By Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira
Single combat to be decided by the judgement of God. -From a miniature in the “Conqêtes de Charlemagne,” a Manuscript of the Fifteenth Century, in the National Library of Paris.
As a collective phenomenon of ‘feud against feud,’ all that diminished in intensity with the elevation of kings, the Church’s great insistence on peace, and the Imitation of Christ which is a masterpiece in this matter. But what was the end result? It was the appearance of dueling. Duels were a leftover of that excess of combativeness. And the duel shows that the old spirit of combat and extermination—which of itself is highly censurable—that old spirit of combativeness was still able to pulsate with any morsel of food it might be given.
(Excerpt from an MNF, Thursday, Sept. 14, 1989 – Nobility.org translation)
