Joseph de Maistre and Houellebecq

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Joseph de Maistre and Houellebecq Anonymous Fri, Feb 4, 2022 12:12:25 No.19867454 [Reply] [Original]

The primary fact of human nature guiding Joseph de Maistre's writing in the St. Petersburg Dialogues is man's fallenness. He asserts that all men can attest to this reality, namely, that all men suffer imperfection and experience sorrow. Man's corruption is such that, if one were truly introspective, he would blush at the sight of himself.

Despite this, something in all men stirs them to seek happiness, pointing to that man was made to be happy. Further, all men desire the good. This is evidenced that, whatever decision one makes, he does it because he believes it to be good. Even if one commits an evil act (murder, for instance), he does so because he perceives that evil act to be good.

Man desires happiness. Man desires the good. Man cannot provide these things on his own because of his obvious degradation.

Maistre is drawing the reader upward precisely to show that anything good in man must come from outside himself, from above, as it were, from God. This fallenness is nothing other than Original Sin, and man is not his own solution; Christ is, and this alone through His Catholic Church.

This is chiefly the systemic folly of modern philosophy: man is his own savior. The modern world supposes that science, moral liberality, affluence, and so on, will provide true happiness. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I wish the reader to observe this in modern literature. Personally, I take well to more depressing narratives, such as The Sun Also Rises, Winesburg Ohio, The Idiot, Notes from Underground, and others. These novels illustrate quite well man's terrible state. Consider Sherwood Anderson's work. His short stories include characters who are isolated, lonely, and unable to communicate. This speaks to the isolation, loneliness, and lack of reason in a world lived as if without the Triune God.

All that aside for now. My friend, let's call him JR, knows my nihilistic taste in literature despite my joyous Catholicism. As I tell him, the most nihilistic characters showcase the joy we are made for. Anyway, he suggested to me recently to read Houellebecq.

I am not good at answering texts, and forget watching a video someone sends me, and he thinks I will read this Frenchman!

In his defense, my friend is a duck. He is not just any mallard, either. No, his broad shoulders (wings?) signify his unwillingness to conform to modernism. He despises all that the modern world offers. I inform him that we must return to the ancient ways, for what is eternal is ever new. Yet, autist he is, he tells me he is "losing it" and descends into the depths of the pond from which he came.

Maybe I will read Michel. He smokes. I find that appealing.

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/lit/ - Literature