing, she has invested some big bucks in the your life insurance policy. Oh, and was crazy about him. For another, she idea that you are going to come to an there were a bunch of your personal and her brother had divided a huge untimely end.” things that I packed in a trunk and inheritance when their wealthy father “You’re going to bump me off?” stored at my place. So, here’s a check was killed in an automobile accident. “No. I’ve got a better idea. It’s a com- for the full amount except the windage There wasn’t much more to recom- plicated plan, but it will work. It starts I took out for my expenses.” mend Jenny, but nothing more was with you handing over your wallet and “What a friend you are,” Mel said. required as far as Mel was concerned. your car keys.” He was now, as Harry knew very well, “Something has happened to Mel complied. Harry then handed using the name Mel Kirby, not Mel Jenny?” Mel had asked. “Something him a different wallet and another set of Kelly, and the check had been made bad?” car keys. The new wallet contained ten payable to this new identity. For his part, Harry was a four-time one-hundred dollar bills and an array of “You look pretty sharp with that loser in the divorce courts, but he ID and credit cards for someone named mustache,” Harry said. never stopped interacting with women. Mel Kirby. Mel’s own picture was on the While waiting for his friend to He said he would probably marry driver’s license. show up, Mel had sipped his Man- again as soon as he found someone he “Here’s your new birth certificate, hattan and tried to remember that thought was interesting. and a diploma that proves you have a momentous day a year ago when he “Nothing has happened to Jenny,” bachelor’s degree in business,” Harry and Harry had, to put it mildly, a Harry said, “and I don’t know of said. “And here’s your last will and testa- blockbuster of a conversation. The two anything bad that will happen to ment. Sign it.” Harry signed. friends shared many common interests her. I’m afraid what I have to say Mel bought into the plan after Harry including golf, poker, the theater, and concerns you.” had explained it fully. Mel was to take long discussions about the meaning of Earning a living was another area the car Harry provided and to start a life—discussions that many men would of life that separated the two men. Mel new life far from where they now lived. find hopelessly boring. However, no was a salesman and by all reports a By a stroke of luck, Harry had another one could possibly have found this highly effective one. He liked to say target who was close to Mel’s size and discussion boring. that selling is “a form of robbery based weight. This man would be found in “Thanks for being here,” Harry on telling persuasive lies.” Harry was the burning wreckage of Mel’s car. The had said, beginning the conversation a professional killer, and from some cause of death would be a broken neck that would change Mel’s life for- of his stories, Mel surmised that his sustained in a highway accident. Of ever. “I know it was short notice, but friend, like himself, was very good at course the man’s face and body would this is really important and it can’t what he did. be so badly burned as to be unidentifi- wait.” Harry had phoned Mel with the “You know that Jenny’s brother able, but, because the car was Mel’s… request that they meet without delay at dislikes you,” Harry said, “but I Harry planned to provide his employers one of their favorite taverns. don’t think you know how much he with this victim’s wallet as well as Mel’s. “I’m all ears,” Mel said. “Shoot.” dislikes you.” It was a standard way of announcing

36 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : T H e d e t e cti o n C l u b :

that the jobs had been successfully “This town is fairly out of the way, so I see you? Look, Mel, I can’t tell you completed. never see anyone I know from the past. how important this is. Are you sure?” The new will that Mel had signed But I got a jolt the other day. I was “He didn’t see me. Trust me.” made Harry his sole beneficiary. The making sales calls in Salt Lake City, “Yeah, well,” Harry said, “there plan was for Harry to liquidate all of and I picked a place to grab a quick are some very unforgiving folks back Mel’s holdings and bring the proceeds lunch—a place that was close to the home. They wouldn’t like the idea that to Mel when the dust had settled. customer’s office. So, who walks in the they paid me big money to get a job “Write me when you’re estab- front door but Norm Fredericks.” done and then learn that the target lished,” Harry had said, “and let me Harry jumped to his feet. “What? guy is still walking around.” know your address and phone. But Did he see you?” After dinner, the two men drove don’t sign the letter. No handwriting.” “No. I saw him first. I covered my back to Mel’s apartment. Harry was A question their waitress was face with my menu until he disap- used to tailing people. He was not asking jerked Mel back to the present. peared into the bar. Then I threw down used to being tailed himself. That’s “Yes,” he said, “Another Manhattan.” a twenty and beat it.” probably why he never noticed the two Then he turned to Harry and said, “You’re absolutely sure he didn’t cars that followed them.

badly wounded young man. This may Chesterton’s Bloodthirsty Heirs be history’s first mystery novel. The “I should enjoy nothing more than always writing detective detective is the pagan priest, Calasiris, stories, except always reading them.” —G.K. Chesterton who as the story unfolds links the Brief Reviews of the Contemporary Mystery Scene by Steve Miller lovers, Egyptian brigands, pirates, the oracle of Delphi, Persian warriors, and the armies of Ethiopia. Although one Julia Navarro. The of World War II, and to candidate for authorship is a fourth Bible of Clay (2006). modern Iraq on the eve of century Christian bishop, this is a Did Abraham compose the 2003 invasion. There is purely pagan world with oracles taken Genesis or at least the a race against time to find seriously and pre-Christian religious creation, flood, and the tablets before bombing ceremonies regarded as holy. Coinci- Tower of Babel stories? starts, to perpetrate the dence is rife but no more than in some Julia Navarro sees him greatest theft of antiquities works of Shakespeare and less than dictating the accounts to in history, to assassinate those of Thomas Hardy. Heliodorus a scribe on clay tablets one of Saddam Hussein’s has the excuse that the novel was left in an undiscovered intimates, and somehow to being invented and the gods probably temple in Iraq. Unlike tie up all the loose ends of enjoyed using chance to heighten the The Da Vinci Code, this a complex narrative. Alfred predicaments of mortals. Chesterton book assumes the Bible Tannenberg may be the would have appreciated the chastity of is true and scholarship most evil and ruthless man the lovers, the many reversals of fate such as higher criticism is false. G.K. who ever lived, but this is a tale of and fortune (a brigand chief becomes Chesterton would agree. But more struggles within struggles and amoral- a high priest), the stirring speeches than Indiana Jones-esque archeology, ity versus virtue. There are likeable with quotes from Homer, Euripides, this is a tale of revenge and deceit. A villains and terrifying heroines. The and Herodotus, the epic battles, the quartet of Holocaust survivors hunts ending is perhaps unsatisfying, though sudden appearance of characters the Nazi who murdered their families. true to the characters and who tie together narra- The Nazi, Alfred Tannenberg, with the story. Is the Old Testa- tive threads, the never three SS colleagues, has made the ment as violent, ambiguous, ending perils, and the theft of antiquities into a financial and disturbing as this book? final happy ending when empire. Tannenberg, nearing death, all seems lost. Unfortu- wishes to win respectability for his Heliodorus. Ethiopian nately like other Greek granddaughter Clara as the discov- Story (2nd–4th century novels, quite popular erer of a Biblical artifact. Revealing AD). On the banks of the in the Middle Ages and the Bible of Clay double-crosses his Nile is a scene of carnage. Renaissance, Ethiopian murderous associates and alerts former The remains of a feast Story was consigned by victims to his continued existence. The are littered with corpses. scholars to scorn and narrative shifts from Abrahamic times The only survivors are a obscurity in Chesterton’s to the Third Reich to the aftermath beautiful woman holding a time.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 37 : T H e d e t e cti o n C l u b : The Captain Nicholas Nicholson Casebook by Steve Miller

