Continued From Part Two
That is because one aspect of our Revolutionary world is that man has become increasingly susceptible to outside influences that carry him this way and that like a cork in the sea. Pope Pius XII spoke of this in his 1946 Allocution to the Roman Patriciate and Nobility. His Holiness stated:
“The numberless, anonymous multitude is easily provoked to disorder; it surrenders blindly, passively, to the torrent that carries it away or to the whims of the currents that divide and divert it. Once it has become the plaything of the passions or interests of its agitators, as of its own illusions, it is no longer able to take root on the rock and stabilize itself to form a true people…”
Ladies and Gentlemen, I do not think I have ever read a more accurate description of the plight of today’s youth and young adults. The Pontiff continued, expressing his desire that the Roman Patriciate and Nobility rise up to lead a people tossed about by the instability of modern life by anchoring them in the perennial values of Christian civilization.
After beseeching the Nobility to become exemplary Catholics, in all their enterprises, but especially by restoring the immaculate image of the true Catholic family, His Holiness stated:
“May you then, beloved Sons and Daughters with your great traditions, with care for your progress and your personal, human, and Christian perfection, with your loving good works, with the charity and simplicity of your relations with all the social classes, may you then strive to help the people reestablish themselves on the foundation stone, to seek the kingdom of God and His justice.”
So, in light of all this, I argue that because the 21st century is so terribly void of leadership and role models, we need elites now more than ever before. The fact of the matter is that every society will have role models that will shape the multitudes. If this function does not fall into the hands of a true elite, it will end up in the hands of false elites who represent the worst of society, not the best. When this happens, the results are disastrous.
When I say false elites, I am talking about those whose status is based solely on material goods and who live merely to accumulate the greatest amount of pleasure and sin that life can afford them. These false elites fill the ranks of Hollywood, the music industry and the business world.
Armand Hammer
Dr. Plinio dubbed these false elites the “toads.” Toads because they are inextricably attached to the material things of this world, like a toad that continually embraces the ground. A common trait of these toads is vulgarity which stands in sharp contrast to the impeccable etiquette of a true elite.
Think here of the extravagant and vulgar fashions worn by celebrities at public functions. I cannot fail to mention here the 2010 MTV Video Music Awards at which Lady Gaga appeared wearing a dress made of raw flank steak. Contrast this with the dress one would expect at a traditional European ball for high society. Imagine the different effects these ways of dressing have on society as a whole.
Unfortunately, these toads have all the prestige and influence their massive fortunes can buy. True elites are the only ones who can challenge this influence effectively, because they are the only ones who have the capacity to rise up before the public. The difference is that their rise is due to their excellent qualities, not their inflated bank accounts.
Any time we can promote these true elites in the public and spread their renown, we are performing a very effective and authentically Counter-Revolutionary apostolate.
However, for this to be effective requires a twofold action. The first action must be done by the elites themselves. This consists in them becoming more elite, so that their excellence will shine even brighter, their superiority will be even more evident and their leadership more auspicious.
George Washington at a ball in a 1889 painting by Jean Leon Germome Ferris.
Pope Pius XII described this excellence and its effects in the 1945 Allocution that we quoted above. The Holy Father said:
“In what, then, should this excellence of life and action consist, and what are its principle characteristics?
“It manifests itself above all in the perfection of your work, whether it be technical, scientific, artistic or anything else. The work of your hands and your spirits must bear that imprint of distinction and perfection that cannot be acquired from one day to the next, but rather reflects a refinement of thought, of feeling, of soul, and of conscience, inherited by your forebears and ceaselessly nurtured by the Christian ideal.”
A bit later, His Holiness continued, saying:
“It is also made manifest in the dignity of one’s entire bearing and conduct—a dignity that is not imperious, however, and that, far from emphasizing distances, only lets them appear when necessary to inspire in others a higher nobility of soul, mind and heart.
“Lastly, it manifests itself above all in the sense of lofty morality, or righteousness, honesty, and probity that must inform every word and every deed.”
So the first part of the equation is that elites should become even more elite and let their excellence shine even brighter. The second part is what those of us who are not elites must do. We must follow the example of the elites. We must develop a reverence and awe for those who are greater than we are.
