I am most pleased to publish another guest poast from LRFotS Randale6, who has published a follow-up to his previous piece about the return of the age of hard times and strong men. In this instalment, our friend analyses the manner in which those aforementioned things and qualities translate into cycles of ideology. As before, I present his words without any editing, beyond the cosmetic. May I take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to our friend, and to the wider Didactic Mind community, for their (and your) continued participation in making this site what it is.

The Bad Turning

As discussed in the previous essay, an age of blood and iron must inevitably transition into an age of ideology (and vice versa, the cycle is endless – with one exception). So, what exactly is the age of ideology? The answer is simple: the reign of lesser men. These men are possessed by a spirit of arrogance, incompetence, and weakness.

Yet why do they arise in the first place? Should not the blood of the strong give way to strong descendants? Should not the ways of blood and iron ensure the next generation are stronger and better than the previous? The answer is yes, in the strictly physical sense.

In the mental sense it is the opposite, the next generation may be substantially better off both materially and in body – but their minds are soft, their wits dull, and worst of all they are comfortable… too comfortable. They assume that their rulers will always ensure that prosperity and easy living continues forever.

That is the first step into an age of ideology. Without this first step the second step (which is inevitably the end of the good times) cannot occur. This second step is the solipsism of the elite, accustomed as they are to the blind faith of their subjects, they come to believe that they no longer must deliver the results that their fathers did.

The people will tolerate this for a time, the second generation continuing to coast off the golden age that followed the turning of the cycle from ideology to blood and iron. Yet each subsequent generation will have a harder time of coasting off said golden age, for a current example just compare the Boomers (who had it easy), generation X (who started to encounter difficulties), the Millennials (who have experienced real problems), and the Zoomers (who were fucked from the start).

Remember this simple pattern, for it explains everything you need to know in one sentence. Faith (people) → solipsism (elites) → decay → disillusionment (people) → rebellion (from the people) → blood and iron (results) → faith. This is the endless cycle, success sowing failure and failure sowing success.

We can witness this in the Roman historical cycle – follow along with me, dear reader:

• Roman Republic 200 B.C (the high time of republican blood and iron);
• Roman Republic 200-133 B.C (the golden age that inspires unquestioning faith in the people);
• Roman Republic 133-121 B.C (disillusionment begins, the Gracchi brothers are the first rebellion, they fail);
• Roman Republic 100-44 B.C (disillusionment grows more, Julius Caesar ushers in the return of blood and iron via rebellion against the senate, effectively transforming Rome into an empire);
• Roman Empire 42 B.C to 14 A.D (Augustus completes the work Julius started, ushering in what would be called the Pax Romana);
• Roman Empire 180 A.D (the age of blood and iron begins the transition to age of ideology, the people have again become complacent, and Commodus is a weak, solipsistic emperor who believes he can do whatever he wishes, disregarding the common man and indeed, all reason, prudence and dignity);

Now something must be noted given the example above: the cycle can indeed be broken, the eternal cycle forever put to rest for a civilisation… by the DEATH of that civilisation. Western Rome died entirely, Eastern Rome meanwhile would only ever by a beleaguered, weak shadow of itself… even its golden ages could not equal those of the Empire undivided.

Now we (the writer and viewers, the majority of whom are assuredly of Western extraction, and, to be precise, of English blood) must ponder the cycle and our place in it. Will the West return phoenix like in a halo of blood and iron, or will we join Rome in the lifeless ashes of failure?

Addendum I: I may present a third article on this subject, concerning whether it is possible for the cycle to be broken by means other than the death of a civilisation. This work (IF I produce it) will be necessarily a highly theoretical work that involves much conjecture, reaching well beyond the historical records for its thesis, ideas, and conclusion.

With Didactic Clarity

It is worth noting that our friend, who is not religious, nor a Christian, has (perhaps inadvertently) hit upon a fundamental truth expressed beautifully in Scripture:

¹⁸ For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. ¹⁹ For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. ²⁰ For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world,^[g] in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. ²¹ For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. ²² Claiming to be wise, they became fools, ²³ and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

²⁴ Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, ²⁵ because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

²⁶ For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; ²⁷ and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.

²⁸ And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. ²⁹ They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, ³⁰ slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, ³¹ foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. ³² Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.

— Romans 1:18-32, English Standard Version

The Roman Republic’s fall and collapse into an Empire – and the Roman Empire’s subsequent collapse and centuries-long dissipation – are prime examples of this pattern in action, as our friend most astutely observes. Every empire in history follows this pattern.

From a Christian perspective, this is not in the least bit surprising, because nations are always preferable to empires. Yet, the natural tendency of rising powers is to seek out imperial power. This is a very dangerous and foolish notion. God loves the NATIONS – and He hates EMPIRES, because empires run contrary to nations.

The instinct toward empire is extraordinarily difficult for a nation to resist. Most often, the nations that succeed in doing so, are the ones which have been through an imperial age before, and have suffered for it. This is why China, for example, has historically been actually quite averse to forceful imperial expansion (for the most part). This is also why modern (and even, to a large extent, Imperial) Russia is not in the least bit interested in an aggressively expansionist posture – they got a bellyful of that nonsense with the USSR, and have no desire to repeat the experience.

The key aspect of the argument here is the solipsism of the elites. Simply put, they start thinking of themselves as gods – and in so doing, reject the primacy of the one true God. And, as every civilisation in history which has ever done this, has found out to its horror, God does NOT take that sort of thing kindly.

Such is our situation now. Let us hope and pray, as our friend says, that the West will come out of this humbler, wiser, and more or less intact.

But the signs thus far are not good.