<>We have driven metaphysical and theological abstractions out of politics. What then remains? Man, with his desires and his needs. <>
Modern politics denies the special place of man in God’s creation and regards him as little more than a beast, whose needs are limited to physical comfort.
Men have different levels of needs and desires ranging from mean to noble. As he goes on to explain in that paragraph, nations serve as a moderating factor, enlightening the will. The result is then not just a will but a productive, successful will.
This is, by the way, not to the level of excluding other factors, such as religion and education, and also geography and language. Rather, in some cases, a combination of those produces a nation, and in many others that combination is fruitless. The politics then should be subordinate to national preservation, and, as you note, in modernity they are not.