On Private Property

aptain Nicholas Nichol- influences. (2) This is one of INTRODUCING GKC son has a great fall. The Chesterton’s most macabre consequences seem to stories. The success of the in the 21st Centrury involve replacement of Saw movies shows how with quality products & services body parts. entertaining amputation can C be and may presage a movie The Mystery. Is efficiency version of this work. We can really to be found in turning only hope not. (3) In Humpty Chesterton Quote real arms and legs into artificial Dumpty’s case all the King’s horses ones? and all the King’s men could not Subplot. Why is the story entitled reassemble the unfortunate egg. “On Private Property?” With the right Prussian-Chinese T-SHIRTS physicians success might have Other Characters. The members Wit & Wisdom to Wear! been achieved. Would Dumpty have of a Socialist society; the girl in the been happier? (4) G.K. Chester- tea shop who seems to have vanished; ton always understood the value the family solicitor whose invest- DAILY GKC QUOTE of simple human things. Artificial ments may be unwise; mysterious limbs and an artificial well-regulated men in white coats and spectacles via Twitter, Facebook, and email world deprive us of life’s basic who may be Prussian or Chinese; a pleasures such as hugging a girl or man with a shaven head and goggles kicking a lawyer. who despises natural legs and arms; UNCLE CHESTNUT BOOK & Nicholson’s breakfast companion; The Opening. “When Captain the cloakroom attendant for artificial Nicholas Nicholson found himself legs; the official who confiscates TABLE GYPE falling head downwards through Nicholson’s artificial arms when he empty space, the whole of his for little ones & the young at heart goes for a walk; and the attendants at previous life passed before him. At an ordinary hospital. least if it did not, the narrator of Location. Falling through space; a his adventures will certainly say it MICROCAPITALISM: hospital that believes in amputation; did; as it affords that unscrupulous a residence for those with artificial scribe the most rapid method of limbs; and an ordinary hospital. describing who the Captain was and DISTRIBUTISM 2.0 how he happened to be in mid air Publishing History. “On Private Read the Manifesto for FREE! at the moment. He would describe Property” was first published in at length the life at a public school, the March 19, 1927, issue of G.K.’s the first faint stirrings of the human Weekly. In 1986, Marie Smith’s book brain at Cambridge, the joining CHESTERTON SEARCH Daylight and Nightmare: Uncol- of a Socialist society, the growing lected Stories and Fables of G.K. Search the text of GKC’s writings belief in social order and system Chesterton included the story. It of the German type so abruptly apparently has not been published in interrupted by enlistment in 1914, any volume of G.K. Chesterton’s Col- the incident of the girl in the tea- lected Works, compiled by Ignatius. shop of whom he could never find VISIT US ON THE WEB Notable Allusions. (1) Nich- further traces, the quarrel with the olson’s thought processes have solicitor who had put all the family EternalRevolution.com apparently been warped by public patrimony to the higher purposes school, Cambridge University, social- of finance, and finally the experi- ism, and the worship of German ence in the Air Force which had JOIN US ON FACEBOOK efficiency. The story illustrates what terminated in the way described facebook.com/EternalRevolution nightmares follow from such sinister above.”

38 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : T H e d e t e cti o n C l u b :

