24 / CHRONICLESnLiberal StudiesnThe Rise and Decline of WesternnLiberalism by Anthony Arblaster,nOxford: Basil Blackwell.nStudies of political ideology come innand out of fashion. Conservatism is in,ncurrently, but off-brand Marxism runsna close second. It has been many yearsnsince an important study of liberalismnappeared. Anthony Arblaster has donenso good a job that it is hard to comparenhis book with anything written in thenpast 50 years.nThe opening chapters—exercises inndefinition—are a masterful synthesisnof the broad trends of liberalism,nwhose “metaphysical and ontologicalncore … is individualism.” Arblasternbreaks individualism down into a set ofnfundamental propositions: the distinctionnbetween fact and value, the isolationnof human beings from each othern(privacy), the use of individual experiencenas a moral touchstone, faith innscience, self-possession (the pervasivennotion of ownership extended to one’snperson), and the sovereignty of desiresnand appetites. Within such an analyticalnframework, the transition from oldnliberals like Adam Smith to Americannwelfare-state liberals becomes more intelligible.nUnfortunately, Arblaster is a goodndeal less dispassionately analytical innhis discussion of contemporary liberalsnand their moral failure to oppose Mc-nCarthyism. Like so many toughmindednleftist critiques, Arblaster’snstudy becomes all soft and gooey whennit comes to the Soviet Union: “Wenhave reached 1984, and in spite ofnmany sinister developments, by nonmeans confined to the communistnworld, Orwell’s nightmare of totalncontrol has not been realized.” It isndisingenuous rubbish like this thatnmakes one appreciate the cold warnliberalism of Lionel Trilling. (TF)nBOOKSHELVESnPut Out No Flagsnby Thomas P. McDonnellnGentlemen in Englandhy A.N.nWilson, New York: Viking Press;n$17.95.nA former literary editor of The Spectatornin London and currently touted asnthe new novelist of manners, A.N.nWilson was the author several seasonsnago of a creditable biography of HilairenBelloc. But the novels Wise Virginn(1983), Scandal (1984), and Gentlemennin England, just published in thisncountry, remain chiefly responsible fornhis reputation on both sides of thenAtlantic. His biography of Belloc,nhowever, is worth the lot of them andnany other novels he is likely to producenin his current mode of merely apingnhis betters.nIt has become by now almost standardnprocedure for the book-chatnreviewers to say that Wilson writesnvery much like Henry Green, IvynCompton-Burnett, the late BarbaranPym, or even that he may be comparednto the one and only EvelynnWaugh. But since Evelyn Waugh wasnthe uncontested master of the formnthat is tediously known as the novel ofnmanners and morals, is it at all necessarynthat anyone else should aspire tondisplace him? If there was only onenMozart, do we need other and farnlesser littie Wolfgangs running up andndown the scales of their untowardnambitions?nGentlemen in England, moreover,npurports to be the Victorian novelnregenerated. Outiandish proper namesnare invented by Wilson in order toninitiate levels of amusement which arenbut weakly sustained by the charactersnwho bear these various appellations.nStill, there is one who comes rathernclose to living up to his reputation.nThis is the patriarch of the Nettieshipnclan, which, in turn, is the centralnnndramatic entity of the novel itselfnHead of the family is Professor HoracenNettieship, a specialist in the sciencenof volcanos, whose studies lead him tondoubt the story of Genesis and eventuallynto abandon his Anglican faithnaltogether. He has not spoken to hisnmuch younger wife Charlotte in somen15 years, though they had earlier managednsufficient communication to havenproduced a somewhat flighty daughter,nMaudie, and a virtuous sonnnamed Lionel.nThere is one scene that either almostnredeems or almost destroys thennovel as a whole. The reader mustndecide. This scene recreates one ofnthose public debates which were allnthe rage in what passed for the intellectualnlife of the somewhat-less-thaneminentnVictorians of the period. Thenatheist Mr. Brandlaugh confronts thenludicrously self-styled monk FathernCuthbert in the great Hall of Sciencenover the question: “Is Jesus Christ annHistorical Reality?” The occasion alsonbecomes the catalyst for a confrontationnbetween Professor Nettieshipn(who of course supports the atheistnBradlaugh) and his virtuous son Lionel.nInstead of following in his father’snsecularist footsteps, Lionel has becomena disciple of Father Cuthbert’s and annenthusiast of the Anglo-Catholicismnrampant at Oxford in the days of thenfamed Dr. Pusey.nThe scene is devastating, heavyhanded,nand ultimately destructive. Tonhave written it, Wilson must havenbeen familiar with a novel called ThenMasterful Monk, by someone namednOwen Francis Dudley, very popularnamong Roman Catholics in the earlynyears of the present century. In Wilson’snlatest fiction, however, it isnAnglo-Catholicism that is made tonlook wholly and pathetically inadequatenin a Victorian milieu of conventionalnmorality that was at the samentime unsupported by evangelical the-n