Patron saints seldom dirty theirnhands by campaigning for themselvesnor organizing campaigns for others.nThey may exhort their flock, but theynare not much for actually marshalingnthe troops. Buckley has never shiednaway from his own “firing line,” butnwas kept on the sidelines by the Goldwaternbrain trust and remained apartnfrom all three Reagan presidentialndrives. In between there was Nixon,nwhom Buckley came close to servingnas an in-house conservative. Accordingnto Judis, Buckley gradually awakenednto discover that the Nixon WhitenHouse had cynically set out to cultivatenhim in order to establish greater credibilitynwith the conservative movement.nNevertheless, William F. BuckleynJr. has never been a skeptic on the scalenof another Paar regular, Oscar Levant.nNor has he been a pessimist ofnWhittaker Chambers’s depth and variety.nBut he is not without a sense ofntragedy when it comes to assessing thenhuman condition, of fragility when itncomes to pondering the state of thenAmerican experiment, and of limitsnwhen it comes to the possibility ofnrepairing both.nA once obscure young editor whonfounded a once obscure magazine hasnbecome a permanent fixture amongnAmerican celebrities, and on this lastnscore Judis can be both infuriating andnconfusing. Without fear of selfcontradiction,nhe accuses Buckley ofndisdain for the masses and of using thenmedia, not to mention his own pennand tongue, to bring conservative ideasnto the general public. Of course, it isnpossible to possess more than yournshare of arrogance and to pander to thenmasses at the same time. Just ask GorenVidal. But no man who once insistednthat he would rather be governed bynthe first 200 names in the Bostonntelephone directory than by the Harvardnfaculty can fairly be accused ofnelitism. And no man as diligent asnBuckley has been about preaching tonthe unconverted can be charged withnan ultimate lack of faith in the AmericannEveryman.nJudis might be correct when henguesses that Buckley has become ancaricature of himself—or at least ancaricature of that demon we callncelebrityhood. But I doubt that either isnthe case. Bill Buckley, young or not sonyoung, surely seems to be someonenwho enjoys life too much to be ancaptive or caricature of anyone, evennhimself He also seems to be someonenwho understands that enjoying this lifendoes not demand being captured by it,nand who knows himself without havingnto examine his life. Consciences, afternall, are to be examined; lives are to benlived.nBuckley was — and is — a conservativenwhose Catholicism has always affectednhis politics. He was — and is — anconservative for whom political andneconomic freedom are equally importantnand mutually reinforcing. He wasn— and is — a man who enjoys thentrappings of wealth without flauntingnthat wealth or expending great intellectualnenergy in its defense. He was —nand is — someone who believes thatnmaking money should not be the majornpurpose of anyone’s life, let alone anconservative’s life. He was — and is —nan anticommunist and an enemy ofnanti-anticommunism. He was — andnis — a thinker who understands thenlimits of politics and a doer who acceptsnthe necessity of politics. And henwas — and is — the sort of doer whonwould rather sail the globe than governnhis country. It is also true that WilliamnF. Buckley Jr. was once — and may yetnagain be — a small piece of Albert J.nNock’s saving remnant.nJohn C. Chalberg teaches Americannhistory at Normandale CommunitynCollege in Bloomington, Minnesota.nOld Possumnby Warren SmithnPossum^ And Other Receits fornthe Recovery of Southern Being bynMarion Montgomery, Atlanta:nUniversity of Georgia Press;n$16.00.nThirty years ago, in the fall of 1957, thenFugitive-Agrarian poet Donald Davidsonndelivered the first Lamar MemorialnLectures in a small auditorium usuallynreserved for piano recitals on the campusnof Mercer University in Macon,nGeorgia. Those three lectures, publishednin a slender volume bearing thenlegend Southern Writers in the ModernnWorld, have become essential readingnfor students of Southern lettersnbecause Davidson did not succumb tonnnthe temptation to reminisce aboutnthose fertile days in the 1920’s, 30’s,nand 40’s which we now call the SouthernnLiterary Renaissance. Rather, hentraced the stream of history and ideasnthat made those days so fertile; and henallowed his audience access to thatnhistory and those ideas by explicatingnnot his own work or the work of hisnFugitive-Agrarian contemporaries, butnthe work of his forebears, from thenGreek playwrights forward. Therebynhe placed the Southern writers in anhistorical as well as a geographicalncontext.nIn the shadow of this famousnlecturer—or, more accurately, castingnhis own shadow in the light ofnDavidson — stands Marion Montgomery,nwhose Possum, And Other Receitsnfor the Recovery of Southern Being,nmarks the 30th anniversary of thosensame Lamar Lectures.nThose who have read other ofnMontgomery’s books, poems, or essaysnwill not be altogether surprised by hisnsummoning of the “lowly possum” tonstand as metaphor in this recipe fornSouthern being. For the possum, likenthe Southerner, is an ancient beast,nand —also like the Southerner—hisnway of life has been significantly alterednon the asphalt and beneath thenever-rolling tires of Progress. ButnMontgomery would have us understandnright away that his invocation ofnthe possum is not entirely playful.nPossum represents not only a small,nwhite marsupial; it is also the wordnfrom the Latin lexicon which bringsntogether the ideas of “being” andn”doing.” It means “I am able” and isnconjugated possum, posse, potui. Andnindeed the conditions of “being” andn”doing” are the primary subjects ofnthese lectures, especially as man’sn”knowing” relates to his being andndoing.nHe points out, for example, thatnamong man’s first actions was his namingnof the animals. This action, Montgomerynmaintains, is archetype for ankey ingredient in his recipe: a sense ofnthe “relation between the word we givena thing and [the thing’s] reality, anrelation to be ignored at the cost ofnspiritual chaos in each person and innfamily and in community.” Ignoringnthe relation between words and reality,nMontgomery and many others (chiefnamong them Richard Weaver, whomnNOVEMBER 1388/33n