Yes. "We hold [recognize] these truths to be self-evident...". Who other than a refugee of the "Cukoos' Nest" would trot out to announce that he doesn't "approve" of them?
"Metaphysical truths are by no means accepted because they are merely logically clear, but because they are ontologically clear, and their logical clarity is only a trace of this imprinted on the mind." Here again, this kind of higher truth is "not held to be true -- by those who understand it -- because it is expressed in a logical manner, but it can be expressed in a logical manner because it is true, without -- obviously -- its truth ever being compromised by the possible shortcomings of human reason."
...metaphysical truth "has nothing to do with personal opinion, originality, or creativity -- quite the contrary. It is directed towards those realities which lie outside mental perimeters and which are unchanging. The most a metaphysician will ever want to do is reformulate some timeless truth so that it becomes more intelligible in the prevailing climate." ...
Thus, when the Founders said, "we hold these truths to be self-evident," they were not appealing to mere logic, but to something much higher -- something eternal, axial, and principial, in this or any other cosmos. They were not conveying to King George what they "thought" about reality, but they were disclosing and imparting this transcendent reality to the monarch.
These principles would still be true if not a single human being were aware of them -- which, strictly speaking, is impossible, being that the human, qua human, is the being that is by definition conformed or "proportioned" to the absolute. Humans and humans alone are the cosmic mediators between time and eternity, God and creation, vertical and horizontal -- which is why we may know eternal Truth and conform ourselves to it. Or not.
In short, because we possess free will (freedom being one of the Divine attributes reflected in the human being) we may incarnate Truth or uncarnate the Lie. It's all up -- or down -- to you.
Another brilliant insight from Gagdad Bob!
Plus in his article, he cites a beloved teacher of mine, Eric Voegelin:
...the whole point of the left is that — in the turgid but accurate phrase of Eric Voegelin — it "immamentizes the eschaton," meaning, in plain Raccoon lingo, that it collapses the vertical into the horizontal, which dispenses with the "permanent things" of the transcendent realm altogether. As a result, all that is left for the bereft left is a horizontal, temporal, and material struggle "below," which necessarily pits one group against another, based solely upon the lust for power. Any cynical "humanist" will tell you that this is simply the way of the world.I doubt that either kosta50 or JCB would admit to being leftists, or left "progressives."
But they sure do reason like leftist ideologues: They're glad to "'collapse the vertical into the horizontal." It seems they know that the vertical ever points to the Absolute (God) "beyond" — i.e., transcending — the merely natural world accessible to "horizontal" experience. They simply will not have any vertical direction/dimension at all.
Thus the fool says in his heart, There is no God.
Problem with that is, there is no "adequation" between leftist ideology and the world as it is. Leftist ideology ever seeks to supplant the First Reality in which human beings actually live, in which humans have always lived, with a preferred "second reality" of their own making. The "adequation" problem will always defeat them on this score. But they aren't honest enough to admit it.
They really don't care about reason, in the end. Bottom line, if anything, they have contempt for reason — if it points to conclusions about the world which they do not like. And so, they prefer to deal in wrecking balls....
Thanks so very much for the excellent essay/post, dear brother in Christ!