The Neo-Puritan War on Christmas
“Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.” – H. L. Mencken “Let any man of contrary opinion open his mouth to persuade them [the Puritans], they close up their ears, his reasons… »
Redeeming the Time
Picture it. A book store in Madison, Wisconsin, in the mid-’90s. Quite the unlikely place you’d expect to be exposed to the true history of the Pilgrims being totalitarian religionists, not the freedom-seeking refugees in… »
His Truth is Marching On
Social activist Julia Ward wrote “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” in 1861, the same year that Henry Timrod composed his “Ethnogenesis” (the poem which kicked off part 2 of this series). In it, she… »
The New England Pharisees
“Religion, taking every mortal form But that pure and Christian faith makes warm, Where not to vile fanatic passion urged, Or not in vague philosophies submerged, Repulsive with all Pharisaic leaven, And making laws to… »
A City Upon a Hill
Recently, Business Insider editor, MSNBC contributor, and public-radio personality Josh Barro called the left’s war on American culture “annoying.” He explained that “Liberals have supplanted conservatives as moralizing busybodies.” New York Magazine‘s Jonathan Chait even tweeted support of Barro’s “sensible thoughts,” calling out the Democrats’ supposedly new-found… »
The Mind of the North
In my opinion, the single best short summary of the political and cultural differences between North and South appears in the movie Ride with the Devil, starring Tobey Maguire. Ride with the Devil is powerful,… »
“United States ‘History’ as the Yankee Makes and Takes It”
John Cussons had enough. It was 1897, and for thirty-two years he had watched as “Northern friends of ours have been diligent in a systematic distortion of the leading facts of American history— inventing, suppressing,… »
The Real Old Time Religion
People in the South who are intuitively attuned to its culture and history suspect that what passes for popular, evangelical religion in the region is not precisely what it has been in the past. Besides… »
Albion’s Seed: Cavaliers and Puritans
Random observations from reading David Hackett Fischer’s Albion’s Seed (which I’ve not yet finished)- Ain’t, betwixt, innards, unbeknownst- These are words that originated in the Southern and Western parts of England, and which came to… »
