Passing of the Conservative Mind: On Difference between Conservation and Being in Tradition
Prompted by the passing of great English conservative philosopher Roger Scruton, we take the opportunity to sketch the distinguishing marks separating what it means to be a conservative and what it means to belong to Tradition, stances only seemingly similar but in actual fact worlds apart from each other. We take Scruton as an exemplary figure of contemporary conservative thought and his attitude towards religion as a starting point and argue that it has very little to do with what might be called a traditional attitude. Further we discuss the understanding of time, eternity and causality peculiar for traditional thought and explain how conservatism is in fact alienated from it. We conclude with a broad sketch of what we see as signs that modernity is actually over, taking into consideration an ongoing dissolution of popular art, i.e. the lowest form of the expression of modern spirit.
