“Most Conservatives for most of the time have wished to keep things as they are and believe along with the Duke of Cambridge that the time for change is when it can no longer be resisted”.
(Lord Robert Blake, “The Conservative Party from Peel to Churchill” p271).

I was reminded of Blake’s highly readable work, when I came across this article by Ryan Bourne of the libertarian Cato Institute, https://capx.co/why-are-some-conservatives-so-obsessed-with-libertarians/.  Bourne’s piece also brought to mind my own poem, “Conservatism”, which is reproduced below:

Conservatism is a scepticism regarding what some call “progress”
Coupled with a desire to redress
Genuine grievances, lest the great wall
Crumble and fall
Crushing all.

Conservatism is men who
Wish the clock
Would stop
At half-past 2
But know that this man can not do.
While the reactionary believes that one can rewind the clock
And it’s hands lock
At some frozen place
In time and space.

Conservatism is scepticism about equality
For the Conservative does see
That each tree
Is different. but the forest has a heart
And we are all part
Of an organic whole
With each being possessed of his own unique soul.

Some say
That the Conservative way
Is an obsession with the bottom line
And that selfishness does Conservatism define.
Others maintain
That economics is an obsession of the Classical Liberal’s brain
And that the liberal interloper
Should slope away.

Conservatism is walks in country parks
As the larks
Twitter high above.
It is a love
Of old friends
Who are not means to ends.
It is a desire to enjoy
And not to destroy.

The ship must be kept on an even keel
Lest we into anarchy reel.
Yet some say
That today
Many Conservatives do not behave that way …