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Does Taylor define "civilization" first? I don't know, but certainly can go look.

I ask because if "liberty and civilization are incompatible," then the American experiment was doomed from the start. The Founders were civilized men, and mostly not frontiersmen. What they didn't want was the "over-civilization" of Europe, which they knew sapped men's souls.

I see a real difference between civilization as enforced by social contract -- where one restrains one's self to achieve social acceptance and its benefits, or chooses not to -- and civilization as enforced by the power of the state -- where, as Yakov Smirnov would say, society chooses you. The right to freedom of speech is the clearest enshrinement of that distinction, and may end up as the last one.

Liberty and civilization are not incompatible - but they do always exist with a condition of tension between them. That is why the art of uncorrupt politics is important, and the extreme diffusion of political power is desirable.

The way I see it there seems to be a sliding scale with Liberty on one and and Civilization on the other; the more you have of one, the less of the other. You can try to find your ideal place on the line but you can't have both at once in their fullness.

Sometimes the liberty is lost because civilization becomes too rigid and structured, and sometimes you lose civilization because all rules fall apart and chaos results. The ideal place is probably a third the way from liberty, with the world mostly wild and wooly but nothing is ever static.

Liberty and civilization are not at all incompatible, quite the reverse.

Liberty is as often confused with freedom as freedom is with democracy. As Tocqueville lamented, there is no political system so miserable as democracy without liberty.

What then is "Liberty?"

Liberty creates civilization. Liberty in civilization creates prosperity, and surpasses prosperity to create luxury. Luxury destroys liberty, for it corrupts the discipline required to cultivate the virtues. Thus ends liberty, and shortly after, civilization. That, anyway, is the essence of an argument made by Montesquieu in the Spirit of the Laws

There are so many people who just do not have any value added to add to the OP work, so please try to bring a more constructive discussion to this post. I know i am not doing anything constructive with this posting but i wanted to tell you guys about it.

Lol, war dies eine einzigartige Hub! Ein großer gelesen - gewählt und interessant!

Hola, he sido un lurker alrededor de su blog para unos pocos meses. Me encanta este artículo y de todo su sitio! Mirando hacia adelante a la lectura más!

Heya Ich bin zum ersten Mal hier. I gefunden diesem Board und ich finde es wirklich wirklich nützlich und es half mir aus a lot . Ich hoffe, etwas zurück zu geben und zu helfen andere wie Sie geholfen