Schram left the series midway Tony Shalhoub: He’s the guy! through the third season, possibly by Chris Chan due to a dispute with the producers, although the true facts of the behind- robably no other American of the perpetrator is known, à la the-scenes situation has never been television series has brought me Columbo, so the bulk of Monk’s mys- revealed. Sharona was written out of more consistent, undiluted plea- teries are how-dunits, where the great the series, only returning for a single sure than Monk, the recently detective has to figure out how an alibi guest appearance in the final season. concluded mystery-comedy was concocted or the motive behind Monk still needed constant help, Pseries starring Tony Shalhoub in the unusual actions. If one is familiar with so the character of Natalie Teeger title role. The exact reason for this is the mini-mysteries of Hy Conrad, a (Traylor Howard), was introduced hard to pinpoint. Monk is both comedy producer and frequent writer for the to fill the void. On paper, Natalie and tragedy, a show so entertaining show, one will have a head start on was essentially a copy of Sharona, a that its most profound observations the solution for most of the episodes. single mother struggling to make about the natures of life and sanity are Even if one figures out the crime’s ends meet, albeit with less brashness often overlooked, anchored by Shal- solution early on, it is always worth and nursing skills. Monk’s instant houb’s remarkable performance. it to watch Shalhoub at work. In the attachment to her was a bit of a As the series opens, Adrian Monk hands of other actors, the role of the leap, and the relationships between is the former wunderkind of the San permanently nervous sleuth would Natalie and the other characters Francisco Homicide Department, have been played as a broad carica- took the better part of a season to forced out of his job after a mental ture, with every twitch and fear played mature, and Natalie’s personality also breakdown caused by up for silly laughs. Had needed time to develop and differen- the car-bomb murder of Monk been a mere tiate itself from Sharona. Although his beloved wife, Trudy clown, with his worries Sharona is my favorite of the two, (played mostly by Melora presented as mere buf- Natalie grew on me, and by the end Hardin in flashbacks foonery, the character of the fourth season she comes into and dream sequences). would not have been her own. Devastated by his loss nearly as sympathetic. There were other cast changes and frustrated by his The heart of Shalhoub’s over the years. Stanley Kamel inability to catch the performance is the fact served as Monk’s patient therapist culprit, Monk’s originally that Monk has allowed Dr. Charles Kroger for three-quarters moderate case of obses- his grief to become of the series’ run, but unfortunately sive-compulsive disorder the ruling force of his Kamel succumbed to a heart attack deteriorated to the point life. Monk is clearly an after season six, and Hector Elizondo that he could no longer incredibly unhappy man. assumed the role of Monk’s new function. Monk developed If all of the great stories psychiatrist Dr. Neven Bell. Both men phobias to hundreds of items, ranging are at heart love stories, the eight- shine as skilled professionals dealing from germs and heights to wind, frogs, season saga of Monk is the love story with a deeply damaged patient. Most and milk. between a man and his deceased wife, episodes contain plenty of guest stars. Through the assistance of his and his inability to experience joy In most series, the frequent famous private nurse, Sharona Fleming (Bitty after her death. faces are a mere gimmick to attract Schram), Monk resumed solving Thankfully, there is a second- viewers, but on Monk the stunt cast- mysteries as a special consultant for ary love story forming the soul of ing works. My favorite of all the guest the police force. Though he remained Monk, and that is the relationship stars is John Turturro as Ambrose dependent on moist towelettes to save between a badly damaged man and Monk, the detective’s agoraphobic him from germs, and upon Sharona his friends. Stottlemeyer is primarily brother. to assist him with every aspect of a consistently irritated foil for Monk Shalhoub had a thriving career daily life, he managed to solve cases early in the series, but afterwards the as a quirky character actor prior to that stumped the regular police force, character is improved and developed Monk, and he will almost certainly much to the chagrin of the perpetually into Monk’s friend and ally, although continue his success in the future, frustrated Captain Leland Stottlemeyer he never ceases to be annoyed by although Monk will always be his (Ted Levine) and the well-meaning Monk’s eccentricities. Sharona and signature role. The only disappoint- albeit often-clueless Lieutenant Randy Monk work as a wonderful odd couple ment about Monk is that it ended Disher (Jason Gray-Stanford). during the first two and a half seasons, after only eight seasons, though it Though each episode of Monk with the tough, practical, smart- had potential for more. Ten seasons contains a murder investigation, only a mouthed nurse and single mother would have been far better, and a handful of the episodes are technically keeping her boss as closely tethered nice round number would have fit whodunits. In many cases, the identity to reality as possible. Unfortunately, Monk’s predilections too.

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 39 : T h e s I g n at u r e o f m a n : of the fireworks are as festive and as Chesterton on Art varied; but behind them is the darkness. They themselves are their only illumina- tion; even as in that stern philosophy, man is his own star. The rockets of ruby Stained Glass and sapphire fade away slowly upon the by G.K. Chesterton dome of hollowness and darkness. But the kings and saints in the old Gothic he value of the old monasticism stricken on fire with crimson and gold, windows, dusky and opaque in this hour had been that there was not flamboyant and full of the war of the of midnight, still contain all their power only an ethical but an economic heavens at that moment when the sun of full flamboyance, and await the rising repose. Out of that repose had seems to turn to bay. The sixth would of the sun. come the works for which the be of green and silver, and typify the From “The Three Orders,” St. Francis of Assisi; Tworld will never be sufficiently grate- sad and universal pardon that lingers “A Hole in the Caste,” The Return of Don Quix- ful, the preservation of the classics, the in the sky after the fall of the sun. The ote; Introduction to Theodore Maynard’s Poems, beginning of the Gothic, the schemes of seventh would, by the lawful opera- 1919; “The Meaning of the Theatre,” Lunacy science and philosophies, the illumi- tion of a good design, be utterly black and Letters; “The Fading Fireworks,” Alarms nated manuscripts and the coloured and brooding, a drift of dark clouds, and Discursions. glass. One of the lost arts is stained declaring powerfully the final divinity glass. of darkness. It would seem a fine and The visible clue to the Middle Ages artistic ending. is colour. The mediaeval man could Nevertheless, one condemning and paint before he could draw. In the decisive thing would have to be said. almost startling inspiration which we The last window with its dome of utter call stained glass, he discovered some- darkness, would not be a good window; thing that is almost more coloured than it would not be a window at all. For colour; something that bears the same behind all designs for specific windows relation to mere colour that golden stands eternally the essential idea of flame does to golden sand. He did not, a window; and the essential idea of a like other artists, try in his pictures to window is a thing which admits light. A paint the sun; he made the sun paint dark window cannot be a good window, his pictures. He mixed the aboriginal though it may be an excellent picture. light with the paints upon his palette. We should have to sacrifice the inter- Let us suppose that an incom- nally artistic character of the seventh parable artist in stained glass were design to the fact that when externally asked to design seven church windows considered, when taken in connection symbolically representing the periods with the peculiar objects of the work of day and night in connection with concerned, it was inartistic. seven great moods of man. He would I have heard it said that the whole conceive the first window in white, che- art of fireworks came first from the quered faintly with a pale gold and rose, land of Confucius. There is something expressing the young austerity of the not inappropriate in such an origin. The dawn, its pure passions and its innocent art of coloured glass can truly be called colours. He would fill the second pane the most typically Christian of all arts with gold, darkening or rather enrich- or artifices. The art of coloured lights ing itself, into brown towards the edges, is as essentially Confucian as the art of expressing the masculinity of things, coloured windows is Christian. Estheti- the triumph and even the insolence of cally, they produce somewhat the same the sun. The third would be of a dense impression on the fancy; the impres- blue, that blue of midday, which in the sion of something glowing and magical; very tropical intensity of summer has a something at once mysterious and resemblance to the midnight darkness. transparent. But the difference between The fourth would be full of a cer- their substance and structure is the tain pale purple of afternoon, a purple whole difference between the great tinged with silver, which suggests more Western faith and the great Eastern completely than any earthly thing the agnosticism. The Christian windows are conception of resignation and order, solid and human, made of heavy lead, detail of the Rose window in the an endless ending of things. The fifth of hearty and characteristic colours; but cathedral at Chartres, 12th century would be the window of the sunset, behind them is the light. The colours

