Alexander Solzhenitsyn – The Pull Of The Land

Live Not By Lies

June 21, 2023June 21, 2023 Richard Barnes

We have embarked on a series of posts designed to state some easily verifiable truths about us and our heritage as Americans. Although this blog is principally about Venezuela, the careful reader can easily discern the mutual interests and benefits between the United States and Venezuela, especially in the first half of the 20th Century which saw great progress in Venezuela’s infrastructure alongside an expanding and self-assured middle class while the United States benefited from basic raw materials, especially iron ore and oil.

I’ll not clutter this post with links to earlier articles, but if memory needs refreshing, please use the search bar and insert key words such as Mene Grande, Bethlehem Steel, US Steel, Petroleum, Pérez Jimenez, Juan Vicente Gómez, Ranchitos, and much more.

Although this recently begun series of posts primarily addresses the United States, they have a major bearing on Venezuela and the route to bankruptcy she has embarked.

In 1974, Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote a timeless essay, Live Not By Lies. In it he urged his fellow countrymen to resist the seemingly resistless pull to agree to obfuscations and deceits. His point was that if many determined to not agree to the official lies, the source(s) of the lies would weaken and collapse. Solzhenitsyn’s essay was much shorter and more concise than The Power of The Powerless written by Václav Havel four years later, which expanded on the same themes.

As we continue with this series of posts, it is good to first remind ourselves of what those who looked to us, and who eventually became disheartened by us, would urge upon us now when we are being compelled to say “yes” when we mean “no”.

Towards the end of his essay, Solzhenitsyn wrote:

Our way must be: Never knowingly support lies! Having understood where the lies begin (and many see this line differently)—step back from that gangrenous edge! Let us not glue back the flaking scales of the Ideology, not gather back its crumbling bones, nor patch together its decomposing garb, and we will be amazed how swiftly and helplessly the lies will fall away, and that which is destined to be naked will be exposed as such to the world.

And thus, overcoming our temerity, let each man choose: Will he remain a witting servant of the lies (needless to say, not due to natural predisposition, but in order to provide a living for the family, to rear the children in the spirit of lies!), or has the time come for him to stand straight as an honest man, worthy of the respect of his children and contemporaries? And from that day onward he:

Will not write, sign, nor publish in any way, a single line distorting, so far as he can see, the truth;
Will not utter such a line in private or in public conversation, nor read it from a crib sheet, nor speak it in the role of educator, canvasser, teacher, actor;
Will not in painting, sculpture, photograph, technology, or music depict, support, or broadcast a single false thought, a single distortion of the truth as he discerns it;
Will not cite in writing or in speech a single “guiding” quote for gratification, insurance, for his success at work, unless he fully shares the cited thought and believes that it fits the context precisely;
Will not be forced to a demonstration or a rally if it runs counter to his desire and his will; will not take up and raise a banner or slogan in which he does not fully believe;
Will not raise a hand in vote for a proposal which he does not sincerely support; will not vote openly or in secret ballot for a candidate whom he deems dubious or unworthy;
Will not be impelled to a meeting where a forced and distorted discussion is expected to take place;
Will at once walk out from a session, meeting, lecture, play, or film as soon as he hears the speaker utter a lie, ideological drivel, or shameless propaganda;
Will not subscribe to, nor buy in retail, a newspaper or journal that distorts or hides the underlying facts.

This is by no means an exhaustive list of the possible and necessary ways of evading lies. But he who begins to cleanse himself will, with a cleansed eye, easily discern yet other opportunities.

Yes, at first it will not be fair. Someone will have to temporarily lose his job. For the young who seek to live by truth, this will at first severely complicate life, for their tests and quizzes, too, are stuffed with lies, and so choices will have to be made. But there is no loophole left for anyone who seeks to be honest: Not even for a day, not even in the safest technical occupations can he avoid even a single one of the listed choices—to be made in favor of either truth or lies, in favor of spiritual independence or spiritual servility. And as for him who lacks the courage to defend even his own soul: Let him not brag of his progressive views, boast of his status as an academician or a recognized artist, a distinguished citizen or general. Let him say to himself plainly: I am cattle, I am a coward, I seek only warmth and to eat my fill.

For us, who have grown staid over time, even this most moderate path of resistance will be not be easy to set out upon. But how much easier it is than self-immolation or even a hunger strike: Flames will not engulf your body, your eyes will not pop out from the heat, and your family will always have at least a piece of black bread to wash down with a glass of clear water.

Betrayed and deceived by us, did not a great European people—the Czechoslovaks—show us how one can stand down the tanks with bared chest alone, as long as inside it beats a worthy heart?

