Richard Wollheim
THE NEW CONSERVATISM IN BRITAIN
Someone once remarked that if the cyclical theory of his–
tory were true, it would be only because people believed in it, and
in this remark, seemingly an expression of faded idealism, there is
much sound commonsensical truth about human nature. In the do–
main of man as opposed to that of nature, whether things happen or
not is by no means independent of whether we think they will. The
revolutions described by the heavenly bodies may be indifferent to our
beliefs and opinions about them, to our efforts to anticipate or pre–
vent or predict them; those devised by human beings most certainly
are not. From which it follows that if there is a revival of conserv–
atism in Britain today, it must be in some way connected with the
fact that people have for so long been saying that the time has come
round for one.
A more profitable question, however, is whether there is in fact
a revival of conservatism. A difficult question to answer: difficult
because it's difficult to know what should count as an answer. What
is a revival? And what is conservatism?
It
may be said in the most general terms that left-wing views
express themselves most naturally in principles: and right-wing views
not in principles but in arguments- in arguments, that is, directed
against those principles. Historically these arguments fall into three
fairly well-defined groups. First there are the arguments asserting
that the principles of the Left are false because they are incompatible
with, or offend against, some true conception or vision of society,
generally a vision more refined or spiritual in character, of which
a profounder kind of knowledge is obtainable through the happy
light of faith or 'true reason' or perhaps the happy darkness of preju-