40 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : C h e s t e r t o n u n i v e r s it y : we discover the secular life. “We have had to search the cathedrals to find An Introduction to the Writings of G.K. Chesterton by Dale Ahlquist the guilds.” Of course, there is little inter- est these days in either cathedrals or Windows on the Past guilds. “Modern men,” says Chesterton, “are less anxious to be men than to be and on the Present modern.” In considering the Wife of Bath on her pilgrimage to the Canter- The Apostle and the Wild Ducks bury Cathedral, Chesterton muses: “I suppose the whole stretch of history n 1974, the centenary of G.K. We see Christmas while looking at from the medieval to the modern world, Chesterton’s birth, there was a ancient pagan festivals. We see adults might be summed up in the reversal small but spirited attempt to create fighting while looking at children play- of that journey.” Our present pilgrim- a Chesterton revival. Two or three ing. We see the present while looking age is away from the Church towards books about Chesterton were pub- at the past. hygiene. We are no longer concerned Ilished, The G.K. Chesterton Society While most all the essays flash with spiritual cleansing, only with health was founded, The Chesterton Review brilliantly with Chesterton’s verbal and beauty. was started, and, well, nothing else. As fireworks, the title essay is actually quite Man searches for the sacred. we all know, the 1970s were The Dark subtle. Why this curious juxtaposition of Because many different cultures find the Ages, probably the worst decade in the an apostle and wild ducks? Chesterton sacred in many different things, it does history of human existence. You just gives an account of visiting the fens of not mean, as the modern skeptic con- have to look at my high school gradua- Norfolk, which are loved by sportsmen cludes, that nothing is sacred; it means tion picture for proof. as an ideal setting for duck hunting. that something is sacred. One year later, Dorothy Collins Why, for instance, is a home more released a collection of Chesterton sacred than a hotel? Because even essays under the title of The Apostle though we have conveniences in a hotel, and the Wild Ducks. This would be we do not have ownership. It is owner- the last book of his writings edited by ship that allows us to be creative, to someone who had a direct link with carve something or cut up something Chesterton. Hereafter, all the post- the way we want it. Chesterton argues humous books must, I suppose, be that where that power of ownership considered second and third genera- “is democratically distributed men are tion, even if they are pure Chesterton. more than citizens, they are all artists.” Dorothy’s excellent and well- I need not repeat for the hundredth integrated collection of essays span time that the case against communism Chesterton’s entire career, but it is is not a case for capitalism; indeed the amazing how we cannot detect a dif- He is told of a medieval church that case against communism is that it is ference in his voice in essays written contains wall paintings of wild ducks, much too like capitalism. It matters decades apart, even when they are laid thereby demonstrating how ancient was little whether our allegorical hotel is out side by side. The style is the same. this sport. He and his companions make called by capitalists an hotel or by com- The philosophy is the same. Though their way to the remote church and view munists a hostel. The case against it is she was Chesterton’s personal secretary its impressive wall paintings of the apos- that it is not a home, and that the spirit and his literary executrix, she did not tles, but no one sees any ducks in the of man will never feel at home in it. know the original source of some of paintings. Disappointed, they are about The volume concludes with one the essays, and, even though she claims to leave, when he suddenly notices of Chesterton’s most sublime essays, none of these essays have been col- something about the figure of St. Paul: “What is Right with the World,” which lected before, one of them had actually on the interior of his embroidered gar- would have remained hidden much appeared, ironically, in Chesterton’s ment is a design that is distinctly “ducks longer if Dorothy Collins had not dusted very first book of essays,The Defen- all over.” Ducks with dogs pursuing it off and brought it out. It is fitting dant, seventy-five years earlier. Geir them, no less. The local artist had man- that this was her final contribution to Hasnes had not yet arrived. aged to include his favorite sport while her master’s books. But hidden within The collection is divided into five depicting the Apostle to the Gentiles. the text she may have captured Ches- different sections: on time and place What is the point of this appar- terton’s own humble assessment of his (under the guise of history and travel), ently pointless parable? It shows that life’s work: “I wish I could claim that I on literature, on reflection, and on common men, not just clerics, were had ever supplied poetry to anything; it that rich and wonderful Chestertonian connected to the Church. And the seems to me that I am at the very best topic, things in general. Reading each larger lesson is that it is only by study- a humdrum scientific student noting it essay is like looking through a window. ing the religious life of this period that down.”

