On Aristocracy

"My principles are only those that, before the French Revolution, every well-born person considered sane and normal."

For most people in our day and age, the term “aristocracy” carries with it the baggage of numerous negative connotations, most of which are derived from popular impressions about history. These impressions are generally derived from simplistic, and often grossly biased and incorrect, views taught in democratic public school systems. As a result, generations of Western school children have grown up with a flawed understanding of who and what aristocrats are and do. At best, the average modern, democratic Western man imagines that the aristocrats who fill the pages of our traditional history were supercilious toffs and duffers, to be laughed at, not to be taken seriously. At worst, aristocrats are equated with “dictators” or “murderers,” often by the know-nothing dimwits who write our textbooks.

Yet, as the testimony of history actually shows, none of these impressions are close to being accurate. While nobody reaches the perfection of their station, it is unjust and simpleminded to tar a predominant element in the history of practically every human society that has ever existed based upon the failings of a few. Indeed, the principle and institution of aristocracy has been a tremendous stabilizing force across the range of human history and has provided a boon to mankind which no other social system has been able to approach.

What is Aristocracy?

So, what IS aristocracy? Aristocracy is a term which mean “rule by the best men.” When it works as intended, this is exactly what aristocracy seeks to provide – it serves to raise the best men, those most fitted through both their natural excellent qualities and their diligence at cultivating superior attributes, into leadership roles over the common mass of humanity. When a society is not being artificially distorted in some way, the spontaneous rise of an aristocratic caste will be the natural result of the varied interactions within a social dynamical system.

One of the criticisms of aristocratic systems is that they rest upon a foundation of social and political inequality. As far as it goes, this criticism is true, but also quite irrelevant. Aristocracy certainly is built upon the fact of natural inequalities among men which exist due to the multitude of factors which interact within complex social systems. These inequalities are obvious to any honest observer – some people are simply more intelligent, stronger, more competent and capable, more courageous, more temperate, more spiritual, more willing to sacrifice for the future, etc, etc. than are others. When these factors are not interfered with, they result in some rising and others sinking. There is nothing wrong with this. This is completely natural, which is why artificially democratic and egalitarian criticisms of aristocracy centered upon “inequality” are irrelevant. They rest on an assumption (the equality of all people) which is itself unnatural and empirically false.

In a sense, aristocracy is the codification of this inequality among men, usually by the events of history and the gradual development of custom and a traditional system, though it may also be buttressed explicitly by positive law as well. New or reinvigorated aristocracies arise most often during times of severe social stress, usually after a previous polity or civilization has decayed and collapsed. Another engine for the creation of aristocratic hierarchies is during periods of migration and entry into new lands, either by conquest or colonization.

An example of the first would be the well-known creation of the feudal aristocratic system that developed in the Germanic states which established themselves on the ruins of the Roman West. Examples of the second kind would be the feudal systems that developed among the Indo-Iranian states that followed upon the invasions of Indo-Aryans into northern India and Persia. In both cases, conditions existed which allowed superior men to rise and exercise power, with the aristocratic hierarchies sorting themselves out via the competition for power that took place among the various emerging nobilities.

However, the principle of aristocracy involved much more than merely that of individuals filling leadership positions or exercising rulership over a region or nation. Aristocracy is as much a mode of being as anything else. An individual may be aristocratic by nature even if he does not live within a social system in which a strict hierarchy is upheld, or even exists, due to that social system’s deficiencies. As a mode of being, aristocracy encompasses many spiritual and intangible elements which do not necessarily arise from within merely experiential existence. An individual is an aristocrat of the spirit because he displays superior qualities, not merely a superior social or legal position. The objective for a rightly-ordered social system would be to bring the existing sociopolitical hierarchy into accord with the natural one that already exists among the various inequalities of the society’s members. The social system should come to exalt the aristocrats of the soul within it.

A conceptual tool that I find useful (following somewhat upon Baron Evola’s use of the terminology) is the Hindu caste system, which itself developed as a result of the Indo-European invasion of India around 1400 BC. Very generally speaking (and ignoring its innumerable subdivisions), this system divides into a three-fold system of social hierarchy. The first caste is made up of the brahmana (priestly caste) and the kshatriya (warrior and administrative caste). For my purposes, I tend to join these two elements into a single “aristocratic” caste, of which they represent two aspects. The second caste is the vaisya, typically made up of the merchants, farmers, artisans, tradesmen, and so forth. Along with the brahmana and kshatriya, these were collectively known as the arya, indicating that they were also of the invading Indo-Aryan stock. However, they were the “little men” among the invaders. The third and lowest caste are the sudra, made up of the very poor and generally unfree, the common laborers and so forth. The sudra are thought to generally be descended from the subjugated Dravidian stock which originally inhabited the Indian subcontinent.

