Status Updates From Legends of Modernity: Essay...

The question can also arise whether with the development of such technological means of communication as radio, film, and the daily press, freedom of thought is possible at all. Does this not mean constant infection with whatever ideas are in circulation, and even that when the masses are given ostensible freedom they may succumb to total unification?

When he gets away from trying to describe the irrational, Milosz is very good. The metaphysical emptiness of rights deriving from the Protestant notion of autonomous authority apart from the visible Church Militant, which fractured the source of authority on the question, has allowed any group to put just about whatever it wants into the existing framework of right and wrong. MacIntyre / Taylor would agree.

Wow. Goes from a Balzac quote to the most concise description of how the disintegration of Christian metaphysics in the public consciousness has both rendered the Church a glorified NGO in many instances and left modern politics in its fundamentals (ends, not means) a freaking mess dominated by ever changing mob preference.

That's a hell of a page.