A review of journalist Peter Hitchens' book, The Abolition of Britain, published by Quartet Books, London, 1999, 351 pages.
by John Ross Schroeder
Peter Hitchens is a journalist and
columnist with 20 years service on The Daily Express in London.
He has spent the last 20 years plumbing the soul of Britain. He has found
aspects of the process enormously disappointing. Especially in the last
two decades he discovered a deep shift in the British people's way of
life.
Unwelcome Changes in Family Life
Family life is right at the top of some very
unwelcome changes. Social activities have shifted dramatically from the
home to the workplace. Children dress as miniature adults rather than children.
They are more loyal to peers than their own parents.
At the time of Sir Winston Churchill's
death in January of 1965, "93% of British marriages, including Churchill's
own, endured to the grave." Now the United Kingdom's divorce rate leads
all of Europe, and the British easily outdistance their nearest European
rivals in the number of illegitimate children. Very questionable distinctions.
At the time of writing this review, the
press reported a 26-year-old who is now a grandmother. Her 12-year-old
daughter recently gave birth. Apparently the grandmother's ex-boyfriend
is the father.
The efficacy of the Anglican Church itself
depends upon stable families and lasting marriages to pass on its faith
and traditions. As one famous British novelist wrote during the mid-1930s
(quoted by Hitchens): "Making marriage in any serious degree unstable,
dissoluble, destroys the permanency of marriage, and the church falls.
Witness the enormous decline in the Church of England [this was back
in the '30s-a drop in the bucket when compared to present conditions].
The reason being that the church is established upon the element of
union in mankind… The marriage-tie, the marriage-bond, take
it which way you like, is the fundamental link in Christian society.
Break it, and you will have to go back to the overwhelming dominance
of the State."
