How can tradition do anything but endorse the way things happen to be–which at present means established liberalism?
If traditionalism were a formal rule it could of course tell us very little; the current state of a tradition is simply the current practices, attitudes, beliefs and so on of the community whose tradition it is. The point of tradition, however, is that formal rules are inadequate. Tradition is not self-contained, and not all parts of it are equally authoritative. It is a way of grasping things that are neither knowable apart from it nor merely traditional. One who accepts a religious tradition, for example, owes his ultimate allegiance not to the tradition but to God, who is known through the tradition. It is allegiance to something that exceeds and motivates the tradition that makes it possible to distinguish what is authentic and living in the tradition from nonessentials and corruptions.
