Here Is a Man

In this essay, as in much else, Burke was what our time calls an “anti-intellectual”: that is, he exposed mercilessly the vainglory of the cult of Pure Reason. And in this, as in so much else, Burke displayed an intellectual power far superior to that possessed by the dogmatists of Rationalism.

M. Dutourd was twenty when he surrendered to the Germans in 1940, but his current book has all the faults of adolescence. His style is often spasmodic and declamatory; his judgment of some of his countrymen, including Marshal Pétain, is sometimes both unjust and inconsistent. But for all that, he has written a book that is as refreshing as a cool breeze in the evening of a sultry day.

RO

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Revilo Oliver

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In this essay, as in much else, Burke was what our time calls an “anti-intellectual”: that is, he exposed mercilessly the vainglory of the cult of Pure Reason. And in this, as in so much else, Burke displayed an intellectual power far superior to that possessed by the dogmatists of Rationalism.

M. Dutourd was twenty when he surrendered to the Germans in 1940, but his current book has all the faults of adolescence. His style is often spasmodic and declamatory; his judgment of some of his countrymen, including Marshal Pétain, is sometimes both unjust and inconsistent. But for all that, he has written a book that is as refreshing as a cool breeze in the evening of a sultry day.