Contra Gentiles: Non-Cartesian Sociology

W. H. Marshner

Triumph
Vol. VII No. 8
October 1972

One day during TRIUMPH’S summer dormancy, I received the manuscript which is published elsewhere in this issue under the title, “Non-Sociology.” It was a memorable day because the manuscript turned out to be a refutation of the commission which had procured it. As I recall, my commission had asked the redoubtable J. Wisner to assist our readers in their task of making a new Christendom by exposing them to the personalities and doctrines of the great Catholic sociologists of the last century: men like LePlay, Mun, and La Tour du Pin. They were the direct forbears of Christopher Dawson, as who (savor this syntax) they deserve to be as well known. But Wisner’s response was to sweep them all away; in fact — and this is the worst of it — he dismissed them with an argument from which I cannot dissent, though it makes me distinctly uncomfortable. Continue reading “Contra Gentiles: Non-Cartesian Sociology”