Classical vs Modernist: The evolution of the political foundations of the West

[Errigal]

The Terror is lasting until the present days. It's not called Jacobin, it's called Orangeism.

So Orangeism continues but Jacobinism does not? The Iraqis and Afghans are still experiencing the joys of the Enlightenment by way of white phosphorus explosives. The Jacobins now run NATO and the Pentagon.

[Iberian]

So Orangeism continues but Jacobinism does not? The Iraqis and Afghans are still experiencing the joys of the Enlightenment by way of white phosphorus explosives. The Jacobins now run NATO and the Pentagon.

Fair point. It's a contest.

What's important is to recognise that both arise as branches of the same historical continuum.

[Errigal]

Fair point. It's a contest.

What's important is to recognise that both arise as branches of the same historical continuum.

Well I do but as I said earlier I also recognize the liberalism we all benefit from now came out of the same 200-300yr period. I and my family would have been stuck in the 3rd Estate sadly if things had remained as some might like.

[Iberian]

Well I do but as I said earlier I also recognize the liberalism we all benefit from now came out of the same 200-300yr period. I and my family would have been stuck in the 3rd Estate sadly if things had remained as some might like.

You are assuming (wrongly) that the political alternative to the Revolution has to be a continuation from Feudalism in the form of Absolutism.

I need to remind you here that, parallel to the cultural Renaissance, there was a political Renaissance built as an effort to bridge evolution from the Late Classic (Christian) Age, by-passing the more obscure aspects of the Feudal Age –or Dark Ages.

Against this Political Renaissance, the Protestant Revolution (the Reform) was a reaction, a reactionary force. The other reactionary force against was 'austracism', which was derived from the impostor Holy Roman Empire of the Germans, and which it expanded its sui generis form of eastern absolutism, or despotism.

Also of interest here is the fact that it was a Protestant Converso –Henry IV of France– and his ministers who laid the foundations for Absolutism.

[Iberian]

For the record..

What appears to be common in the descendents of the Irish, Scottish and English Jacobites who fled to Spain is that nearly all of them seem to have had connections with Freemasonry at some point. I don't know how common this was among Jacobites, but it is unthinkable of among their absolutist Spanish counterparts, the Carlists.

I've consulted a source who's well acquainted with Freemasonry –being well connected in its circles too, though not necessarily a Freemason himself– who has confirmed that Jacobite leaders were prolific in the lodges.

To name one, the 1st Duke of Wharton, an English Jacobite, was founder of the Lodge La Matritense in Madrid. An early infiltration of English Freemasonry in Spain, in 1728, which was soon dissolved and banned by the Spanish Holy Office in 1738. It returned in 1808 during the Spanish War of Indepence with the entourage of the Duke of Wellington.

The study of Wharton looks interesting for what is conflicting: A Jacobite, therefore supposedly a staunch Catholic [though he converted to the Catholic Faith only 15 days after writing on a private letter that nothing would ever incite him to abandon the religion in which he had been educated, the Church of England] but also a libertine whose father, the 1st Marquis of Wharton, was a whig, and whose tutor was a strict Calvinist. His only child, who was educated under his own tutelage, turned into a unstable and compulsive character, and lacking in religious or moral principles, according to Wharton's biographher Bryam Dale.

Add.:

In 1738 Pople Clement XII sanctioned the Bull In Eminenti condemning Freemasonry. In the said bull it reads:

Therefore, bearing in mind the great harm which is often caused by such Societies or Conventicles not only to the peace of the temporal state but also to the well-being of souls, and realizing that they do not hold by either civil or canonical sanctions; and since We are taught by the divine word that it is the part of faithful servant and of the master of the Lord's household to watch day and night lest such men as these break into the household like thieves, and like foxes seek to destroy the vineyard; in fact, to prevent the hearts of the simple being perverted, and the innocent secretly wounded by their arrows, and to block that broad road which could be opened to the uncorrected commission of sin and for the other just and reasonable motives known to Us

Those reasonable motives "known to Us" are apparently details about Freemasonry given to Pope Clement XII by Wharton during a private audience.

[Errigal]

You are assuming (wrongly) that the political alternative to the Revolution has to be a continuation from Feudalism in the form of Absolutism.

I need to remind you here that, parallel to the cultural Renaissance, there was a political Renaissance built as an effort to bridge evolution from the Late Classic (Christian) Age, by-passing the more obscure aspects of the Feudal Age –or Dark Ages.

You are wrong that I assume anything of the kind and so your reminder is not needed. I think you are assuming I'm taking a position I'm not.

.....
Also of interest here is the fact that it was a Protestant Converso –Henry IV of France– and his ministers who laid the foundations for Absolutism.

Yes but mainly because religious divisions in France forced an increased role for the state. With a religiously divided people the French Crown came to demand a greater show of loyalty from its subjects.