This will naturally lead us to do everything in our power to suppress the influence of false elites and propagandize the true elites. We need to do whatever we can to make them known and spread their influence.
This is not an easy task, because it can be difficult to find true elites in our world. However, they do exist. It is important to note that in order to have a beneficial influence on society, they do not have to be perfect.
A State Banquet hosted by the late Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace.
For example, Queen Elizabeth II did all the bad things that we all know she did, however, in many ways, she had a very beneficial effect on her people. For example: on one occasion, she was hosting a dignitary from a less refined nation.
During the meal, one of the courses had to be eaten with one’s hands. Afterwards, to freshen up the guests’ hands, the servants brought around little bowls filled with perfumed water. The idea was that the guest would wash his fingertips in the perfume water and dry them off so he would be ready for the next course.
Not understanding the bowl’s purpose, the foreign dignitary grabbed it and drank all its contents in one gulp. This put Queen Elizabeth in a difficult situation. Were she to wash her hands in the bowl, it would make the dignitary feel foolish.
Without hesitation, Her Highness grabbed her bowl and drank it to the end to give the impression that the dignitary had acted appropriately. This self-sacrificing act was such an example of the very heights of etiquette, charity and good manners that simply hearing about it uplifts the soul.
Prince Luiz de Orleans e Bragança (1938-2022).
In 1997, Prince Bertrand’s brother, Dom Luis exhibited a similar level of refined manners at a TFP conference we had at the time. For the conference, we had brought in the chef that cooks for the French TFP, thinking that his superior French cooking would elevate the food at the event. Things went well enough until he decided to bake a cake.
Due to the language barrier, the French chef baked the cake with salt rather than sugar. No one bothered to taste the cake before it was served out and because Dom Luis was the guest of honor, His Highness was served before anyone else.
Ladies and Gentlemen, when the servers came to collect the dishes after the meal, there was only one plate that had been completely emptied of its salt cake. It was the one belonging to Dom Luis, who had eaten the whole piece without a word of complaint.
Hearing these stories demonstrates a superiority of manners and an excellence of charity that uplifts the soul. These are the types of examples that our vulgar self-serving world desperately needs and it is only the elites that can provide them. That is why we who are not nobles, with the illustrious exclusion of Prince Bertrand, we can do an authentically Counter-Revolutionary apostolate by spreading these stories and doing whatever we can to increase the prestige of the elites among us. We can do nothing more effective to counteract the vulgar and miserabilistic century in which we live.
Fred Chase Koch, 1900-1967, was an American chemical engineer, who founded the oil refinery firm Koch Industries, the second-largest privately-held company in the United States. In 1928, Koch traveled to the Soviet Union to build oil refineries, but he came to despise communism and Joseph Stalin’s regime. Koch self-published a 39-page, anti-communist pamphlet “A Business Man Looks at Communism” relating his experiences in the Soviet Union and warning of the threat of Communist take-over.
With this, we have tackled the last myth we will be challenging in this talk. Hopefully we have shown that now, more than ever before, is THE time for TRUE elites to fulfill their roles in society. We will now briefly summarize what we have seen and then we can move on to the conclusion.
Our talk has consisted in challenging American myths about equality. We began by pointing out the existence of an American Myth which states that America is a thoroughly egalitarian nation and that this egalitarianism is the reason for our successes.
We showed how, beginning in the middle of last century, sociologists began to take a deeper dive into American society and proved that it is not, nor has it ever been, nearly as egalitarian as former scholars would have us believe. One sociologist we quoted went so far as to suggest that “American society is almost as class-based as British society.”
This is not surprising because sociology demonstrates that a truly egalitarian society cannot exist because whenever two or more people get together for any purpose, hierarchies form spontaneously.
The second myth we challenged was that a meritocracy is the only just society, because it only gives benefits and privilege to those who have earned them. We showed how this is false because such a society denies the designs that God has for the family and the virtue of gratitude. God gave parents a burning desire to leave their children in a better condition than the one in which they entered life. To deny parents this ability is a great injustice.
It is also unjust to deny a privileged status to the children of a father who has spent himself and his resources to benefit the common good to the detriment of his personal family. Doing so would violate the virtue of gratitude which, according to St. Thomas of Aquinas, consists in giving to a benefactor even more than one has received from him.
