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The Feudal Principle
Julius Evola
Revolt Against the Modern World

A description of the feudal regime as an organic system based on personal bravery, honor, and free interaction rather than abstract law or collective public power.

...quests a second aspect of the abovementioned development took place: the bestowal of conquered lands as fiefs in return for the commitment to faithfulness. The Frank nobility spread into areas that did not coincide with those of any given nation and became a bonding and unifying element. From a formal point of view, this development appeared to involve an alteration of the previous constitution; to rule over a fief was regarded as a regal benefit contingent upon loyalty and service to the king.
In reality, the feudal regime was a principle to be followed rather than a rigid reality; it was the general idea of an organic law of order that left ample room for the dynamic interaction of free forces fighting either side by side or against each other, without attenuations or alterations—subject before lord, lord before lord—and that caused everything (freedom, honor, glory, destiny, property) to be based on bravery and on the personal factor since nothing or virtually nothing was based on a collective element, public power, or abstract law.
As it has rightfully been remarked, in the feudal system of the origins the fundamental and distinctive feature of regality was not that of a "public" power, but rather that of forces that were in the presence of other forces, each one responsible to itself for its own authority and dignity. Thus, such a state of affairs often resembled a state of war rather than that of a "society"; it was precisely because of this, however, that a particular differentiation of energies occurred. Never has man...
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Julius Evola

Revolt Against the Modern World

Feudal School of Independence

The candidate agrees with and extends the parent's view by describing the feudal system as a 'school of independence and of virility' where relationships of faithfulness and honor were paramount, directly aligning with the parent's emphasis on bravery and the personal factor over collective elements.

...abstract law. As it has rightfully been remarked, in the feudal system of the origins the fundamental and distinctive feature of regality was not that of a "public" power, but rather that of forces that were in the presence of other forces, each one responsible to itself for its own authority and dignity. Thus, such a state of affairs often resembled a state of war rather than that of a "society"; it was precisely because of this, however, that a particular differentiation of energies occurred.
Never has man been treated so harshly as in the feudal system, and yet not only for the feudal lords who had the responsibility of protecting their rights and honor, but also for the subjects this regime was a school of independence and of virility rather than of servility; in this regime the relationships of faithfulness and of honor played a larger role than in any other Western time period. Generally speaking, in this type of society, beyond the promiscuity of the Lower Empire and the chaos of the period of the invasions, everybody was able to find the place appropriate to his own nature, a...
For the last time in Western history the quadripartition of society into serfs, merchants, warrior nobility, and representatives of spiritual authority (the clergy in the Guelph and the ascetic, knightly orders in the Ghibelline system) took form and affirmed itself in an almost spontaneous way. The fact that the feudal world of personality and of action did not exhaust the deepest possibilities of medieval man was proven by the fact that his fides was able to develop in a sublimated form and...

Arthur Schopenhauer

The Wisdom of Life

Knightly Honor's Minotaur

The candidate directly contradicts the parent's positive view of honor and personal bravery by calling knightly honor a 'solemn farce' that makes society 'stiff, gloomy and timid,' thus challenging the value of the feudal ethos praised in the parent text.

...poisoned arrows have been found in Cupid's quiver, an estranging, hostile, nay, devilish element has entered into the relations of men and women, like a sinister thread of fear and mistrust in the warp and woof of their intercourse; indirectly shaking the foundations of human fellowship, and so more or less affecting the whole tenor of existence. But it would be beside my present purpose to pursue the subject further. An influence analogous to this, though working on other lines, is exerted by
The principle of knightly honor,--that solemn farce, unknown to the ancient world, which makes modern society stiff, gloomy and timid, forcing us to keep the strictest watch on every word that falls. Nor is this all. The principle is a universal Minotaur; and the goodly company of the sons of noble houses which it demands in yearly tribute, comes, not from one country alone, as of old, but from every land in Europe.
It is high time to make a regular attack upon this foolish system; and this is what I am trying to do now. Would that these two monsters of the modern world might disappear before the end of the century! Let us hope that medicine may be able to find some means of preventing the one, and that, by clearing our ideals, philosophy may put an end to the other: for it is only by clearing our ideas that the evil can be eradicated. Governments have tried to do so by legislation, and failed. Still, if...

Julius Evola

Revolt Against the Modern World

Freedom's Faithful Dedication

The candidate explains the underlying drivers of the feudal order by stating that ancient Nordic-Germanic societies were based on the principles of personality, freedom, and faithfulness, providing a causal explanation for the parent's claim that everything was based on bravery and the personal factor.

...the formula renovatio Romani Imperii was spoken. Not only did they identify Rome as the symbolic source of their imperium and of their right, but the Germanic princes also ended up siding against the hegemonic demands of the Church; thus they became the protagonists of a great new historical movement that promoted a traditional restoration. From a political perspective, the congenital ethos of the Germanic races conferred to the imperial reality a living, stable, and differentiated character.
The life of the ancient Nordic-Germanic societies was based on the three principles of personality, freedom, and faithfulness. This life never knew the promiscuous sense of the community nor the inability of the individual to make the most of himself other than in the context of a given abstract institution; in these societies to be free was the measure of one's nobility. And yet this freedom was not anarchical and individualistic, but it was capable of a dedication that went beyond the person, and it knew the transfiguring value that characterized the principle of faithfulness toward one who...
Thus, groups of devoted subjects rallied around leaders to whom the ancient saying did apply: "The supreme nobility of a Roman emperor does not consist in being a master of slaves, but in being a lord of free men, who loves freedom even in those who serve him." Also the state, almost like in the ancient Roman aristocratic concept, was centered on the council of leaders, each member being a free man, the lord of his lands, and the leader of the group of his faithful. Beyond this council, the uni...

Blaise Pascal

Pensees

Power's Imaginary Foundation

The candidate shifts the lens from personal bravery and honor to the role of necessity and imagination in forming social bonds and hierarchies, reframing the basis of social order away from the parent's focus on dynamic personal interactions.

...those who do not invent, the latter will call them ridiculous names, and would beat them with a stick. Let no one then boast of his subtlety, or let him keep his complacency to himself. 303 Might is the sovereign of the world, and not opinion.--But opinion makes use of might.--It is might that makes opinion. Gentleness is beautiful in our opinion. Why? Because he who will dance on a rope will be alone,[120] and I will gather a stronger mob of people who will say that it is unbecoming. 304
The cords which bind the respect of men to each other are in general cords of necessity; for there must be different degrees, all men wishing to rule, and not all being able to do so, but some being able. Let us then imagine we see society in the process of formation. Men will doubtless fight till the stronger party overcomes the weaker, and a dominant party is established. But when this is once determined, the masters, who do not desire the continuation of strife, then decree that the power which is in their hands shall be transmitted as they please. Some place it in election by the people, o...
These cords which bind the respect of men to such and such an individual are therefore the cords of imagination. 305 The Swiss are offended by being called gentlemen, and prove themselves true plebeians in order to be thought worthy of great office. 306 As duchies, kingships, and magistracies are real and necessary, because might rules all, they exist everywhere and always. But since only caprice makes such and such a one a ruler, the principle is not constant, but subject to variation,...