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teristically modern vision of the free, responsible subject. This enters
into tension with a host of traditional practices. But this is not by
itself exceptional; so, for instance, did Christianity in the early Mid–
dle Ages with the warrior ethic inherited from pagan times, as Mac–
Intyre argues.
What is new, and alarming, is that th is moral vision sustains
and is itself sustained by an increasingly bureaucratic society, and
that together they foster a neglect and forgetfulness of the back–
ground of virtues and practices without which this moral vision itself
constantly tends to become distorted and trivialized. On the other
hand, it is also true that the new notion of freedom has developed its
own practices or modified traditional ones. I am thinking, for in–
stance, of the practices of political self-rule sprung partly out of the
tradition of republican government which moderns revived.
MacIntyre recognizes this revival in the eighteenth century
but seems to think that it has been totally neutralized. In comparing
our times to the dark ages, he states: "Th is time however the bar–
barians are not waiting beyond the frontiers; they have already been
governing us for quite some time." A quip, no doubt. But nonethe–
less indicative. MacIntyre's critique of modern society and moral
thought seems to me very one-sided. Precisely because of the impor–
tance of virtues and practices for moral life, we need to see where
new ones are arising as well as where old ones are being abandoned
and lost. MacIntyre handles the side he does acknowledge with
brilliance and insight. O u r task is equally to discern and nurture the
coheren t moral visions of the good life.
CHARLES TAYLOR
THE I AND THE WE
LIBERALISM AND THE LIMITS OF JUSTICE. By Michael J. Sandel.
Cambridge University Press. $29.50.
Michael Sandel's book is a critique of a certain kind of lib–
eralism. The version of liberalism that interests Sandel is one "in
