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| Fyrsten og et av hans hjertebarn: Poundbury |
Hans Kongelige Høyhet, Fyrsten av Wales, gjester landet vårt i disse dager og det er således verdt å igjen minne folk på hans livsanskuelse som har sin basis i Sophia Perennis. Dette har gitt seg uttrykk i alt fra byplanlegging og arkitektur, til landbruk. Førstnevnte gjennom den integrale og holistisk oppbygde byen Poundbury, som tross kritikk fra moderne orienterte arktitekter som Alain De Botton (arkitekten som planlegger å bygge et ateistisk "tempel" i London), synes å være på rett vei til tross for at kun de innledende fasene av utviklingsprosessen er gjennomført. Når det gjelder landbruk får Fyrsten utløp for sin interesse gjennom den organisk-drevne gården Duchy Home Farm. Ikke bare er de produsenter av økologiske matvarer, i tillegg driver de et fond for fremme av denne type mat i Storbrittania, nettbutikk, utøvelse og videreføring av tradisjonshåndverk, bevarelse av artsmangfold og alternative innfallsvinkler til kjente problemstillinger innen landbruket (blant annet benytter man seg av homeopatisk behandling av syke dyr).
For many years, I have been trying – often in the face of relentless criticism and ridicule – to draw attention to some of the elements of this crisis and to the ways in which they are linked to conventional values. At times, when in optimistic mood, I am encouraged to believe that we can come to our senses in time and change our ways of being before we are obliged to do so by catastrophic circumstances. But I am afraid that I do not always take this view. Often, I find myself convinced of the warnings given not only by Sir Martin Rees but also, of course, by sages and mystics of all faiths and of all time; warnings of the coming of a Dark Age, an age in which our ignorance and arrogance – a dangerous combination, surely – will lead us, indeed may already have led us, towards catastrophe. The present examples of pestilence, flood, famine, storm and climatic disruption are surely evidence enough. At the very least, they seem to foretell of conditions of chronic imbalance and disharmony – no doubt as much a part of our inner as our outer condition.
The traditionalist perspective is that we are living at the end of an historical cycle. At the beginning of this cycle all and every possibility is latent. However, as the cycle evolves or unfolds, these possibilities begin to manifest themselves in the world of time and space, beginning with the highest and gradually moving towards the lower. At the end of the cycle, the very lowest possibilities manifest themselves. The traditionalists tell us that at the cosmic level this process cannot be withheld or interrupted. It must take place. The cycle, they say, must exhaust itself before a new one can replace it.
I know that this might seem to suggest that we are entirely the passive victims of this cosmic unfolding. However, as I understand it, the traditionalists would go on to say that if this were the only reality then all attempts to pursue and align ourselves with spiritual realities and experience would be in vain. And that cannot possibly be. Indeed, it is precisely on the individual plane and through our understanding of and attachment to traditional norms of metaphysical doctrine and spiritual practice that we can, in a measure, transcend the baleful influence of the descent that is the eventual exhaustion and end of our cycle of history and prepare ourselves and the world for the beginning of the next. It is in this way, and perhaps only in this way, that we can overcome the mind-numbing despair of Modernism – not by false optimism, but by an understanding of and an attachment to the truly Real.
- HKH, Charles, Fyrsten av Wales
