The Logos
The Logos
What is the ‘rational principle’, that governs and develops the universe? This is Logos. Ever a Western principle, to develop a principle! Philosophers still ponder this; as well, Psychologists. But what is a principle, which cannot be used in the hear and now? Government, religion, each in turn, have tried to provide a principle by which we may attain a certain unanimity, a certain humanity, one to the other. The West, of all the race-cultures on the planet have, in my mind, come the closest to providing all with these blessings. Have there been excesses, to be sure. The cultural-Marxist would point this out in extremis, and expect all in opposition to dwell on these excesses at the expense of all other considerations, as if this is the sum-total of the entirety of Westernesse.
We offer this consideration:
There is some merit to the allegations by some, that modern democracy has become the ‘new’ communism of the present age. The ‘egalitarianism’ of Karl Marx, for instance, or Lenin’s political dictums concerning ‘aristocracy’ and ‘monarchy’ included the ‘democratic’ ideal of the ‘masses’ which, taken to the extreme, ushered in the enslavement of the very mass the communists claimed to speak for. Laws of an extremely excessive nature ‘forced’ the mass to accept the ‘leveling’ of their society in the name of ‘progress’. No Hereditary or Traditional institutions were allowed to remain, since it was ‘through these selfsame institutions’ that the ‘people’ had been denied ‘choices’ of their own; to be sure, the decadence of the existing leadership was obvious, and cannot be discounted as reasons for such wide-spread discontent, but to replace the old with democracies of the mob, is to say that the only prescription necessary for an ailment is poison.
The Dialectics of Hegel [George Wilhelm Frederich Hegel, born 1770, Germany] was essentially in opposition to the ‘marxist/lenninist’ doctrine but, nevertheless, was studied by the revolutionist of both the Menshevik party and the Bolsheviks in Russia were not the logical dynamics of ‘negation’ and ‘knowledge’. Hegel was fascinated by the works of Spinoza, Rousseau, Kant, and Goethe and by the revolution of France. Modern philosophy, culture, and society seemed to Hegel fraught with contradictions and tensions [the ‘struggle’ in ‘natural law’], such as those between the ‘subject’ and ‘object’ of knowledge, mind and nature, ‘self’ and ‘other’ [inner and outer man], freedom and authority, knowledge and faith, the Enlightenment and Romanticism. Hegel’s main philosophical project was to take these contradictions and tensions and interpret them as part of a comprehensive, evolving, rational unity that, in different contexts, he called “the absolute idea” or “absolute knowledge”.
The modern claims that ‘freedom’ is the higher value. But this simply is Idea. It stands alone as Idea.
But what of Honour? Is it not a ‘higher’ ideal? Is it not higher, because without it, there would be no freedom?! The idea of freedom is inconceivable without honour, and so likewise. The soul is capable of good in and of itself. No dalliance with the almighty will assure honour or freedom. That comes from within; it comes from the soul marked with Honour, and which begets Freedom.
The renaissance, then, was the transvaluation of those values inherited from that Levantine thought of Byzantium, through the last vestiges of the Roman empire (so-called ‘holy’); yet, that empire had truly died with Marcus Aurelius. It had become a reassertion of Western thought. The ‘stoic’ philosophy of a dying Rome added just the right amount of poison to a senile ‘civilization’, which ultimately led to the Renaissance itself. But to what purpose? To what scheme of things?
In the ‘scheme of things’, to the student of causality, what is the purpose, what is the meaning of such radical change, of such transvaluation? The cause, or ‘scheme of things’, will ever be that sense of real culture-purpose which, will ever and anon, be the ‘purpose’, of and by itself, which wills itself to show the world its inner most purpose. So, it was, that this renaissance showed to the entire world that it was race, and by definition, its culture, which was to be seen [visually], and which was to rule [demonstrably].
It was into this age, this modern age of Western man that a re-awakening showed itself in a unique ‘culture-purpose’ for the world to see. Not since Alexander had such a cultural-becoming been seen: The purpose of culture was finally realized. It was to the ennobling of the individual, to which culture owed its very heartbeat and, hence, to the organic body; that is, the Race-culture.
Erasmus, Bacon, Cervantes to name a few, defined this process; each in turn, seeing a part of the growing consciousness. Yet, it was much more, this renaissance, than simply the extension of the Liberal Arts. It was, and always is the convolution of a new birth: But it was more – it was the interplay of amity and enmity. It was ‘man within’ and ‘man without’. It was the inner feeling, that spiritual guide, which was to speak for the race-culture saying: ‘…all things foreign must be kept out…all things foreign existing must be cut out…’ which was crying out to be heard. It was to the very survival of that inner core of culture-bearers, which must survive at all costs; for it is, precisely, these ‘culture-bearers’, like the individual, who are the healthiest, for they live only for the continuation and benefit of the whole. This growing consciousness would transmit itself time and again to future generations, sometimes clearly and sometimes with unintended dimness. In a word, the Renaissance was the ‘Unconscious’ expression of the race-culture; that very sense of survival, which ever and anon, seeks its own survival, at the expense of the whatever lies ‘outside’ itself. It is the Race Memory seeking to extend itself by reissuing the experiences of the ancestors as empirical proof of its own self worth. This feeling ultimately led to a re-ordering of their society: The Reformation.