It will not be an easy path, perhaps, but it is the easiest among those that lie before us. Not an easy choice for the body, but the only one for the soul. No, not an easy path, but then we already have among us people, dozens even, who have for years abided by all these rules, who live by the truth.

And so: We need not be the first to set out on this path, Ours is but to join! The more of us set out together, the thicker our ranks, the easier and shorter will this path be for us all! If we become thousands—they will not cope, they will be unable to touch us. If we will grow to tens of thousands—we will not recognize our country!

But if we shrink away, then let us cease complaining that someone does not let us draw breath—we do it to ourselves! Let us then cower and hunker down, while our comrades the biologists bring closer the day when our thoughts can be read and our genes altered.

And if from this also we shrink away, then we are worthless, hopeless, and it is of us that Pushkin asks with scorn:

Why offer herds their liberation?

Their heritage each generation

The yoke with jingles, and the whip.

February 12, 1974

And that, dear friends, is the power of the powerless [RMB].

Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s (1918-2008) essay was published the day he was arrested (for the final time) and deported to the United States: February 1974.

Converting The Catastrophe Of The Revolution

May 31, 2023May 31, 2023 Richard Barnes

[The left-wing Republicans] managed to convert the catastrophe of the [French] Revolution into a stirring and soft-focused myth, largely by downplaying, editing out, or explaining away its most sanguinary ‘episodes’, like the Terror, as deviations from the noble idea, a process in which the great historians of the Republic, some of whom achieved high office, were thoroughly collusive, and which has obvious echoes of subsequent events in Russia, although there, historians tended to be shot” — Michael Burleigh, Earthly Powers, p. 339 [emphasis mine].

Alexander Solzhenitsyn wrote, “To destroy a people, you must first destroy her roots.” This observation has multiple applications of which two are primary.

One application is to a country, such as The United States, where for more than a century now, her media and academia have utterly distorted her colonial and early Republic history. The effect of this has been to rear generations who have been taught not only to not know, let alone understand, but to actually hate their country for her racist, repressive, and utterly corrupt colonial past and founding. In effect, there was nothing good in our past and to “progress” we must “burn it down”, cast it aside, and start over. These generations not only despise their fathers, they refuse to listen to anyone with the temerity to show them, even from primary sources, that they have been taught bunk.

Another application is to apply it to a country, such as Venezuela (and much of South America) where for more than two centuries, her media and academia have utterly distorted her colonial [Spanish] history and mythologized and glorified her recent history, inaugurated by the godlike Simón Bolívar, who “liberated” her and initiated the birth of true liberty and civilization. The effect of this has been to rear generations who have been taught to not only scorn, let alone understand, but to hate their colonial past and to believe that all civilization began in the modern era. These are generations who ignore what even Bolívar admitted as he neared death, that centuries of civilization had been wiped out by his revolutions.

Both applications are nefarious and will surely precipitate utter ruin unless arrested. In the first case, they lead to a refusal to defend one’s people and home; in the second, they inspire a false valuation of one’s recent history. In both cases, they result in a headlong rush into ruinous policies and actions.

And, in both cases, an insufferable arrogance is birthed and encouraged: Job would say to them, “No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you.”

Dishonest historians and media are nothing new. Solzhenitsyn told about American correspondents who visited Moscow and reported back to America how the Russian people were filled with unspeakable joy and gratitude for Soviet Communism, this in the face of millions dying from hunger and torture in the Gulag network of concentration camps and prisons. Not to mention the dishonest and debunked “reporting” by such as Walter Duranty who lied with a straight face about the forced famines in Soviet Ukraine. He “won” the Pulitzer prize for his grim fairy tales and to this day, that honor has yet to be denounced, let alone recalled, by The New York Times.

Examples can be easily multiplied.

Jesus said, “By their fruits ye shall know them.”

We do not need the media or historians to show us the very real, life-killing, tyrannical fruits of Communism and Socialism, by whatever names they may be called in any given era. Just a few observations here and there will suffice, assuming we are willing to see and listen. For example, we now have, in the United States, hundreds of thousands, if not millions of emigres who escaped the chains and gulags of Asian and Eastern European tyrannies. Many of them have been raising their voices and sounding the alarm, most acutely over the last three years. Sure, they are dismissed, ignored, or mocked by the bien-pensants who write from their ivory towers in commerce and academia and who despise the men and women who do the work and pay the taxes and actually love their country and her history.

But we ought not dismiss them, for in warning us, they reach back to the horrible truths of their past, and point to what our future will be if we do not change course, beginning with the very real, religious Foundation of liberty.

As for the “noble idea”, their pasts and our future are not “deviations” from it, but rather are intrinsic to it.

