morality” but as one “of economic andnsocial well-being.” She argues that then”answers” to her new family agenda “lienin the whole range of the social, physical,nand biomedical sciences.” Normativenvalues, religious traditions, and ethicalnteachings are curiously ignored.nAn truth, public life stands at the mercynof private life. When the latter falters,nthere is little that govermnents can do tonset things right. This insight, borrowednfrom C. S. Lewis, is the theme animatingnJoseph Sobran’s new volume of essays.nSingle Issues. With this book, James P.nMcFadden adds to the reputation of hisnnascent publishing house. The HumannLife Press. Perhaps more than any singlenindividual, McFadden has quietly raisednthe quality of public discourse on the issuesnof abortion, family policy, infenticide,nand the role of moral judgments in publicnlife. Facing a hostile, secular left desperatelynseeking to dismiss such issuesnas trivialities, McFadden recognized earlynon that rational, historic, and compassionatenanalyses of such questions couldnonly work to the advantage of traditionalnforces.nMr. Sobran, senior editor oiNationalnReview and columnist for ^c Los AngelesnTimes, tackles head-on the “single issue”ncharge frequendy bandied about by thenmainstream media. The debates overnfemily, sexuality, abortion, and secularization,nhe insists, are indeed singular, fiindamental.nWhat issues could be nearernto the heart of civilization, he asks? Whyndoes “mainstream” opinion fear debaten”about what man is, and about what societynshould be”? In answer, Sobrannsuggests that American liberalism, whilencalling itself “pluralist,” is in lact aggressivelynsecularist, seeking “to force religiousnawareness out of public life… whilenblandly pretending nothing serious is atnstake.”nHis essays on subjects ranging fromnlafherhood to pornography to the “valuefreensociety” work gracefully and insightfullynto gird up and reinterpret a badlynmauled cultural and social patrimony.nFor example, rejecting what he calls then”orgasm ethic,” Sobran emphasizes thenlinkage between sexual love and socialnorder. “The ability to enjoy full sexualnrapture and yet to subordinate it to thendiscipline of fidelity,” he writes, “is angenuine human achievement—and anfruitful one. It gives resonance to individualnlives and health to whole societies.”nElsewhere, he decries “the crimes ofnsecularism,” insisting that the “humannrights” logo include “not only the rightnto dissent, but the right to worship” andnthat secularism “be judged not by its professionsnof tolerance, but by its own internationalnrecord… [which] is a grislynA Man Out of TimenAlzina Stone Dale: The Outline ofnSanity: A Biography o/G.K Chesterton;nWilliam B. Eerdmans; GrandnRapids, MI.nby Keith BowernIn an all-too-brief flicker of creativity,nHollywood produced an imaginativenmovie in 1979 called Time After Time.nThe premise of the film was that Jack thenRipper, a hedonistic, Edwardian physician,nshows up at a dinner party of H. G.nWells’s fresh from a kill. Tlie police arenhot on his heels, so the Ripper absentsnhimself from the party, choosing Wells’snbasement for his hiding place. There henfinds the Time Machine and through industriousnguesswork manipulates thenlevers and dials projecting himself forwardnto San Francisco, 1979. Wells discoversnhis friend’s method of escape and,nthrough an altruistic urge to save the fiiturenfrom this monster, pursues him.nWells eventually defeats the rogue, butnnot before learning that the gloriousnUtopia he’d expected has actually becomenthe sort of moral vacuum for whichnthe Ripper is perfectly adapted. It’s anclever idea, but if the producers had anynMr. Bower is managing editor o/ThenHillsdale Review.nnnone everywhere.” Turning to the family,nSobran states that its current weakenednstatus could never have been imposednfrom above. “To a great extent, alas, itnsprings from popular demand. Fornication,nadultery, and abortion are nothingnnew…. But these old sins are now beingninstitutionalized as ‘rights,’ and … arennow forming part of a new and malignnpolitical order in which the reality of thenfamily must crumble before the realitynof sheer state power.” As Dr. Bernsteinnpursues her new femily-oriented agenda,nshe should keep this useful, moral, andnhistorical message in mind. Dnknowledge of who H. G. Wells was theyndidn’t let on. They could have at leastnconsulted Rebecca West before makingnH. G. into a prudish Victorian, when innfact he was more of a goatish Edwardian.nIt would have been much more amusingnto have G. K. Chesterton pursuing Wellsninto the frolicsome Haight-Ashbury.nWells certainly could have done fernworse damage to the future than thenRipper, and Chesterton would have beennthe perfect man to catch him. After all,nChesterton’s biographers point out repeatedlynthat time meant nothing to G.nK. He never let it enter his calculations.nChesterton was an ideal traveler; hisnphilosophy of tourism was never to ridiculena culture for being different fromnone’s own. Whereas Wells would havenbeen crushed at the apparent failure ofntechnology to elevate the human conditionnbeyond the capital vices, Chestertonnwould have embraced whatever realitynhe’d smmbled upon, thinking none thenworse of men that still needed saving.nHe knew they would always perform atnmuch the same level, though he neverngave up hope that some political systemncould be developed that would permitnmen to experience a more natural relationshipnto the land and to one another.nIn his journeys Chesterton might havenstumbled into a meeting of environmen-nSeptember 1983n