It is well true, that in some cases this transvaluation, this experience, is oft times the violent reactions of a people that has resented a foreign presence as not being a natural part of itself4; sensing a change in direction unfamiliar with sound historical reason; or changes in specific or general [public] thought processes of the race-culture. It is reaction. In addition, while a true ‘reactionary’ is limited by the emotional elixir of the moment, it is nevertheless the impetus, which should show the way to his more rational, yet nonetheless courageous, cousin. This process is seen clearly in the Renaissance and the Enlightenment respectively. In more benign clothing perhaps, we see another birthing, a growing sense of aspiration and purpose, although just as revolutionary in the battleground of the Arts.
Thoughts and ideas are continually at odds. Expression of these thoughts and ideas are constantly being promoted. The Modern loves the conflagration, the confusion, and the obfuscation of what ‘art’ has always represented: The simple display of beauty, courage, love, devotion, form, and vitality of the human spirit is downplayed, even discouraged, by the modern, for he knows that deeply ingrained in the common man and nobility alike, there is a resonance, which truly transcends class. Art was that medium, which was truly democratic: if every worth was equal, then the art of the day would trace that equality. Spirit in man may designate equality, but truly, the visual arts decree the superior and inferior. Let the Modern paint this, as he will. He will be judged by what he portrays on his canvass.
As the Egyptian hieroglyphs were to the ancients, in their unique balance of line and angle so, also, in the Western period of 1500-1700* [a.d.]; for even the Greeks and Romans had not actualized the becoming of its race-culture as did these, for their respective time periods. This is simply the will to express oneself. It is this constant searching to express oneself, for expression, which has marked the West. Was it not, after all, from the canvasses of Rubens, Pousin, Botticelli, Titian, Da Vinci, David, and Caravaggio that the essence of the West finally began to awaken? *
If one were to carefully analyze the tangible and intangible elements of each higher-culture, one would most likely see that the manifestation of purpose was seen in the visual and written arts of that particular culture and, more importantly, is inextricably bound with it. As stated above, the Egyptian hieroglyphs were line and angle, and beautiful no doubt when viewed by their creators. But from our point of view, this art was ‘flat’, and not representative of what we see in the environment that surrounds us. Their reality was not ours. Thus the duality of consciousness.
Art, as a perspective, brings out the ‘psychic’ picture of each and every artist. To bring such a ‘perspective’ to the eye of the observer is a mystical one. It was this mysticism, regardless of the medium employed, which brought about the ennobling of the individuals or people who shared in this perspective.
Western art, deeply held that mysticism was part and parcel to the examination of the ‘body and spirit’, which enabled the individual to express himself in ways and means that heretofore had been seen only on the rarest of occasions. The Renaissance brought out much that was unseen, at least within the boundaries expressed by this movement, by allowing the artist to burst out, so to speak, with colours, draftsmanship (all true sciences), and a realistic ‘perspective’ (allowing three dimensional viewing) specifically on the ‘canvasses’ of the modern artists. This full colour was, and can be seen with all art, an expression of the inner mind (i.e. the individual outlook on personality, rage, courage, love, war, etc.) both from the artist himself and the viewer who is contemplating the specific work. In contemplating this very same art, it was possible, unlike the Grecian art of ages past; one could ‘see’ the story behind the art (in its minute form). Art had become a medium to explore the greater elements of nature and Life; of spirituality, and leadership; of manliness, and poetry.
The mysticism of Allegory, of Fable, of Myth, that epoch-creating motif of a people was brought to bear by such men as Rubens, Titian, David, Girodet, and Pousin told of the original mystical spirit of the West. To be sure, these artists were schooled in the ‘styles’ and ‘traditions’ of Greek classical art. But more than typical ‘classicism’ in art was their teacher. The ‘total’ history of their past, our past, included the common history of the Nordic, Roman/Celt, East European race-cultures. The total panorama of their art was of a ‘family of men’, the men of the West. This ‘art’ described the complete breaking away from the art of the past, and described in lucid and compelling pictures of the race-culture; it was the ‘story of the ages’ for all to see and share. It was the storytelling motif of the history of our ancestors, of its very antecedents. It broke the confines of Orthodox Church dogma.
Once the floodgates were open, there was no turning back.
