@Crisis of the Modern World - Rene Guenon@
Abraxas
[Excerpt from 'Crisis of the Modern World']
by Rene Guenon
OUR chief purpose in this work has been to show how it is possible, by
the application of traditional data, to find the most direct solution
to the questions that are being asked nowadays, to explain the present
state of mankind, and at the same time to judge all that really makes
up modern civilization in accordance with truth instead of by
conventional rules or sentimental preferences. We make no claim to have
exhausted the subject or treated it in full detail, nor to have
developed all its aspects completely without omissions. The principles
that inspire us throughout make it necessary, in any case, to put
forward views which are essentially synthetic and-not analytical, as
are those of " profane " learning ; but just because these views are
synthetic, they go much farther in the direction of a true explanation
than could any analysis, which, indeed, can scarcely have more than a
merely descriptive value. At least we consider that enough has been
said to enable those who are capable of understanding to deduce for
themselves a part at least of the consequences contained implicitly
therein ; and they can rest assured that the work of doing so will be
of far more value to them than reading something that leaves no matter
for reflection and meditation, for which, on the contrary, we have
sought to provide an appropriate starting point, that is to say a
foundation from which to rise above the meaningless multitude of
individual opinions.
It still remains to speak briefly of what might be called the practical
bearing of such a study ; this could be passed over or ignored if we
had confined ourselves to purely metaphysical doctrine, in relation to
which no application is more than contingent and accidental ; but in
the present study applications are just the thing with which we are
concerned. These have, moreover, a twofold justification, quite apart
from the practical point of view : they are the legitimate consequence
of the principles, the normal development of a doctrine which, as it is
one and universal, must embrace all orders of reality without exception
and at the same time, aswe explained when speaking of " sacred
science," they also form, at least for some persons, a preparatory
means of attaining to a higher knowledge. Furthermore, when in the
realm of applications, there is no harm in considering these for their
own sake as well, provided in so doing one is never led into losing
sight of their dependence on the principles. This last is a very real
danger, since it is indeed the source of the degeneracy that made "
profane science " possible, but it does not exist for those who know
that everything derives from and is altogether dependent on pure
intellectuality, and consequently that anything which does not proceed
consciously from it can be no more than mere illusion. As we have said
many times already, the starting point of everything should be
knowledge ; and thus what appears the most remote from the practical
order is nevertheless the most potent even within this order, since it
is impossible, here as everywhere else, to accomplish without it
anything of real value or anything that will prove more than a vain and
superficial agitation. But to return more particularly to the question
that. concerns us here, it may be said that the modern world would
cease to exist at once if men understood what it really is, since its
existence, like that of ignorance and all that implies limitation, is
purely negative : it exists only through negation of the traditional
and superhuman truth. Thus, through knowledge, the change could be
brought about without the intervention of a catastrophe, a thing that
seems scarcely possible in any other way ; is it not right, then, to
say that such knowledge can have truly incalculable practical
consequences ? At the same time, however, it is unfortunately very
difficult to conceive of all men attaining to such knowledge, from
which most of them are further-removed than was ever the case before ;
but as a matter of fact, it is quite unnecessary for them to do so, and
it would be enough if there were a numerically small but powerfully
established elect to guide the masses, who would obey their suggestions
without even suspecting their existence or having any idea of their
means of action ; is it still possible for this elect to be effectively
established in the West ?
We do not intend to repeat here all that we have already had occasion
to say elsewhere as to the part that the intellectual elect will have
to play in the various circumstances that can be regarded as possible
in a not too distant future. We will confine ourself to saying this :
in whatever way the change, which may be described as a passage from
one world to another, may come about-whether these " worlds" be larger
or smaller cycles does not matter-it can never involve absolute
discontinuity, since there is always a causal chain linking the cycles
together, even though the change may have the appearance of an abrupt
breach. If the elect of which we spoke could be formed while there is
still time, they could so prepare the change that it would take place
in the most favourable conditions possible, and the disturbances that
must inevitably accompany it would in this way be reduced to a minimum
; but even if they cannot do this, they will still have before them
another yet more important task, that of helping to preserve the
elements which must survive from the present world to be used in
building up the -one that is to follow. Once one knows that a re-ascent
must come, even though it may prove impossible to prevent the downward
movement first ending in some cataclysm, there is clearly no reason for
waiting until the descent has reached its nadir before preparing the
way for the re-ascent. This means /that whatever may happen the work
done will not be wasted : it cannot be useless in so far as the benefit
that the elect will draw from it for themselves is concerned, but
neither will it. be wasted in so far as concerns its later effects on
mankind as a whole.
