Essays in Idleness

Not only can I now recite the whole Roman alphabet — and in the correct order, from ay to zed, the way I did as a clever little boy in a Pakistani kindergarten (which supplied good, “British class” biscuits) — but I have been avoiding the Internet, while attempting to read beuks. These turn out to be so much better, even in translation from Slavic languages.

Mikhail Bulgakov (the inventor of the “bandy legs sign” as a young venereologist) is my necessary author for this purpose. His interactions with one Joseph Stalin in later life (though not much later, for he perished well before old age) interfered with his career as one of that century’s most talented writers, and also as a droll humourist, almost equal to Gogol. His great posthumous novel, The Master and Margarita, remains in paperback print, and a wonderful array of surreal tales and plays awaits those who speak Russian. I am quite envious of them. Too, he could sing baritone in the opera.

But he was born in Kiev, of a Russian family, and so has been “unpersoned” by the counter-revolutionary Ukrainians. They seem to have removed his statue, and possibly the Bulgakov Museum behind it, entirely without the help of Russian drones. His satirical works usefully made not only Communism, but general liberal nihilism, into farce, but did not win him prizes. Mr Stalin, one of the more consistent opponents of systemic whiteness, disliked his celebration of the White Guards, against the Red Guards; and Mr Bulgakov had a preternatural tendency to political incorrectitude. Nevertheless, Stalin was afflicted with a tiny particle of literary taste. He did not have Bulgakov summarily shot, as he did with so many others.

The Master novel accomplishes something not attempted since the inept Immanuel Kant. Rather than wasting time, trying to prove the existence of God, Bulgakov proves the existence of the Devil. What a perfect concession to modern sensibilities! Philosophical readers should examine this treatise, immediately.

One, — and I, especially — have always thought of himself as a party man. Indeed, while reclining on the floor the other day, trying to recite the Roman alphabet, the question of what party I belonged to came briefly to the fore. I realized that I had never found a party that would accept me, in any of my conditions, even though they will accept anyone who has sent them money, and does not make public statements that are too embarrassing.

But I do not send money for any political cause, and I trust that my latest stroke-like experience will be a transient phenomenon.

The important thing is not to get medical attention. Interventions of that sort seldom turn out well; and are even less likely to work than a political intervention. Fortunately, I live in Canada, where the only medical service one can get promptly is “assistance in dying,” or an abortion.

But back to my political party. It is true I am an exponent of “Extreme Rightness,” and a practitioner, for I tend to be right on every policy subject; the opposite of a socialist, who pretty invariably exhibits “Extreme Wrongness.”

Mr  Javier Milei, who is currently pulling Argentina out of the ditch, explained this perfectly:

“At one point I thought being on the left was a mental problem. The empirical evidence is so overwhelming. It never worked anywhere, but they refuse to accept it. Therefore I thought it was a kind of block that prevents them from seeing the numbers. The lefties hate numbers, the way they hate bathing. …

“However, what I discovered is that being on the left is a disease of the soul. The left is built on envy, hatred, resentment, unequal treatment before the law. Lefties are very violent, and since they have no way to answer to arguments, they go for physical violence. They immediately resort to all kinds of physical violence because they are unable to refute arguments.”

This is also what I have found, consistently, over many decades of political controversy. But “Conservative” parties tend to be almost as deluded as self-styled “Liberal” parties. Anarchism might be attractive, except it always swings left. I think Distributism is preferable, but typically disappears because it does not reward power corruptly.

Still: call me a Distributist.

One does well to examine the Song of Roland (the French, XIth century, chanson de geste) before jumping to conclusions about war. I particularly recommend Scott Moncrieff’s translation (1919), which had an introduction by G. K. Chesterton; it has been anthologized elsewhere. He neither glorifies nor condemns war, and actually, neither did Roland in the “splendidly inconclusive conclusion.” War contains both good and evil characters and events, and is never finished in this world. Any final victory must wait patiently on God. So long as there are insane barbarians (the present regime in Iran offers an unambiguous example) they will have to be fought. It is inappropriate to “make peace” with such a vicious and deceitful enemy. And when there is fighting, there are casualties. The Lord — and Christ is not a milquetoast — does not require us to omit this task, and did not condemn it in His Bible. Those who fight for the right, deserve honour; those who insist on “peace, peace” regardless of circumstances are cowards who deserve contempt.

It is sad that there are people, even Catholics, who don’t understand this.

While trying to recover the use of my brain, lately, I have been investing time and effort in reading authors whose surnames begin with “G” — Gobineau, Goethe, Guicciardini. I wish I could do this in French, German, and Italian, respectively, but even after whipping myself, I find that my linguistic abilities fall short. At the moment I am reading Francesco Guicciardini’s review of the Discourses of Machiavelli (his older contemporary, who was considering the historian, Livy), on the topic of the Guardianship of Freedom.

Would nobles or plebeians be the better choice for this task? And incidentally, which group is more likely to riot?

The power to arraign was balanced between both parties in ancient Rome; the consuls put down the conspiracies of the Gracchi and Catiline, and tribunes were appointed to protect the plebs, which they did with enthusiasm because they were plebs themselves.

Machiavelli would put the power of government into the hands of the plebs, given only a choice between the two, because he chiefly feared the ambitions of the nobles. Guicciardini, whom I have always preferred, would instinctively take the opposite view. He does not expect oppression from the upper-class “optimates” — who tend to favour conservatism, tradition, “culture,” and the arts — but instead, dislike pressure from the shrieking and evil populist mob.

“Well, rocks do not die, and yet they are part of nature.” My correspondent may not have seen the rocks, being crushed into gravel by a road crew with machines. Who will hear their cry, and who stand for their rights, the way the environmentalists stand for innocent vegetables and other defenceless creatures?

Granted, I am being facetious, but let us imagine instead a planet formed by processes of nature into an immense diamond in the sky, or better a Red Dwarf, such as our Sun’s nearest neighbouring star, Proxima Centauri — as I was quite convinced until Monday evening. But this is because I failed to distinguish hardness from density, as I am prone to do. Plenty of metals out-dense a diamond; my personal preference is for gold. The luminosity of Proxima Centauri is so slight that there is risk we may bump into it, or into one of the several dozen other Red Dwarves in our vicinity, when Elon Musk develops the giant rocket that will launch us through the galaxy.

Indeed, this is one of the many worries for the near-light-speed voyages that surely he is planning. Celerity like that, and the baffling effects of velocitation, will surely expose us to a misfortunate prang along the way. It is among the reasons we may never get there; and meanwhile, that we may not even settle Mars (I add, parenthetically). For there is the question of what humans can endure, when removed from our customary bourgeois supports on interminable space missions.

Brown Dwarves are also a danger, to interstellar travellers, although they are just huge gas-bags (typically larger than Jupiter, according to another of my informants). Surprisingly, big as they are, I hadn’t noticed them until the day before yesterday.

An oversight.

Each of the items we find in nature is on an unavoidable course out of existence — which by convention we call extinction, or colloquially, death. All will, sooner or later, no longer be, although we might receive replacements. Nevertheless, material nature is tremendously insecure, and truly, “Maya,” as the Hindoo philosophers maintain in their Upanishads and Vedanta. What is our apparent reality, is merely an illusion, or as some translate, magic. The “fact” that the reader has a body, let alone a headache, is among his fantastic apparitions. Or perhaps we should be diplomatic, and call it a misunderstanding. Wait patiently, and it will pass away.