Architecture, for instance, brought to bear by Archimedes, was utilized in its own artistic fashion to ‘house’ this very art: the Gothic cathedrals of Milan, Tours, Notre Dame, Mt. St. Michael and others (who were often targeted for destruction by the armies of the allies in the second fratricidal war in the last century) and others which were the epitome of the Western soul in actualizing, in the ‘outward form’, the total essence of its spirit, while the canvass art showed the deep, rich, ‘inner spirit’. The tangible and intangible made manifest.
These great and beautiful cathedrals were designed on a four-square pattern; balance and symmetry being understood to best represent the balance of Heaven, Earth, body, and soul. A curiously ‘pre-christian’ belief. From every angle, one’s eye is drawn simultaneously to its entrance as well as its ‘spires’ pointing, as it were, to a higher power, antennae, perhaps, to assemble those unseen frequencies in the mind of the attendant. Each doorway and façade reduces in size, bringing one’s mind into sharp relief, as if concentrating on focusing the thought process.
Conversely, the spires rising straight up pierce the sky, a pathway to the greater God himself. As one enters the main entrance, a porthole to that deep, somber inner space, one is shunted down further and further into deepest consciousness. As the columned, arched ceiling stood above you, creating that ‘womb-like’ feeling of protection, surrounding you. Traveling deeper into this majestic cavern, it is the various forms of art, particularly that of the canvass art, which draw one, on an unbroken travel into that inner space of the psychic, of the mystical. One’s eye follows each frame, is moved by each distinct contour of colour, centering one’s mind on the theme of each. Each picture essentially providing the context of the very place and time of its telling; the mystical connection between the inner and outer man.
In this spiritual, mystical repose, one begins to wander, and once again the very structure of the inner sanctum compels the individual to look up into those majestically vaulted ceilings, feeling insignificant, knowing that the power of God must, indeed, be immense. The atmosphere is dark, and mystical, corners and pockets illuminated or dense, creating a feeling of aloneness, shared only by the paintings themselves.
The mind is an amazing mechanism, and will fill in the vacancies, even if on a primordial level; the presence which one feels will overwhelm him, will consume him. His spirit then, will begin to soar. Perhaps, if he listens closely he, truly, will hear that ‘still small voice’ so often described by mystics and prophets. This edifice, truly, is the place made by man, that is the closest to the cathedral of Nature herself.
All of this, of course, began long before the ‘modern’ cathedrals of the Renaissance. To be sure, the complex structures, engineering, and ‘typology’ was an evolutionary one. The Chinese, even before the 13th century, was complex. In fact, the ‘lineal-line’ of history of the modern, even though not thoroughly mean spirited, does not even trace their ‘cultural-civilization’ as they would of the West. Any student of the West will, if he is honest, seek to understand the interrelatedness of all cultures: some to a lesser or greater extent. How much of Western technology relating to the physical sciences of architecture were borrowed or copied? Perhaps quite a lot. Chinese technology was considerably more developed then that of the early medieval West, and after the middle of the 13th century there was a fair amount of knowledge available concerning China It seems likely today, that the ‘unity-of-mankind’ Modern will overreach in the matter by overstating the influence of Chinese ‘priority’, which is undoubted, to Chinese causual influence as the hidden author of Western mechanics. But this is not necessarily on target. Consider this: The epoch we are discussing was supra-natural, and the five-hundred years, which we are over-seeing was but an extraordinary spark which shines the brighterfor our attention. There were no Chinese blueprints nor Chinese engineers available to teach the West. At most, there were scattered whisperings of this or that invention, or building, or science. It was, and is, the Faustian logic of our Western people: we were willing to try and emulate, from anyone, a good Idea. The kingdoms of the Levant, Africa, or India were not the same; yet, they had much greater influence, and were influenced by the Chinese civilization. The point here is that as a ‘presence’, or a state of mind, it was the West who stands out. Yes, the ‘vision’ of a people may be seen in many sciences, but Art defines the embryonic, and rising spirit.
Does all this not come from the Mind?
Psychology, and its related sciences, must needs be the conduit, but not necessarily the final arbiter, of the values, indeed, the moral implications of the desires and predilections of an individual or a collective, for this latter is what is causing so much of commotion today. Identity politics, if that can be a true description, is about the individual a million-fold. It is these similarities, this natural glue, so to speak, that is the topic of this Age, and what the mind can envision, it can achieve.
It is a powerful time, a time not just for reflection and learning, but one of sacrifice for the greater good. It is not a time for self-doubt. A man and woman can do great things, impossible things, for what they truly Love.
In my mind, Love is the greatest of these principles.
Yes, this is all Logos. I think of this as a combination of principles, this logos. This, truly, is Enlightenment.
There is so much more to add, but that is for another time
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