‘Wherever an altar is found, there civilization exists,’ wrote Joseph de Maistre, and Alexander Boot’s How the West was Lost diagnoses the disorder of modernity as ultimately spiritual. As what Schopenhauer termed the metaphysical animal, man seeks in vain for political or economic cures. This article is a summary of what I consider to be Boot’s most salient points, along with my commentary on them.
According to Boot, the modern world results from a revenge-driven attack by ‘Modman’ - civilization’s internal barbarian - on the Christian tradition of ‘Westman’. Since the two prongs of Modman’s attack, nihilism and philistinism, are ultimately doomed to fail, Boot argues that it behoves all those who would oppose it to ‘keep vigil over Westman’s treasure’. As Christianity was founded on the ruins of Rome, so from the wreckage of Modman’s project will arise a ‘revived and rejuvenated Westman, a Lazarus brought back from the dead, a light reignited to blind the infidels yet again with the glory of transcendent beauty.’
That, in essence, is Boot’s thesis. It recalls T. S. Eliot’s ‘Thoughts After Lambeth’ (1931):
‘The World is trying the experiment of attempting to form a civilized but non-Christian mentality. The experiment will fail; but we must be very patient in awaiting its collapse; meanwhile redeeming the time: so that the Faith may be preserved alive through the dark ages before us; to renew and rebuild civilization, and save the World from suicide.’
Though the night of Eliot’s prophesied dark ages thickens still, in a dark time the eye begins to see, and Boot offers trenchant insights into both the causes and consequences of our cultural decline.