For it is by no means a “noble idea”, but rather an ancient, demonic one, as is attested by millions of voices crying from their blood-soaked graves.

Although this study covers religion and politics from the French Revolution to the Great War, it demonstrates, once again, that there is nothing new under the sun

Alexander Solzhenitsyn (1918-2008) warned the west, as he observed her unwillingness to defend her heritage, her love of materialism, ease, and pleasure, and her blindness to the same systems of philosophy and government that created the Soviet Gulag Archipelago, Mao’s Cultural Revolution, Pol Pot’s Killing Fields, and more.

Postscript

May 25, 2023May 25, 2023 Richard Barnes

After publishing The Unquiet Death of Cetin Mert, I came across several reports about American teachers’ in-your-face determination to indoctrinate their students in Communist ideology.

From Fox News: “Rebeca F. Rothstein [works at North Bethesda Middle School in Maryland] also posted about providing ‘Marxist literature’ to kids and said, ‘F— capitalism.’ She shared in one instance that she was ‘tired after a long day of indoctrinating students.'”

“‘I had to un-brainwash myself from capitalism in order to fall in love with socialism and communism,’ she said. ‘If everyone had the same amount of money, then money wouldn’t be worth anything.'” [Do parents truly want their children to learn economics from low-wattage bulbs like this specimen?]

“‘Capitalism must go,’ she said. In that same video she said, ‘revolutions involve violence.'”

“The school district ignored multiple requests for comment about her quote on violent revolutions and whether they support the rhetoric.”

An article in Townhall reported on an event organized by the Colorado AFL-CIO, the parent organization of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), the nation’s second largest teacher’s union, where a Colorado teacher took the stage to call for a “forceful cultural revolution”, borrowing from that great humanitarian, Mao Zedong (formerly known as Mao Tse Tung).

“Tim Hernandez is a teacher at Aurora West Preparatory Academy in the Aurora Public Schools District, according to its website. He announced in his speech at the Colorado AFL-CIO event that he advocates for Marxist-Leninism to be taught in schools, admitting that he teaches radical Communist doctrines in his classroom.”

As noted in my prior post, we must oppose this evil by affirming our love for Truth and for humanity. And those of us with school age children need to decide as to where, how, and by whom they are to be schooled.

And, no, I do not equate schooling with education.

Jesus said, “By their fruits ye shall know them.” The fruit of Communist ideology, by whatever name it might use to cloak itself, is death. Tens of millions of horrible deaths precipitated by the godless state. No amount of foolish, deceitful, and dangerous rhetoric can hide that fact.

Live not by lies.

George Meany, call your office.

George Meany (1894-1980) on Time’s cover in 1955

He was an old-time labor leader who genuinely understood and opposed Communist ideology. His introduction of Alexander Solzhenitsyn in June, 1975, was powerful and reverberates to this day.

The Power of the Powerless II

November 6, 2021November 6, 2021 Richard Barnes

I invite you to read Part I for background on this series of posts, whose title is taken from Václav Havel’s famous 1978 essay.

Havel valiantly attempts to define his terms, beginning with “dictatorship”. One who carefully reads the following extracts from the early paragraphs of his essay, will see he speaks to us today.

Because good writing speaks across generations.

From “The Power of the Powerless”

(all emphases are mine):

“Our system [speaking of Czechoslovakia, in 1978] is most frequently characterized as a dictatorship or, more precisely, as the dictatorship of a political bureaucracy over a society which has undergone economic and social leveling. I am afraid that the term “dictatorship,” regardless of how intelligible it may otherwise be, tends to obscure rather than clarify the real nature of power in this system. We usually associate the term with the notion of a small group of people who take over the government of a given country by force; their power is wielded openly, using the direct instruments of power at their disposal, and they are easily distinguished socially from the majority over whom they rule. One of the essential aspects of this traditional or classical notion of dictatorship is the assumption that it is temporary, ephemeral, lacking historical roots. Its existence seems to be bound up with the lives of those who established it. It is usually local in extent and significance, and regardless of the ideology it utilizes to grant itself legitimacy, its power derives ultimately from the numbers and the armed might of its soldiers and police. The principal threat to its existence is felt to be the possibility that someone better equipped in this sense might appear and overthrow it.

“Even this very superficial overview should make it clear that the system in which we live has very little in common with a classical dictatorship. In the first place, our system is not limited in a local, geographical sense; rather, it holds sway over a huge power bloc.… And although it quite naturally exhibits a number of local and historical variations, the range of these variations is fundamentally circumscribed by a single, unifying framework throughout…. Not only is the dictatorship everywhere based on the same principles and structured in the same way (that is, in the way evolved by the ruling power), but each country has been completely penetrated by a network of manipulatory instruments controlled by the power center and totally subordinated to its interests….