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 41 : F e a r o f f I l m : Dawson (Sean Bean), an entrepreneur drunk with the arrogance of wealth and power. The police are curiously reluctant to investigate Dawson, for reasons eventually revealed as having to do with a secret business partner- Red Riding Is No Fairy Tale ship with him, and when Dunford places his trust in the wrong people, tragedy ensues. Red Riding Trilogy (2009) cherished creed: “To the North, where 1980 centers around the only we do what we want!” which is the only honest policeman in the Trilogy (at In the Year of Our Lord 1973 local measure of right and wrong. least in his professional life), Peter Directed by Julian Jarrold The Trilogy intertwines fictional Hunter, who is brought in from In the Year of Our Lord 1980 murders with the real-life slayings of Scotland Yard to investigate the Directed by James Marsh the Yorkshire Ripper. The Trilogy’s Yorkshire Ripper slayings. The regular most obvious villain is the Yorkshire Yorkshire police are reluctant to pry In the Year of Our Lord 1983 police force, an irredeemably corrupt into these murders, since the serial Directed by Anand Tucker institution as ruthless and venal as any killer’s crimes threaten to throw light All three parts written by Tony Grisoni, organized crime syndicate. Throughout upon their own illegal activities. The based on the novels by David Peace the series, innocents are tortured into police block Hunter’s investigation at false confessions, truths are covered every turn, and Hunter’s crumbling Reviewed by Chris Chan up at extreme and bloody costs, and personal life does little to alleviate the all that is good and pure is slaughtered situation. Hunter eventually discovers he Red Riding Trilogy is a mas- on the altar of profit. The amounts a witness who reveals that the West terwork that displays the depths of joy and humor in the Trilogy are Yorkshire Constabulary is capable of of human depravity, depicting microscopic, yet the viewing experi- even greater atrocities than previously a community deprived of any ence, distressing as it often is, never thought, but how can one bring the genuine moral authority, thereby fails to be thoroughly engrossing. criminal justice system itself to justice? Texploring the nature of evil without a Each of the three films has a differ- The final entry, 1983, centers shred of moralizing or grandstanding. ent character (or multiple characters) on three characters, each trying to Yet for all the sickening wickedness at the heart of the story. In 1974, the escape their pasts and bring some that permeates every frame of this protagonist is Eddie Dunford (Andrew light to a very dark world. The first dark and gritty series, the Trilogy Garfield), a young and overconfident two are minor characters in the never descends into the cheap and journalist whose determination to earlier films. BJ (Robert Sheehan) is popular nihilism that is so prevalent catch a scoop leads him to investigate a young male prostitute, traumatized in today’s entertainment. Satanic vice a series of serial kidnappings and by horrific crimes. Maurice Jobson may dominate this five-hour epic, and murders. Dunford’s prying draws him (David Morrissey) is a detective who though by the series’ end there is little into a romantic relationship with the has long lacked the nerve to fight the purifying purgation or comforting mother of one of the victims, and culture of corruption that has drained justice enacted; truth, redemption, and the clues eventually lead to John the police force of any semblance of moral courage take their stand against the implacable forces of darkness and score a victory. The Trilogy is based on four novels by David Peace, although the second entry in the series was deleted and its contents apportioned to the other three parts: 1974, 1980, and 1983. Each of these made-for- television movies was helmed by a different director and was filmed in a different format, giving each a distinct atmosphere, though all three share recurring characters and a labyrinthine plot. The Trilogy is set in Yorkshire, in Northern England, a largely rural area that looks upon the urban southern regions of Great Britain with undis- guised hostility. They have their own

42 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : F e a r o f f I l m : moral authority, and he is forced to step outside the law in order to right some of the very great wrongs he has helped perpetuate. The last and argu- ably the most touching performance of the three leads is John Piggott (Mark Addy), a depressed schlub of a lawyer who gradually grows a spine and becomes a hero, risking his life to expose the injustice that putrefies everything it touches. Piggott is unwill- ingly dragged into the fray to defend a wrongly accused man, and as he struggles to escape from his abusive policeman father’s shadow, he comes to realize that the Yorkshire Police are madly trying to suppress a secret that cannot be hidden much longer. 1983 takes the unanswered ques- tions of the earlier films and reveals that a very real and dangerous wolf in sheep’s clothing has orchestrated the ambiguity. There is no thorough quick snatches of dialogue. The identi- major events of the Red Riding Trilogy. summation explaining all the clues ties of the villains are clear by the end The horrifying secret at the heart of the and charting out everything that of the Trilogy, although the extent of series is so vile, so shattering, that the happened, as in the best traditions of their crimes is not. Even after repeated depths of the iniquity are only revealed Agatha Christie. Peace’s conclusion viewings, even the most alert person in a maddeningly oblique manner in implies rather than openly explains, cannot be faulted for not being com- the final minutes of1983 . and the details behind several of the pletely sure what happened, although Part of the Trilogy’s power lies crimes can only be inferred by piecing no one can doubt that what happened in its vagueness and carefully crafted together brief flashback scenes and was utterly demonic.

Socialism

;;Socialism is a system which makes the corporate unity the popular thing. It is the opposite of the truth that prop- of society responsible for all its economic processes, or erty is privilege. The truth is that communism is for the all those affecting life and essential living. If anything few and property for the many. Certain minds have always important is sold, the Government has sold it; if anything perceived that life would be simplified without posses- important is given, the Government has given it; if anything sions, as it would be simplified without passions. But so to important is even tolerated, the Government is responsible simplify the whole of human life would be rather to nullify for tolerating it. (“The Beginning of the Quarrel,” The Outline of Sanity) it. (Illustrated London News, Oct. 25, 1919)

;;Mechanical collectivism is a desperate remedy, a Nihilist ;;Let us say plainly that Socialism is not a thing fit for remedy, like teetotalism. (Illustrated London News, Nov. 16, 1907) angels, but simply a thing unfit for men; not because men are below Socialism, but because they are above it. ;;The Socialist is not wrong because he realizes that things Because honour, and lordship of a little place, and defence have been lawlessly scattered. The Socialist is wrong of the family, and rational defiance of the powers of the because he wants to sweep up all the scattered things world, are not things of which we are ashamed; they are into one monstrous heap in the market-place instead of not weak indulgences, but natural rights. (Illustrated London News, putting them back in their proper places all over the town. June 29, 1912) Because the explosion has gutted grandfather’s clock and sprinkled the works of it all over the pavement, he says ;;What it is worthwhile to point out, first and last, is that that grandfather’s clock never belonged to grandfather, but Socialism is a tyranny; that it is inevitably, even avowedly only to the Commissioners of Paving. (Illustrated London News, May and almost justifiably, a tyranny. It is the presence that 12, 1923) government can prevent all injustice by being directly responsible for practically anything that happens. (Illustrated ;;It is because the sense of property is primary and not London News, Oct. 10, 1925) artificial that the whole philosophy of communism is fun- damentally false. (Illustrated London News, Jan. 5, 1924) ;;Socialism is Manichean, and castrates men to keep them pure. (Platitudes Undone) ;;It is really the opposite of the truth that communism is