The question, then, should be viewed in this way the elect still exists
in the Eastern civilizations, and granting that it is becoming less and
less numerous owing to modernist encroachments, it will nevertheless
continue to exist until the end, because this is necessary in order to
safeguard the "ark" of the tradition, which cannot perish, and to
ensure the transmission of all that, is to be preserved. In the West,
on the other hand, the elect now no longer exists ; the question may be
asked, therefore, whether it will be reconstituted before the end of
our epoch, that is to say whether the Western world, despite its
deviation, will take part in this work of preservation and
transmission. If not, the result will be that Western civilization will
have to disappear completely, since, having lost all trace of the
traditional spirit, it will no longer contain any element that is of
use for the future. The question, thus framed, may have only a very
secondary importance in so far as the final result is concerned; it
has, nevertheless, from a relative point of view, a certain interest
that cannot be overlooked once we consent to take into consideration
the particular conditions of the times in which we are living. In
principle, it would be sufficient to remark that this Western world is
a part of the whole, even though it seems to have broken away since the
beginning of modern times, and that all parts must to a certain extent
contribute towards the ultimate reintegration of the cycle. But this
does not necessarily involve a preliminary restoration of the Western
tradition, - which, indeed, may be preserved only in a state of
permanent possibility at its source and not in the special form that it
has taken on at any time. We merely indicate this in passing, for, in
order to make it fully understandable. it would be necessary to branch
off into considerations affecting the relations between the Primordial
Tradition and the subordinate traditions, for which there is no place
here. Considered in itself this would be the most unfavourable solution
for the Western world, but the present state of things in the West
gives rise to the fear that it is the one which is actually being
realised ; however, there are, as we have said, certain signs which
seem to show that all hope of a better solution need not yet be quite'
abandoned.
There are at present more people in the West than one might suppose who
are beginning to see what is wanting in their civilization; if they
fall back on vague aspirations and embark on research that is too often
barren, and if they sometimes even lose their way altogether, it is
because they lack real knowledge, which nothing can replace, and
because there is no organisation that can give them the doctrinal
guidance they need. We do not refer here, of course, to those who have
succeeded in finding such guidance in the Eastern traditions and who
are therefore, intellectually, outside the Western world ; such persons
must necessarily remain exceptional cases and cannot in any way form an
integral part of a Western elect ; they are, in reality a prolongation
of the Eastern elects and might form a link between these and that of
the West once this was really established ; but the latter, by very
definition, can only be established through the initiative of the West,
and therein lies the whole difficulty. This initiative could come in
one of two ways only: either the West would have to find in itself the
means of bringing it about through a direct return to its own
tradition, a return which would be a sort of spontaneous reawakening of
latent possibilities ; or certain Western elements would have to bring
about this restoration with the help afforded by a knowledge of the
Eastern doctrines, which, however, could not for them be quite direct,
since they would have to remain Westerners, but which could be obtained
by a sort of second-hand influence working through intermediaries such
as those of whom we have just spoken. The first of these two hypotheses
is very unlikely, since it depends on the existence in the West of at
least one rallying point where the traditional spirit has been
preserved intact, and as we have already said, this seems to us very
doubtful, notwithstanding certain affirmations to the contrary ; it is
therefore the second hypothesis that needs to be examined more closely.
In this case it would be better, although not absolutely necessary, for
the elect to-be able to take ' as its basis a Western organization
already enjoying an effective existence. . It seems quite clear that
there is now but one organization in the West that is of a traditional
character and that has preserved a doctrine which could serve as an
appropriate basis for the work in question, and this organization is
the Catholic Church. It would be enough to restore to the doctrine of
the Church, without changing anything of the religious form that it
bears outwardly, the deeper meaning really contained in it, but of
which its present representatives seem to be unaware, just as they are
unaware of its essential unity with the other traditional forms ; these
two things are, as a matter of fact, inseparable from one another. This
would mean the realization of Catholicism in the true sense of the
word, which etymologically expresses the idea of " universality," a
fact that is too apt to be forgotten by those who seek to make of it no
more than the denomination of one special and purely Western form,
without any' real connection with the other traditions. Indeed it may
be said that in the present state of things, Catholicism has no more
than a virtual existence since we do not see in it any real
consciousness of universality ; but it is none the less true that the
existence of an organization bearing such a name is in itself an
indication that there is a possible basis for a restoration of the
traditional spirit in its fullest sense, the more so because throughout
the Middle Ages it has already served as a support for it in the West.
. Really, therefore, all that would be necessary would be to
re-establish what already existed prior to the modern deviation, though
with the adaptations called for by the conditions of another period;
and if such an idea astonishes or offends certain people, it is because
they themselves, though unconsciously and perhaps even against their
will, are so completely governed by the modern outlook as to have quite
forgotten the meaning of a tradition of which they retain only the
outer shell. The important question is whether the formalism of the "
letter", which is also, a variety of materialism as we have defined it
earlier on, has utterly smothered spirituality or only temporarily
overshadowed it, leaving the possibility of a re-awakening within the
existing organization ; only the course of events will give an answer
to this question.