“[This system] commands an incomparably … precise, logically structured, generally comprehensible and, in essence, extremely flexible ideology that, in its elaborateness and completeness, is almost a secularized religion. It offers a ready answer to any question whatsoever; it can scarcely be accepted only in part…. In an era when metaphysical and existential certainties are in a state of crisis, when people are being uprooted and alienated and are losing their sense of what this world means, this ideology inevitably has a certain hypnotic charm. To wandering humankind it offers an immediately available home: all one has to do is accept it, and suddenly everything becomes clear once more, life takes on new meaning, and all mysteries, unanswered questions, anxiety, and loneliness vanish. Of course, one pays dearly for this low-rent home: the price is abdication of one’ s own reason, conscience, and responsibility, for an essential aspect of this ideology is the consignment of reason and conscience to a higher authority. The principle involved here is that the center of power is identical with the center of truth….“

As we shall see in future posts, Havel will go on to note that his observations most certainly apply to the United States.

In 1978, even the most obtuse could see that Americans were living in “an era when metaphysical and existential certainties” were in a state of crisis. I began my career in public accounting in that era and during “boot camp” [our tough, initial training] I was aghast at the blasphemy, profanity, and utter cynicism so evident in the speech and actions of many (thankfully, not all) of my professional contemporaries.

These were the crème de la crème of American society and it was ominous. Talking with a colleague there, I told him that I had been born in an American mining camp and my early childhood was amongst WWII veterans. I am certain that their mouths were not ivory soap clean when I was not around, but for sure, even in the club bar, where children were not banned in that era, I never heard even a smidgen of language such as I was hearing at this gathering of young professionals. Nor, as a child, did I ever sense a total disregard or disrespect for the Deity, as I was witnessing now.

Again, thankfully, “boot camp” experience was not a “100%” situation, but it was widespread enough for concern. So, when I heard Solzhenitsyn speak at Harvard and, especially, later when I read the speech, I hearkened back to my early professional career and understood his observations, although a good number of my contemporaries dismissed them.

But he and Havel, having lived and suffered through societies which had lost their liberties and who became subservient to established “power centers” most certainly saw many similarities in western societies, including the United States. They saw that a loss of belief in eternal verities will lead to abject submission and to assignment of transcendence to others, most likely the State; these are dispositions or inclinations which require “abdication of one’s own reason, conscience, and responsibility.”

Havel foresaw our disposition to a ready acquiescence to a ruling elite who would tell us what to do and when. Otherwise known as living within the murderous lie of totalitarianism. And to live under totalitarianism (whose definition Havel will continue to develop) requires living under a lie.

Mr. Shingler, the father of a childhood friend. I post his photo as an example of the men around whom my childhood friends and I grew up. They were not perfect men, in the sense that they had their sins and foibles. However, looking back, I can see they did their best to not harm the consciences of the children who saw them and were otherwise in their ambit.

My father, left, at my little brother’s first birthday. He also reflected the ethos of “do no harm”, to the best of his ability. Havel, and also Solzhenitsyn, saw the loss of that ethos in America. By the time of this photo, many of the Americans with whom I grew up had already left El Pao along with their families.

November 11: 1918 and 1620 (Written on November 11, 2020)

November 12, 2020November 12, 2020 Richard Barnes

All the best to our veterans and their families today.

As most Americans know, or should know, this day was once known as Armistice Day, commemorating the ceasing of hostilities of World War I (“The Great War”) at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. It was renamed “Veterans Day” in the USA in 1954.

But that’s not the November 11 I’d like to address in this post.

Earlier today, as I was beginning to put these thoughts on paper, my younger daughters shared a quote by Ronald Reagan: “We are never defeated unless we give up on God.” That further reminded me of today’s topic: The Mayflower Compact, which was signed on November 11, 1620, 400 years ago today.

America’s history, including the constitutions of the 13 colonies, the Declaration of Independence, the United States Constitution, and the constitutions of the states simply cannot be understood if we ignore the covenantal nature of our founding.

Although 20th century historians began to insist that ours was an “Enlightenment” founding, and by that, they meant a secular founding, the truth is otherwise, and is far more interesting and meaningful.

Some date The Enlightenment around the mid-17th century, either with Descartes’ declaration, “I think, therefore, I Am” in 1637, or Newton’s Principia Mathematica in 1687; however, the Enlightenment is mostly identified with the French philosophes and atheists such as Voltaire. Perhaps we should date it according to most French historians, somewhere between 1715 – 1789, meaning the period between the death of Louis XIV until the French Revolution.