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 43 : t h e d I s t r i b u ti s T m a r k e t P l a c e :

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44 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : th e d I s t r i b u ti s T m a r k e tp l a c e :

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Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 45 : C h e s t e r t o n ’ s m a i l b a g :

Gilbert Keith Chesterton Answers His Mail our correspondent contemplates a Utopia in which all men shall wander about inventing machines out of their Two Letters to the Editor own wild fancy. But it seems the general result of machinery that most of G.K.’s Weekly, and of the men are turned into machines, not into original geniuses who invent Chesterton’s Replies machines. With all allowance to the other side we think therefore that machinery should be the exception SIR, of choice in one’s work, and so on. At and not the rule. It is surely desirable to see present we have machinery, the manu- (Aug. 1, 1925) whether we can all agree as to what is facture and use of which are tragically drudgery? I think we cannot. “Drudg- perverted and exploited by financiers ; ; ; ery” implies hard and uninteresting to suit their own selfish ends, and so toil, and one thinks immediately of the new drudgery has been artificially cre- SIR, old saying that: “What is one man’s ated in spite of the efforts of engineers It is difficult to see how the appall- meat is another man’s poison.” (Fol- to reduce it. In short, I submit that ing science of war can be applied lowed by the further reflection that it is the machinery of Finance that is successfully without the more appall- in these days of business “enterprise,” enslaving us all to-day, not the machin- ing science of specialisation, or the one man’s meat is quite likely to be ery of engineers. division of labour to the nth term. his own poison, too.) Mr. Penty, after Yours faithfully, More ships and bigger ones, more watching other people work, concludes Hugh P. Vowles aeroplanes and faster ones, more that concrete mixing is not drudgery. guns, more transport, more shells. All He also thinks (Heaven help him!) that We are not (as we have often these are needed unless we are to have digging is not drudgery. Perhaps he did said) extremists about the extinc- another children’s crusade. A man not merely watch this latter operation tion of machinery; though we should cannot make shells in his back garden. but directed it—from a distance, with a have no hesitation whatever in Some portion of our commercialism telescope and a speaking trumpet. On extinguishing machinery, if it really is necessary to defend our civilisation. the other hand, he believes that engi- were the only way back to liberty and This portion is very large. My ques- neering processes—the manufacture of property. But when all allowance is tion is: “How do you intend to abolish steel and work in foundries, for exam- made for their point of view, the fact commercialism without leaving our ple—are so arduous that the gain due does surely remain that mechanical civilisation a prey to the barbarians?” to labour-saving devices is offset by the work is mechanical. We mean that Or alternatively, “How do you propose loss involved in their manufacture. Let it is by a special necessity mechani- to reform a thing so rotten?” me assure him that many of us who cal. This truth is involved, not so Yours faithfully. have actually worked in front of blast much in the evils of machinery, as John B. Townson furnaces and in foundries are thank- in the very merits of machinery. It ful that this has at least saved us from is the whole point of machinery, it We have often thought of the the ghastly necessity of digging a field! is the whole pride and perfection of very real difficulty our correspondent There are, in fact, many men who find machinery, that its ultimate work- raises, the fact that machinery may such work easier and more interesting, ing is minutely exact, and therefore still appear necessary for interna- even under present conditions, than invariable. Simpler forms of work, tional self-defence even when it has digging in field or garden, or milking that deal with different soils and almost ceased to seem necessary for cows or rearing hens and pigs. We may states of weather in different ways, anything else. If we were common be eccentric, we may be quite mad, really are more opportunist. They are cosmopolitans it would not affect us: but that is how we feel about it. I think more akin to the arts and crafts, in but nothing would induce us to give Mr. Penty over-accentuates the drudg- which each problem may be a unique up England except to a unity that ery, which is at present associated with and unexpected one to be dealt with would really express her. It seems the making of labour-saving devices in a different fashion. Now a large to us there are two reforming stages and machinery generally—just as no machine, if it is a good machine, not to be confused. One is the easing doubt I over-accentuate the drudgery must be made so that all its small of capitalist congestion by the better of digging. He does not sufficiently effects are similar. The task of invent- distribution of wealth; and that we allow for the compensations which a ing a machine may be as imaginative can set about very soon. The other is man finds in the work he likes; nor for as the task of inventing a poem. But a new era for the whole world, and the possibility of a civilisation based on the task of minding a machine must depends on conversion as well as machinery wherein drudgery might be mean seeing that the mechanism is construction. almost eliminated by greater freedom mechanical. We do not know whether (June 27, 1925)