We also saw that a meritocracy would require dictatorial power to enforce and would stifle the development of true elites, the formation of which requires many generations of privilege and excellence.
Last we challenged the myth that elites may have served their purpose for a certain time of history, but they are no longer viable in today’s world.
To refute this, we saw that a primary cause of our corruption is because we lack the leadership that only true, virtuous elites can provide. Thus, now more than ever is the time to support the formation and dissemination of elites throughout society. Our survival depends on it.
Frederick Vanderbilt Field, great-great-grandson of railroad tycoon Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt and an American leftist political activist, who supported many openly Communist organizations.
We saw that our world is filled with vulgar false elites who buy their way into positions of prestige. The only way to effectively counter the terrible influence of these toads, is with true elites who gain prestige because of who they are, rather than what they have.
Last we saw that for this to be truly effective will require a twofold process. First, the elites must become ever more elite. They must shine increasingly brightly through their excellence of their persons and actions.
The second part of the process is that those of us who are not elite, must welcome the beneficial action of the elites, first of all in us through admiration and dedication and then we must become propaganda experts who spread the fame and prestige of the elites as far and as wide as possible.
Before moving on to the conclusion, are there any questions?
To conclude this talk, I would like to finish by inviting you all to challenge American myths about equality in your own lives. We have shown that America is not really an egalitarian country in the strict sense of the word. Nevertheless, as Americans we have been imbued with egalitarian principles from our earliest years.
However, there is a profound contradiction in all this, because deep down Americans instinctively love the aristocracy and nobility. This was well described by James Hodges, writing about the success of the show Downton Abbey.
He wrote: “Americans fell in love with Downton Abbey because it offered them a dream they could not articulate but deeply desired: a world where everyone knew their place, where lords ruled with justice, where servants found dignity in service, and where beauty draped every detail…
“In the end, Downton Abbey was America’s guilty pleasure—not because it betrayed our democratic ideals, but because it revealed what we secretly want: leaders with integrity, roles with dignity, and a society where even the smallest duty has meaning.
“It turns out, we didn’t overthrow the aristocrats in our imaginations. We just imported them, polished the silver, and sat down to dinner with them once a week.”
So, we have this contradiction in our souls. We love hierarchy, while at the same time feel that it is somehow unjust. We must overcome this contradiction. To help in this endeavor I will present three concrete things that we can all do along these lines.
The first, and most important, is to weed out the egalitarian principles in ourselves so that we become truly hierarchical souls. This can be boiled down to the practice of three virtues.
A young boy admiring the knight. From bygoneamericana. Photo taken by Wayne Miller, USA in 1955.
The first is humility. Humility gives us the ability to admire those who are superior to us without envy. To love their superiority because superiority denotes proximity to God, the ultimate Superior. In a word, it fills our lives with reverence and awe when we are exposed to greatness. The second is gratitude. This gives us the desire to pay back those whose sacrifices and assumed responsibilities have created the benefits we enjoy in society. The third is charity, whereby we love our neighbor. This means want each individual to enjoy the rights and privileges that are proper to his place within society.
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The second thing we can do is educate ourselves concerning the Church’s teachings on social inequality. For this, I can offer no better source than the book Nobility and Analogous Traditional Elite by our founder, Dr. Plinio. It is a treasure-trove of rational thought and documentation that presents the mind of the Church about hierarchy in society.
The third thing is to spread these truths as far and as wide as possible. Instill in your children a love of hierarchy. Teach them to admire those things that are superior to them. Find enchanting stories about the nobility and tell them to your children and spread them in your social circles. The web site Nobility.org, updated regularly by Miss Jennifer Segerstrom is full of such stories and facts that will embellish Church doctrine on elites and their roles in society and make it more lively.
Ladies and Gentlemen, if we engage in this form of apostolate, we will stand out, because no one in today’s world talks about these things. However, we will be doing our part to bring back Christian civilization and usher in the Reign of Mary.
Thank you.
A native of Saint Louis, Missouri, Mr. Michael Whitcraft heads up the TFPs Southern California operations. He is a frequent contributor to articles on the TFP website. Based on the prophetic incites of Prof. Plinio, he lectures TFP members, supporters and friends on a wide range of subjects.