We can see elements of the three castes within practically every human society that has ever existed, and even within our own. The inversion within Western democratic, egalitarian societies does not exist because the caste system is lacking, but because it is inverted from its natural and right order, as we will see below.

Aristocracy, as alluded to above, is a matter of the spirit. It involves superior individuals who are not driven by materialistic or worldly impulses, but who instead manifest a preeminence of mind and spirit, who are concerned with honor and eternal realities, not with transient profit or petty political bickering. Befitting the priestly and kingly nature of their caste, aristocrats should naturally rule with authority, yet be subservient to the necessary work of maintaining stability and right order for their people and societies (though obvious not to the people themselves). The natural aristocrat desires the order of civilization on both the temporal (kingly) and eternal (priestly) levels.

This explains the traditional association of aristocracy with land and realm. These institutions serve to provide a great measure of permanency and stability which reflects the polar axial order that ought to define the aristocratic temperament. The aristocrat holds the land because the land does not move, and neither should he nor his caste. In many historical aristocratic systems, the nobility has either eschewed by custom, or else been forbidden by law, to participate in commerce and money-lending, instead deriving their wealth from the usufruct of their lands. This was the case with the senatorial caste in the early Roman Republic, among the Spartan elite, and among much of the medieval European aristocracy.

This temperament contrasts with those of the lower castes. The vaisya – the merchant, the banker, the moneymaker, the tinkerer and tradesman – is tied up with the never-ending grasping for money and profit. His principles are not those of the eternal, but of the material, the temporary, the pragmatic and unprincipled. The merchant wants money, not eternal principles. The vaisya are mercurial, and it has historically been through them that the eternal revolutionary conflict which seeks to overthrow aristocratic order and social stability have come. The sudra are sensual and driven by the quest for pleasure, desiring to obtain what they did not work for themselves. In many of the great revolutions of recent history, the sudra have been the pawns of wealthy vaisya seeking the overthrow of aristocratic systems, supposedly for “the good of the people.”

The aristocratic caste upholds the spiritual bases of its societies, while the vaisya pervert them with materialism and the sudra degrade them with physicality and sensuality. The vaisya seek to make religion, as with everything else, subject to the power of money and to remove it from being an impediment to unscrupulous avarice. It comes as no surprise that the great commercial republics of history – from Venice in the Middle Ages to the United States of America today - have been the fonts for the commercialization and ecumenization of religion. Likewise, the sudra evade religion entirely or else (when given free rein) act to coarsen their societies to the point that religion becomes powerless. This is seen today in the way in which the influence of underclass values on Western (and particularly American) popular entertainments has resulted in a thoroughly godless and sensual diversion of emphasis from the spiritual and intellectual to the sexual and licentious. The natural aristocrat will seek to oppose and destroy these degenerate influences.

Related to this, the aristocrat is one who understands that leadership involves self-sacrifice for his kin and people and realm. He does not seek to rule so as to accrue money, fame, or political office to himself (though these may indeed come his way). Rather, he does so because he is, or has made himself, worthy, and rules because he is the best and most capable man to promote the health and right order within his society. As with the example of Jesus Christ (who is Himself the exemplar of Evola’s polar axial kingship), the aristocrat is lord, yet is servant to the good of those whom he rules.

What Aristocracy is Not

Having seen what are the basic principles of aristocracy, let us not explore a few particular applications of these principles. I’ll begin by addressing the matter of what is NOT aristocracy but is often commonly misperceived to be by those whose thinking has been tainted by modernism.

First, politicians are not aristocrats. Indeed, the very notion of striving for the approval of the voting public to gain office is completely anti-aristocratic on its face. Likewise with the idea of engaging in demagoguery to sway the populace over to one’s side. The very concept of “politics” in the commonly understood democratic sense assumes a populist and demotic aspect to the advancement of the one holding power which is entirely at odds with the aristocratic principle of ruling because of natural right and capacity. Indeed, while aristocratic systems are intended to promote the best men with the best qualities into rightly deserved power within social hierarchy, democratic politicking generally serves to select for entirely the wrong set of characteristics in its leadership. The successful democratic politician is the one who can lie, bribe, cut deals, and play off competing interests against each other. The existence of a self-perpetuating political class in a democracy is not at all the same thing as having an aristocracy.