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❏ Visa ❏ Mc ❏ Amex ❏ Disc # (Or include your check/MO) Exp. Date Signature : N e w s W I T H v I e w s : increase the supply of implantable Compiled by the Gilbert Magazine News-Gathering Staff organs the team, consisting of two Emergency Medical Technicians, an organ donor family services special- ist, and an emergency physician, will monitor 911 calls and respond with- out summons to the home of anyone one between the ages of eighteen and sixty who is in danger of dying “When the real revolution happens, it of cardiac arrest. Once there, the won’t be mentioned in the newspapers.” team will have fifty minutes after the person is declared dead to load the When art goes to one’s head Rules is Rules body into their Organ Preservation Ambulance, hook it up to a machine NEW YORK, N.Y.—Wafaa Bilal is SHARON SPRINGS, Kan.—When to restore blood circulation, and an interactive and performance artist alert Union Pacific rail crew employees get it to a hospital where the body with a knack for creating contro- saw smoke coming from one of the will be provided with supplemental versy. His 2007 piece, “Domestic cars of their coal train they imme- oxygen. There is no word on what Tension,” allowed virtual users to diately stopped in compliance with would happen should circulating shoot him with a paintball gun 24 established rules. They quickly deter- blood and fresh oxygen revive a hours a day. Calling the work a sharp mined the problem was a faulty wheel potential donor; we suspect, following piece of political art, the Chicago bearing that became overheated and the movie script, the team might try Tribune named Bilal its artist of the melted, letting a metal support drop to convince him that he’s either dead year. For his next effort Bilal created down and grind on the rail, leaving a or may as well be. a video game piece, “Virtual Jihadi,” trail of white hot molten metal in its in which he inserted an avatar of wake. The bigger problem was that Healthy, wealthy, and unwise himself as a suicide bomber hunting when the train stopped: the damaged then-President George W. Bush. This rail car was resting on a creosote- LONDON—From what we gather, time Bilal’s work received recogni- coated wooden bridge. Sensing there Chesterton could tolerate science but tion from both the city of Troy, could be further complications, the didn’t have much use for celebrity. A New York, which closed down the crew requested permission to move British group, Sense About Science exhibition, and the New York Civil the train a bit further. Union Pacific (SAS), is of a similar mind. In a list Liberties Union, which sued the city management, with the wisdom of of what they view as the year’s worst for censoring it. Not content with experts far removed from the situation, abuses against science, SAS called awards and lawsuits, Bilal has upped informed them the rules prohibited out several absurd health suggestions the ante with his latest project, “The moving any train found to have a glitterati on both sides of the Atlantic 3rd I.” Courtesy of a small digital defective part. While the higher-ups have embraced. For instance pop camera implanted in the back of his were exercising their authority things star Sarah Harding is said to crumble head, Bilal will record everything that did get more complicated, as the charcoal over her food in order to goes on behind his back for the next wooden bridge caught fire and eventu- absorb “all the bad damaging stuff year. During that time the camera ally collapsed. Despite the rules, the in the body.” Soccer star David will transmit images every minute train moved—although not in a direc- Beckham and soon-to-be-royal Kate to monitors at the Arab Museum tion likely to gladden the hearts of Middleton have been sporting holo- of Modern Art in Doha, Qatar. The Union Pacific’s shareholders. Maybe gram-embedded silicone bracelets artist, who also teaches at New York the railroad’s managers were follow- that they claim will improve energy University, said the camera position- ing the rules for the sake of efficiency; and fitness. Our favorite tip, although ing was meant as an “allegorical however, as Chesterton said, efficiency one we won’t be trying any time statement about the things we don’t has no philosophy for incidents before soon, comes from supermodel Naomi see and leave behind,” and expects they happen. Campbell, Ashton Kutcher, and Demi the project will raise “important Moore, who periodically live for up social, aesthetic, political, techno- “Bring out your liver…” to two weeks on nothing more than logical, and artistic questions.” What maple syrup, lemon, and pepper to these might be, along with the project NEW YORK, NY— Eminiscent of cleanse their systems. We humbly itself, is beyond our understanding. the “Bring out your dead” scene from suggest that Moore, Campbell and G.K. Chesterton observed: “The good Monty Python and the Holy Grail, the the others form their own SAS group, artist is he who can be understood; City of New York has established an with the first and last letters standing it is the bad artist who is ‘misunder- Organ Donation Unit, which will comb for “stupid” and “suggestions;” we stood.’” Using these criteria, we can the city looking for body parts from leave it to readers to supply an apt guess how G.K. would classify Bilal. the recently deceased. Intended to three letter word for the middle.

48 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 : N e w s W I T H v I e w s :

Progressive parliamentarians teetotaler; or...he must be a Moslem complained that the water wasn’t as rather than a Christian on the moral soft as it looked and that he’d suffered GENEVA, Switzerland—The upper problem of wine.” In a bit of para- a sprained ankle. What no one real- house of the Swiss parliament has dox Chesterton no doubt would have ized at the time was Stevic had landed drafted a bill to decriminalize sex appreciated, Dragan Stevic, neither square on the head of the shark that between consenting family members, Moslem nor temperate, is Egypt’s had been terrorizing tourists for weeks, or what is otherwise known as incest. newest hero. Stevic, a native of Serbia, killing it instantly. When the shark Green party MP Daniel Vischer, one of was vacationing at Egypt’s premiere washed up on the beach a short time the bill’s backers, said in what had to resort on the Red Sea and after a night later Stevic was credited with single- be a painful twist of logic that incest of heavy drinking, he decided a dip in handedly saving the tourism season. is “a difficult moral question,” even the sea would sort him out. Handing Dubbing him “Shark el Sheikh,” grate- though he had no difficulty approving his beer to a friend he climbed up to a ful resort owners awarded Stevic a free of inter-familial hanky-panky. Other high-diving board and took a running vacation. Unfortunately he couldn’t col- supporters claim incest laws are leap into the water. To his surprise and lect right away, as he was hospitalized “obsolete” while offering no arguments that of onlookers Stevic didn’t make with alcohol poisoning shortly after his as to why this is the case—sort of like much of a splash. Back on shore he heroic act. the progressives Chesterton described as being in favor of Thursday because it wasn’t Wednesday. A final argument Clerihew Corner The Imitators for dumping the law was that it was unnecessary because incest is rare in Adam Smith Switzerland. A spokesman for the Prot- Celebrating Famous & Never gets messed with estant People’s Party, in a display of Infamous Names with By those who place their salvations rare common sense, pointed out that E.C. Bentley’s Elusive In The Wealth of Nations. murder is also rare in the country but Light Verse Form —Edgar Fane, Ft. Worth, Texas no one has suggested doing away with homicide laws. One wonders what Par- Karl Marx liament might accomplish should this Was eaten by sharks kind of sense become more common. But they could not digesto The Communist Manifesto. Same sex marriage with a twist —Joel Finkel, Chicago, Illinois ORISSA, India—When Minati Prime Minister Cameron Khatua married Sitakant Routray, she Sure put the hammer on took him in sickness and in health, for Centralized medicine, better or worse, richer or poorer, but Socialism to jettison. not for male or female. Routray, who posed as a devout man unwilling to —Sophia Mason, Lovettsville, Virginia consummate his marriage because of Belloc, comma, Hilaire, a religious vow, managed to hide the The Originator Always fought like a bear fact he was really a she for a good six Henry the Eighth For Distributism and Catholi-casm months. It beggars the imagination Took a thuctheththion of mateth. Like Chesterton, but with a hint more how long Routray’s charade would He inthithted that the monkth sarcasm. have lasted had Khatua not barged into Were a lathy lot of thkunkth. the bathroom while he/she was bath- —Kaiser Johnson, Los Angeles, California —Edmund Clerihew Bentley ing. With the cat out of the bag, so to The future concerns David Zach speak, Routray soon disappeared along As five minutes tick down on the clock with Kahtua’s dowry and a car and a We should focus our souls on the good jeep they had purchased with a loan in CLERIHEW: A humorous, and the true Khatua’s name. Police investigating the unmetrical, biographical verse Before Facebook and Twitter turn us into marriage speculate that Routray’s goal of four short lines—two closed grey goo. all along was merely to add a new twist couplets—with the first rhyme a to marrying for money. play on the name of the subject. —Jeff Force, Mt. Vernon, Ohio Readers are invited to submit The case of the human harpoon clerihews for “The Clerihew Jones Corner,” with the understand- Longs not for the life of drones SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt—With ing that submissions cannot be But the freedom to roam between tongue in cheek, Chesterton once acknowledged or returned, nor His own flowers, hive, and Queen. said that the first qualification for a will all be published. —Archibald Skemp, Minneapolis, Minnesota modern hero was that “he must be a

