I’ve been re-reading Confessions of a Heretic, a collection of essays by Roger Scruton that was published in 2016, the year after his death. Scruton’s prose is both entirely accessible—he prefers plain language and straightforward sentences—and so rich that I find myself stopping again and again to savor this sentence or ponder that paragraph. Take the question of borders. I’d always thought of borders as purely utilitarian—the place where our law stops and theirs begins. Crude, but necessary. Scruton demonstrates instead that borders represent one of mankind’s highest achievements:

The national idea is not the enemy of Enlightenment but its necessary precondition. The country is defined by a territory, and by the history, culture, and law that have made that territory ours…. Take away borders, and people begin to identify themselves not by territory and law, but by tribe, race, or religion. In short, Enlightenment means borders.

The bureaucrats who run the European Union, the Biden administration—both seem to suppose that borders represent throwbacks, mere hindrances that need to be overcome, transcended, ignored, removed. They have it backward. The rule of law, a certain level of decency and civilization—all depend on borders. Rip down the borders, Scruton shows, and you rip down civilization.