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英国为近代保守主义思想的重镇 ,不但其传统与学理之完备为世人所称道 ,并且它已深深渗入英国政制 ,成了一种难以动摇的生活方式。这种气氛甚至使一些左翼激进政策也只能以保守温敦的方式加以落实。在当代英国 ,代表着这种本土文化而又成大师气象的 ,便是剑桥哲学家奥克肖特 (M.Oakeshott,1901 -1990)。读者这里看到的 ,是他写于1948年、登在《剑桥杂志》(CambridgeJournal)第二卷上的名篇。彼时欧陆狼烟甫散 ,检讨西方文明的弊端也一时蔚成风气。奥克肖特在此文中把欧洲文明引起的灾难归咎于“对道德理想的追求” ,为我们提供了一个乍一看怪怪的视角。他这里所说的理想追求 ,乃是一种有理性主义或科学精神鼎力相助的追求 ,它对一切无法理性化的现象皆不予认可 ,因此不断破坏着“道德习俗”的稳定性———这造成了一种类似于歌德笔下浮士德所面对的困境。不过他并非完全反对这样的追求 ,而是认为此事个人或团体可为 ,整个社会则断断不可为。这种见识既合于我们的常识———把鸡蛋全放在一个篮子里 ,真的好危险———也与奥氏历来反对保守主义哲学化的立场十分相契。
Britain is the center of modern conservatism. Not only is its tradition and academic integrity commendable to the world, but it has deeply infiltrated into British constitutional government and has become an unshakable lifestyle. This kind of atmosphere has even allowed some left-wing radical policies to be implemented only in a conservative way. In contemporary Britain, the representative of this local culture and master of meteorology, is Cambridge philosopher Oakeshott (M.Oakeshott, 1901-1990). The reader here sees what he wrote in 1948 in the second volume of the Cambridge Journal. At that time, the European fireworks were scattered and the shortcomings of the Western civilization were briefly tempered. In this article, Oakeshott attributed the disaster caused by European civilization to “the quest for moral ideal,” which gives us a see-through weird perspective. The ideal pursuit he refers to here is a pursuit pursued with the help of rationalism or scientific spirit. It rejects all phenomena that can not be rationalized and therefore constantly undermines the stability of “moral customs” --- that is, This created a dilemma similar to Faust’s Goethe Faust. However, he did not completely oppose such a pursuit. Instead, he thought that the individual or group can do so and that the entire community can not do anything. This insight is not only a combination of our common sense - putting the eggs in one basket, which is really dangerous - and is in harmony with the position that Austria always opposed to the philosophicalization of conservatism.