The year is 1813. A young Church of England priest named John Strachan is on the frontlines of a military conflict, determined to stand by King and Country in the face of invasion. The city of York is fallen as the Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada and his outnumbered force of regulars retreat to the strategically more important city of Kingston. Strachan must play a leading role in negotiating with the American forces. This test paves a road which will make him the spiritual leader of Upper Canada’s Anglo-colonial elite: the Family Compact. As a Bishop, his firm stance in favour of Loyalism and the Established Church – for throne and altar – will serve as a defence of the values which unite the great families of Upper Canada in the early 19th century. It is a total rejection of the values of the Revolution and the oligarchic Whigs who were behind it.
The year is 1965. The city of York has a new name: Toronto. The city’s academic and philosophic elite are in uproar regarding book recently published by a certain George Grant. Grant is a professor of religion at Ontario’s McMaster University. His new work has levelled an attack against what he perceives to be the total subversion of Canada’s ruling class by the liberal and progressive ideology of the United States. He champions Canada as the political embodiment of an ordered and hierarchical society whose view of human nature derives from the Classical-Christian tradition. The work will secure Grant’s legacy as the staunch defender of a tradition which has disappeared from the consciousness of Canada’s elite. It has been replaced by the project of a liberal internationalist political order.
What changed in the years and decades between 1813 and 1965? Who stood up to defend the High Tory faith which forged a Dominion and took up arms to resist the republican vision to the south?
more
Book Review: The North American High Tory Tradition - Social Matter
The year is 1965. The city of York has a new name: Toronto. The city’s academic and philosophic elite are in uproar regarding book recently published by a certain George Grant. Grant is a professor of religion at Ontario’s McMaster University. His new work has levelled an attack against what he perceives to be the total subversion of Canada’s ruling class by the liberal and progressive ideology of the United States. He champions Canada as the political embodiment of an ordered and hierarchical society whose view of human nature derives from the Classical-Christian tradition. The work will secure Grant’s legacy as the staunch defender of a tradition which has disappeared from the consciousness of Canada’s elite. It has been replaced by the project of a liberal internationalist political order.
What changed in the years and decades between 1813 and 1965? Who stood up to defend the High Tory faith which forged a Dominion and took up arms to resist the republican vision to the south?
more
Book Review: The North American High Tory Tradition - Social Matter