It is possible, moreover, that this same course of events might sooner
or later force on the leaders of the Catholic Church, as an unavoidable
necessity, a decision whose intellectual import they would be far from
properly understanding. It would certainly be matter for regret if they
should be driven to reflection by circumstances as contingent as those
springing from the field of politics-so long, that is, as this is
considered apart from any higher principle. But at the same time,' it
must be admitted that the opportunity for the development of latent
possibilities must be accorded to each person through those means that
fall the most immediately within the scope of his present
understanding. For this reason, we do not hesitate to assert, in view
of the ever increasing state of confusion that is becoming more and
more widespread, that it has become necessary to call for the union of
all the spiritual forces whose action still makes itself felt in the
outer world, as well in the West as in the East ; and so far as the
West is concerned, we can see no other such force than the Catholic
Church. If the latter could thus be brought into touch with the
representatives of the Eastern traditions, it would be a preliminary
step we could not but rejoice at, and might serve as the starting point
for what we have in mind, inasmuch as it would doubtless not be long
before it became apparent that a merely outward and " diplomatic"
understanding was illusory and could not yield the desired results ; it
would then become necessary to pass on to what should normally have
come first, that is to considering a possible, agreement on principles.
For this agreement the essential and only essential condition is for
the representatives of the West to return to a real consciousness of
these principles, which the East has never lost. A true mutual
understanding, be it said once more, can come only from above and
within, which means that it must be in the domain which can equally
well be called intellectual or spiritual, since the two words really
bear exactly the same meaning ; later, and starting from this point,
the understanding would be bound to extend over all other domains, just
as, once a principle is enunciated, it only 'remains to extract, or
rather to make more explicit, all the consequences implied therein.
There can only be one obstacle in the way of such an understanding :
that is Western proselytism, which cannot bring itself to admit that it
is sometimes necessary to have " allies " who are not subjects" ; to
put it more correctly, the. obstacle is the lack of understanding of
which this proselytism is only one of the products ; can this obstacle
be overcome ? If it were not, the elect, in establishing themselves,
would be able to count only on the efforts of those who were qualified
by their intellectual capacity, apart from any particular environment,
and also, of course, on the support of the East ; its work would
thereby be made more difficult and its influence could only make itself
felt after a long interval, as it would itself have to create all the
necessary instruments, instead of finding them ready to hand, as in the
other case ; but we are far from supposing that these difficulties,
however great they may, be, are of a kind that could in any way
whatsoever prevent the work that has to be done.
We therefore consider it opportune to make also the following statement
: there are now already, in the Western world, signs of a movement
which is still ill-defined but which may, and even, if things take
their normal course, must lead to the re-establishment of an
intellectual elect, unless a cataclysm comes too quickly for it to have
had time to develop fully, It is scarcely necessary to say that the
Church would have every interest, so far as the part to be played by it
in the future is concerned, in giving its support to such a movement
rather than letting it take place quite independently and being obliged
later on to follow it in order to retain an influence that threatened
to melt away. Without attaining to a very- lofty and difficult
standpoint it can be understood that it is the Church that would
benefit the most by an attitude which, in fact, far from involving the
slightest compromise in the field of doctrine, would have the contrary
result of freeing it from all infiltration of the modern spirit, and
which, moreover, would entail no outward changes. It would be something
of a paradox to see integral Catholicism realized without the
collaboration of the Catholic Church, which might find itself under the
strange necessity of submitting to be defended against onslaughts more
terrible than any it has yet faced, by men whom its leaders, or at any
rate those whom they allow to speak in their name, had at first tried
to discredit by casting on them the most ill-founded suspicions. For
our own part, we should be sorry to see this happen ; but if it is not
to come to this, it is high time for those on whom their position
places grave responsibilities to act with their eyes fully open to the
matters at issue and no longer to allow attempts which might have
consequences of the utmost importance to run the danger of frustration
owing to the incomprehension or ill-will of certain more or less
subordinate individuals, a thing which has happened before now, and
which is one more sign of the extent to which confusion reigns
everywhere today. Doubtless we shall receive no gratitude for this
warning, which is given quite independently and disinterestedly; but
this is of no importance, and we shall continue none the less to say
what has to be said whenever it becomes necessary and in the form that
we consider most suited to the circumstances. The foregoing is only a
summary 'of the conclusions to which we have been led by certain quite
recent investigations, carried out, it is scarcely necessary to add, in
a purely intellectual field. There is no need, at least for the moment,
to give a detailed. description of them and as a matter of fact this
could have little interest in itself ; but it may be affirmed that not
a single word of what has been said above has been written without
ample reflection. It should be clearly understood that it would be
utterly useless to put forward here by way of objection any more or
less specious philosophical arguments ; we are speaking seriously ,of
serious matters, and have no time to spend over verbal disputes that
would be of no interest and could serve no useful purpose. Moreover it
is our intention to remain entirely aloof from all controversies and
quarrels of school or party, just as we refuse absolutely to accept any
Western label " or definition, since there is none applicable whether
this prove pleasing or displeasing, it is a fact, and nothing will make
us change our attitude in -this regard.