Modern historians swoon over this period, assuring us that we inherited religious toleration, separation of church and state, not to mention our very liberties from this Age.

But “by their fruits ye shall know them”.

The fruits of the Enlightenment are most evident in the French Revolution and its progeny, including the blood soaked South American revolutions of the 19th century, the Russian Revolution of the early 20th, and various and sundry others, mostly characterized by bloodshed, tyranny, and chaos.

For more on the French Revolution see July 14 and More on July 14.

The United States owe their liberties and religious toleration and much more, not to the Enlightenment but to the Protestant Reformation. It is not for nothing that the German historian, Leopold von Ranke, wrote, “Calvin was virtually the founder of America.” American historian, George Bancroft, agreed, “He who will not honor the memory and respect the influence of Calvin knows but little of the origin of American liberty.”

To take only one example, the Puritan divine, Richard Baxter, wrote in 1659:

“And where his [the ruler’s] Covenants with his people limit him, he hath no power in the exempt points: e. g. if he be restrained from raising taxes without the people’s consent, if he yet command the payment of such taxes, he doth so not by Authority: for neither God nor man did ever give him Authority thereto.”

These and words such as these were very familiar to the Founders, the preachers, and the people in the American colonies for a century before 1776.

Ambrose Serle, secretary to British General Howe in New York City, wrote to the British Secretary of State in 1776 telling him that the American Revolution was ultimately a religious war. And Serle was no ordinary observer. He knew whereof he spoke. But he was one of many who made this observation. A Hessian soldier fighting for England said, “Call this war, dearest friend, by whatsoever name you may, only call it not an American Revolution, it is nothing more nor less than an Irish-Scotch Presbyterian Rebellion.” A later historian, John C. Miller, who specialized in America’s early history, wrote, “To the end, the Churchmen [Church of England] believed that the Revolution was a Presbyterian-Congregationalist plot.”

There are many such references, including comments from King George himself, who believed that the rebels were Presbyterians.

There is much, much more, but the above is enough to note the importance of the Mayflower Compact.

The Compact was signed by all on the Mayflower and predated the earliest date of the Renaissance by decades, and the more accepted dates, by a century. It was not an Enlightenment document but rather a most covenantal, Christian one.

In brief, the Mayflower was blown 300 miles off course by a storm and, instead of arriving in Virginia, she anchored off the coast of Massachusetts. And that was a major problem because they now were under no one’s immediate jurisdiction. Rebellion and “we’ll-do-as-we-please” began almost immediately to foment within her bowels.

We must remember that of the 102 passengers on the ship, only 41 were true Pilgrims, religious separatists. The others, whom the Pilgrims called “strangers”, were merchants, craftsmen, indentured servants, and orphaned children. This was the primary source of the rapidly rising anarchistic impulses.

The Pilgrims huddled together amongst themselves and drew up an agreement, a sacred “covenant,” making them a “civil body politic” and promising “just and equal laws.” They had already done this as a congregation of like-minded believers; however, they now had 61 persons who did not belong to their group. Hence, their political document which all signed, even the indentured servants.

This document was signed before they left the ship and quieted those “strangers” who were making “discontented and mutinous speeches.” It was designed to stop the impulse of every man or woman to do as he or she pleased, or to succumb to the spirit of every-man-for-himself.

The Pilgrims knew that for their colony to be successful, they needed folks to be law abiding and productive.

And so, on November 11, 1620, 400 years ago today, the Compact was signed.

And, in my opinion, this goes a long way to explaining why Plymouth Colony was long-lasting, remaining faithful to her Compact until 1691 when they became part of Massachusetts Bay Colony. By contrast, the famous Jamestown Colony was characterized by disastrous governments and was even abandoned in 1610, although later settled once more.

Calvin Coolidge said this about the compact, 300 years after its signing:

“The compact which they signed was an event of the greatest importance. It was the foundation of liberty based on law and order, and that tradition has been steadily upheld. They drew up a form of government which has been designated as the first real constitution of modern times. It was democratic, an acknowledgement of liberty under law and order and the giving to each person the right to participate in the government, while they promised to be obedient to the laws.

“But the really wonderful thing was that they had the power and strength of character to abide by it and live by it from that day to this. Some governments are better than others. But any form of government is better than anarchy, and any attempt to tear down government is an attempt to wreck civilization.”

The first words of the Compact are: “In the name of God, Amen.”

Alexander Solzhenitsyn said, “To destroy a country, you must first cut off its roots.”

Let us commit to teaching America’s history aright to our children and grandchildren.