The Imaginative Conservative
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The Imaginative Conservative is an on-line journal for those who seek the True, the Good, and the Beautiful. We address culture, liberal learning, politics, political economy, literature, the arts and the American Republic in the tradition of Russell Kirk, T.S. Eliot, Edmund Burke, Irving Babbitt and other leaders of Imaginative Conservatism. The magazine offers to our families, our..
The Imaginative Conservative
1d ago
Although he wrote a Requiem Mass, Te Deum, and other spiritual compositions, the French Romantic composer Hector Berlioz has regularly received brickbats from Catholic listeners. In The Catholic Encyclopedia (1907), the Dutch-American organist and choirmaster Joseph Otten decried the Berlioz Requiem as a “sacred work, but it does not express any deep personal faith from Berlioz himself ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
2d ago
The acceptance of Shakespeare’s Catholic sympathies and sensibilities animates "Shakespeare: The Magician and the Healer," by Annie-Paule de Prinsac, who argues that the Bard disguised himself and his meaning in a mannerist mask, which simultaneously and paradoxically revealed truths indirectly and allegorically which it was illegal for him to reveal candidly. Times have changed and ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
2d ago
My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun – In Corners – till a Day The Owner passed – identified – And carried Me away – And We roam in Sovereign Woods – And now We hunt the Doe – And every time I speak for Him – The Mountains straight reply – And do ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
3d ago
The greatness of the American myth is that it is mostly real. Enough of the faux-conservatives, these woke rightists, judging America as not worth saving and smearing our heroes as tyrants or war criminals. On December 3, 2024, James Lindsay, rightish provocateur, revealed that he had “very lightly edited” “several thousand words straight out of ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
3d ago
John Milton’s “ancient liberty” is not the liberalism of Thomas Hobbes or John Locke, where the telos governing human liberty is dispensed with. Rather, “Paradise Lost” cultivates Christian virtues by reclaiming an ancient liberty within the traditional epic verse form and by returning to that which is first or most ancient: Divine Will. The opening ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
4d ago
Christianity is primarily concerned with teaching us how to turn and open ourselves to receive the same Holy Spirit who filled Jesus Christ. The more we are filled with His love, the easier it is to return it in kind, as the divine suffuses and then surcharges human love so that it can reach up ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
4d ago
Little man, rise up! Flee your preoccupations for a little while. Hide yourself for a time from your turbulent thoughts. Cast aside, now, your heavy responsibilities and put off your burdensome business. Make a little space free for God; and rest for a little time in him. Enter the inner chamber of your mind; shut ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
5d ago
Historical revisionists have recently disparaged the righteousness of America's role in World War II, overlooking that the fact the conflict was both a defensive war and a crusade for the liberation of oppressed peoples. We Americans are justified in celebrating it as "The Good War" fought by the Greatest Generation this country has ever produced ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
5d ago
Now goes under, and I watch it go under, the sun That will not rise again. Today has seen the setting, in your eyes cold and senseless as the sea, Of friendship better than bread, and of bright charity That lifts a man a little above the beasts that run. That this could be! That ..read more
The Imaginative Conservative
6d ago
Let us remember this day in Advent as a reminder of the true spirit of Saint Nicholas—a valiant defender of the faith, a tender-hearted lover of the poor and a kindly, generous soul, who saw that the true message of Christ’s nativity was that unless you become like a little child, you cannot enter the ..read more