A warning must also be addressed to those who, through their capacity
for a higher understanding if not through the degree of, knowledge to
which they have actually attained, seem destined to become elements of
a possible elect. There is no doubt that the force of modernism, which
is truly " diabolic " in every sense of the word, strives by every
means within its power to prevent these elements, to-day isolated and
scattered; from achieving the cohesion that is necessary if they are to
exert any real influence on the general mentality. It is therefore for
those who have already more or less completely become aware of the end
towards which their efforts should be directed to stand firm against
the difficulties, whatever they may be, that arise in their path and
threaten to turn them aside. Those. who have not yet reached the point
beyond which an infallible guidance makes it impossible henceforth to
stray from the true path, remain always in danger of the most serious
deviations ; they need to display the utmost prudence ; we may even go
further and say, that it should be carried to the point of distrust,
for the " adversary," who up to this point has not yet been definitely
overcome, can take on the most varied lot and, at times, the most
unexpected forms. It happen, that those who think they have escaped
from modern materialism fall a prey to things which, while seemingly
opposed to it, are really of the same order ; and in view of the turn
of mind of modern Westerners, a special warning needs to be uttered
against the attraction that more or less extraordinary phenomena may
hold out for them ; it is this attraction that is to a large extent
responsible for all the errors of " neo-spiritualism " and it is to be
foreseen that the dangers it represents will grow still worse, for the
forces of darkness that keep alive the present confusion find in it one
of their most potent instruments. It is even probable that we are not
very far from the time referred to by the prophecy of the Gospel to
which we have already alluded to elsewhere . For false Christs and
false prophets shall rise, and shall shew signs and wonders, to seduce,
if it were possible, even the elect." The " elect " here referred to is
the elect in the fullness of its real meaning, according to the sense
in which we have invariably used the word, those who, in virtue of the
inner " realization " they have achieved, can no longer be seduced ;
but this is not the case with those who, as yet, possess in themselves
only, the possibilities of knowledge, and who are therefore, properly
speaking, only the " called "; and this is why the Gospels say that
"many are called but few are chosen." We are entering upon a period
when it will be extremely difficult to " separate the chaff from the
grain and carry out effectively what theologians call the " testing of
the spirits " owing to disordered manifestations that will only grow
stronger and more frequent, and also owing to the want of true
knowledge on the part of those whose normal function should be to guide
the rest, but who to-day are too often nothing but " blind guides." We
shall see then whether the subtleties of dialectic avail anything in
such circumstances, and whether any philosophy, even were it the best
possible, can have the strength to prevent the " infernal powers " from
being let loose ; this also is an illusion against which some people
need to guard, for it is too often supposed, in ignorance of what pure
intellectuality really is, that a merely philosophical knowledge, which
even in the best of cases is a bare shadow of true knowledge, can put
everything to rights and lead back the contemporary mentality from its
deviation ; in the same way, there are those who think they can find in
modern science itself a means of raising themselves to the higher
truths, whereas this science is in fact founded on the negation of
these truths. All these illusions are so many influences leading people
astray, and by means of them many of those who sincerely desire to
react against the modern outlook are reduced to impotence, since,
having failed to find the essential principles without which all action
is absolutely vain, they have been swept aside into blind alleys from
which there is no hope of escape.
Doubtless, the number will be small of those who will succeed in
overcoming all these obstacles and triumphing over the hostility of an
environment opposed to all spirituality ; but let it be said once more,
it is not numbers that matter, for we are here in a domain whose laws
are quite different from those of matter. There is therefore no cause
for despair, and, even were there no hope of achieving any visible
result before the modern world collapses under some catastrophe, this
would still be no valid reason for not undertaking a work whose scope
extends far beyond the present. time. Those who might be tempted to
give way to despair should realise that nothing accomplished in this
order can ever be lost, that confusion, error and darkness can win the
day only apparently and in a purely ephemeral way, that all partial and
transitory disequilibriums must perforce' contribute towards the great
equilibrium of the whole, and that nothing can ultimately prevail
against the power of truth their device should be that used formerly by
certain initiatory organizations of the West : Vinvit omnia Veritas.