Carolina QuotesThe twentieth-century conservative is concerned, first of all, for the regeneration of the spirit and character – with the perennial problem of the inner order of the soul, the restoration of the ethical understanding, and the religious sanction upon which any life worth living is founded. This is conservatism at its highest.
Russell Kirk Connected to the Carolinas
Source
No citation is recorded for this quotation.
- work
- The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Eliot (1953)
- year
- 1953
no citation recorded
Cite this record
“The twentieth-century conservative is concerned, first of al…” Russell Kirk. Carolina Quotes, record CQ-187162988D. https://carolinaquotes.com/quote/187162988d
More from Russell Kirk
When heaven and earth have passed away, perhaps the conservative mind and the libertarian mind may be joined in synthesis, but not until then.
Now the good government […] is the growth of centuries of social experience. It has been called organic; I prefer the analogy “spiritual.” Trusting to the wisdom of our ancestors and the experience of the nation, it puts its faith in precedent, prescription, historical trial and error, and consensus of opinion over the generations. Not infatuated with neatness, it prefers the strength and majesty of the Gothic style.
True conservatism rises at the antipodes from individualism. Individualism is social atomism; conservatism is community of spirit.