Keeping the Faith

The great man holds these dinners once each month, on Fridays at eight o’clock. Punctuality is appreciated. Latecomers are admitted, of course, there being no civilized way to deny them, but the regulation-issue libation, a weak highball, must be sacrificed to the demands of the schedule. At 8:45 the company moves briskly to the dining room and, under the firm hand of the hostess, arranges itself in the prescribed pattern around the brilliantly polished table. There are 24 of us, as always.

The great man makes a few remarks before we turn to the exquisite meal. In recent months these remarks of his have tended to be highly autobiographical. Everything seems to remind him of something else; seemingly unrelated events and personalities are cobwebbed with recollections of the Thirties and the Fifties, and especially of the Forties. These are dangerous times for America, he says in so many words, employing the elegant circumlocution where a flat- out cliché would do just as nicely. His remarks are compellingly interesting, not so much for their intrinsic cogency as for their barometric significance. The great man has served at the elbow of three Presidents. He has lived through dangerous times and not-so-dangerous times and he knows the difference.

About the Author

Neal B. Freeman

Neal B. Freeman, businessman and journalist, was a director of National Review Inc. for 38 years.

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The great man holds these dinners once each month, on Fridays at eight o’clock. Punctuality is appreciated. Latecomers are admitted, of course, there being no civilized way to deny them, but the regulation-issue libation, a weak highball, must be sacrificed to the demands of the schedule. At 8:45 the company moves briskly to the dining room and, under the firm hand of the hostess, arranges itself in the prescribed pattern around the brilliantly polished table. There are 24 of us, as always.

The great man makes a few remarks before we turn to the exquisite meal. In recent months these remarks of his have tended to be highly autobiographical. Everything seems to remind him of something else; seemingly unrelated events and personalities are cobwebbed with recollections of the Thirties and the Fifties, and especially of the Forties. These are dangerous times for America, he says in so many words, employing the elegant circumlocution where a flat- out cliché would do just as nicely. His remarks are compellingly interesting, not so much for their intrinsic cogency as for their barometric significance. The great man has served at the elbow of three Presidents. He has lived through dangerous times and not-so-dangerous times and he knows the difference.