Gilbert Magazine Outlining Sanity 49 : L e tt e r T o a m e r ic a : given by God, which is called life. If the state is a universal provider, it G.K. Chesterton in the New York American is a big shop; and a bad one. What is called production is now merely mechanical production; and has not A Postscript on Liberty even a vicarious quality of creation. We wish to make the populace by G.K. Chesterton creative; whereas practically all modern movements talk in terms of have one rather perverse or per- Now in the aboriginal abstract view the state creating everything for the sonal instinct for defending liberty. of the thing, the matter is simple: Lib- populace. A real spiritual abyss only It is simply that everybody else, erty is Life; it is the fact that all living opens when men appear to us to be good and bad, right and wrong, is things spring from their own roots and boasting of bad actions; and this is just now despising and disregarding drink in the universal vitality in their true of nearly all that modern politi- Iliberty. own way; they may be better in this or cians and philanthropists boast of as Now the one thing I am certain that respect, if they are organised in their good actions. Social idealism is of, in a general review of history and this or that fashion. But they are not often actually Satanic; in the quite humanity, is that, whatever human alive because they are organised; but cold and rational sense that it claims beings might be doing, they were because they are organic. They are all, to be the creator. To start the oppo- apparently incapable of doing it of course, dependent upon their divine site ideal, of creatures being creative, without overdoing it. The tragedy of origin. But that dependence is indi- or rather procreative, by a direct anything tribal was that it was much vidual in the right sense of indivisible; authority from the creator, is not too tribal, the tragedy of what was and not, of course, in the rotten sense only a difficulty but a risk. It involves imperial that it was too imperial. So of individualistic. the probability of some abuse of feudalism was too feudal, commercial- freedom in practice. When the abuse ism too commercial, and industrialism Advertisements often tell us is abominable, the true function of too industrial. In all these cases, government reappears; which is to there was some truth that was being to Watch This Blank Space. I exclude extreme abominations. neglected; and the best business of a confess I do watch that blank But if we are to draw up a list of real reformer is to see that it is not all the cases, for instance, in which a neglected. It is rather especially so space, the modern mind, machine must be forbidden because in the last modern phase, in which not so much for what will it might be faulty, we must at least be we have to be on our guard, not only very careful about what authority can against something being neglected, but appear in it, as for what has correct the fault; and how far that against something else being adver- already disappeared from authority may have faults of its own. tised. Most of us know that we have it. I am duly and dutifully I do not think it surprising, there- seen the end of the age of Reason; and fore, if some of those who share this that we live in the age of Suggestion. impressed by advertisement, general ideal differ about the wisdom Perhaps for the first time, the to this extent; that I do feel of establishing this or that law or limi- degradation of man has been openly tation of liberty. Nor, as I have often declared; in a theory that he can be an intense and piercing repeated, do I see any reason why persuaded without being convinced. curiosity about whatever it is those who thus differ should exclude This is called the theory of the Psychol- that is not being advertised. each other from their common ogy of Salesmanship. In a world full of title to figure in the common cause. this wild falsehood, I confess I guard But I do not believe there is really rather jealously everything that the Life is drawn from God, but not very much difference between us world does not value. Advertisements from government; which is, by com- in principle, but only in proportion. often tell us to Watch This Blank parison, only an accidental and even What I insist upon is that the modern Space. I confess I do watch that blank abnormal necessity, arising from the proportion is a most monstrous dis- space, the modern mind, not so much imperfection of life. Our liberty is not proportion. The new exaggeration is for what will appear in it, as for what liberalism; it is not a romantic reac- all on the side of the excessive power has already disappeared from it. I am tion towards any indefinite ideal of of the State; and it is not surprising duly and dutifully impressed by adver- the emancipation of everything. It is a that some should seem a little jealous tisement, to this extent; that I do feel highly modern criticism of a peculiar of it, in the struggle to establish the an intense and piercing curiosity about modern complication. free man and the family. whatever it is that is not being adver- There is now a false idealism of tised. And I redouble my vigilance, turning government into God, by a From the New York American, July 09, 1932 when I find a man imploring me not to vague notion that it gives everything to (Reprinted in G.K.’s Weekly, November 1, advertise liberty. everybody; to the denial of the liberty 1934)

50 Volume 14 Number 2-3, November/December 2010 THE CHESTERTON REVIEW The Journal of the G. K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture Seton Hall University

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