It was, for Wordsworth, what the failure of Communism was for the radicals of a later day. He could no longer deny the error inherent in “speculative schemes— / That promised to abstract the hopes of Man.” He saw the Revolution as a dream that “flattered the young, pleased with extremes” and made “Reason’s naked self / The object of its fervour.” Confused by pure reason’s failure as a moral guide, he “lost / All feeling of conviction” and “yielded up moral questions in despair.” Slowly, he began to do the brave and difficult thing: to admit he had been wrong and change his mind.
RTWT.
We can only hope that the revolutionaries of our day will find the courage to "change his mind."
When conservatives fret about having to rebuild their party, they should take heart. None of this is new. If, however, they attempt to recreate the sensationalism of the Democrat's success and continue to fall victim to the cult of personality and populism, rather than an earnest rebuilding effort of our intellectual principles based on Western Civilization's values, we will fail.
Now, just as American reaction to the blatant political failures of sixties radicalism led to the Reagan revolution and the long dominance of political conservatism here, so, too, British reaction to the French Revolution led to 20 years of Tory rule. But neither Reaganism nor Toryism could ultimately disguise the fact that a profound and fundamental change in human outlook and attitude had taken place—a change that the sixties and the French Revolution represented rather than caused. When the smoke cleared, those who still believed in Western history, traditions, and institutions had to reestablish their relevance and rebuild their foundations in what was essentially a new world.
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