Second, business leaders, entrepreneurs, and plutocrats in general are not aristocrats. Though they may often attain to astounding wealth and be able to translate this wealth into political power, these individuals are thoroughly vaisya in their temperament, and are not capable of exercising truly aristocratic virtues. “What’s good for business” may not always be (and indeed often is not) what is good for the nation and society, especially when these business interests gain control of a powerful nation’s foreign policy and use it to their own ends. Further, the “entrepreneurial class” simply has no regard for eternal, axial spiritual values that bring a nation and its people into accord with natural and eternal order. Instead, this class often sets a nation against that natural order and creates division and disorder due to its purely materialistic concerns. No, simply being rich does not make someone an aristocratic.

Thirdly, bullies and tyrants are not aristocrats, though libertarian types often tend to perpetuate confusion on this point. Simple “having power” does not make one an aristocrat. Indeed, as we’ve seen, in the sort of disordered societies that characterize the modern western world, very few truly aristocratic and noble souls hold positions of power. The assumption that aristocrats are “bullies” or “tyrants” or “dictators” entirely neglects the necessity for genuine aristocrats to rule for the end of guiding, leading, and taking care of their people.

What Aristocracy Does

As noted above, natural aristocrats may not always find themselves in a position in which they are able to rise to rule. Perhaps they exist within a democratic regime in which virtue and genuine capability is frowned upon and despised. They may even find themselves living under a socialistic or communistic regime in which equality is enforced by the barrel of a gun. The vagarities of history, politics, and social circumstances often work toward creating inferior social systems which reward degeneracy and mediocrity rather than aristocracy. However, in whatever state he is in, the aristocratic soul will tend toward the preparation of himself in spirit, soul, and body so as to make himself worthy such that he may accept power and rule should his circumstances change and return to a more natural order.

The aristocratic soul is one who has power over himself, which allows him to rightly exercise power over others. He invariably seeks stability and order, and rejects, both consciously and subconsciously, revolutionism at any and all levels. He seeks to align himself, his surroundings, and those under him in hierarchy with the eternal axial order of nature and the heavens.

When he is power, the aristocrat ought to rule diligently and with full command of his authority. There should be no challenges against him that are tolerated, nor any self-doubt or second-guessing of himself. However, this does not mean that he rules those under him unrighteously or tyrannically. The aristocrat does not hate or despite the lower castes. He merely recognizes them in their natural positions, and understands that each caste has its rightful roles and should dutifully carry these out. He is mindful of the capacities and particular needs of the lower castes, and benevolently seeks to guide them in the right way.

The aristocrat accept that the vaisya will tend toward materialism and money-grubbing – he encourages the exercise of these propensities in the proper directions, and makes sure that they are not allowed a share of political power which they may then misuse to enrich themselves at the public expense or through usury. Likewise with the sudra, he understands their bent toward sensuality and emotion, and restrains their baser nature and channels them into the directions of work that will build their character and occupy them fruitfully.

The true aristocrat will act diligently to protect those under him from threats both physical and spiritual. He will uphold the spiritual underpinnings of his society and seek to bring them, or else return them, to a place where they accord with eternal truths. He will discourage elements that would introduce instability and disorder among the people. He will root out those who would stir up revolution and damage the organism over which he is the head.

At the same time, the aristocrat will properly exercise his place in his social hierarchy. For those who are above him – his king and those to whom he owes fealty – he will prove loyal and true, setting in his own self the example of righteous dealings which he would expect of those below himself. In dealing with his subordinates, he will not be overbearing in areas in which there is no manifested need for his interference. He will not meddle in their affairs merely for the sake of exercising power or being a busybody, as many democratic “leaders” throughout history have shown themselves wont to be.

In all areas, the ideal aristocrat will seek to perfect these traits of rulership, though certainly we can admit that this ideal standard has not always been accomplished in men who have ruled throughout mankind’s history. However, whether he is at the top of the hierarchy (the king) or at some intermediate level within the noble hierarchy, he will find his place and fit into it, conducting himself with propriety and correctness for the sake of the entire organism of the nation, realm, and people.