If the West is to stay the same, a lot will have to change

                                   Hunter Biden (Getty)  

Plenty of historical situations in which fundamental assumptions about society are disrupted can be restored only by something like revolution

Written By:

Roger Kimball

My favorite line in Giuseppe di Lampedusa’s novel The Leopard comes midway through the first chapter. The times are unsettled. The Risorgimento is sweeping Sicily. Prince Tancredi, the idealistic young nephew of the book’s protagonist Prince Fabrizo, is bantering about the political situation with his uncle. He suddenly waxes serious: “If we want things to stay as they are, everything will have to change” (Se vogliamo che tutto rimanga come è, bisogna che tutto cambi).

Most readers will understand that the whiff of paradox points not to a contradiction but to a profound truth. There are plenty of historical…