21 levels of Self-Deception: THIRD EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

T W E N T Y - O N E L E V E L S

are wider implications when we consider what is meant by ‘the good life’. In fact, here we really give the lie to the notion of the world being dis-enchanted. There’s enchantment, very definitely! But the real problem, I think, is that our would-be enchantments are suppressed.

We only have the liberty of such ambivalence because of centuries of struggle in the West. Modernism has fought to separate science, art and theology as well as promote democracy and equality. Church, State, Monarchy and the Law can all act independently. This permits us the freedom to express whatever we like in words and pictures without fear of being branded either a traitor or a blasphemer or both. The Monarchy cannot stand above the Law. The Church can hold theological and moral precepts of its own, but cannot enforce them via the State — and so on. Perhaps most of us do not stop to think what a privilege this situation is and how genuinely unique in terms of the history of human civilisations and cultures. There are still relatively few countries in the world where such freedom is even understood, let alone permitted. However, those hard-won freedoms of Western culture come with a heavy price. We are rudderless and ambivalent as a society, and often in denial.

What can be made of this? Thomas Moore reminds us of the overarching wildness and mystery from which we have come:

‘Mystery is not a vague unknown; it is a specific unknowable… Contemporary Western life is often split into frenetic passions and emotions that break out destructively in city streets and in family homes, and an endless supply of

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