Is conservatism a mental illness?

Mighty Typography, by Inde/AdventFont.

1. Edmund Burke on the sublime: God as terror

WHATEVER is fitted in any sort to excite the ideas of pain and danger, that is to say, whatever is in any sort terrible, or is conversant about terrible objects, or operates in a manner analogous to terror, is a source of the sublime; that is, it is productive of the strongest emotion which the mind is capable of feeling. I say the strongest emotion, because I am satisfied the ideas of pain are much more powerful than those which enter on the part of pleasure. Without all doubt, the torments which we may be made to suffer are much greater in their effect on the body and mind, than any pleasure which the most learned voluptuary could suggest, or than the liveliest imagination, and the most sound and exquisitely sensible body, could enjoy. (I/7) [jump]

Now, though in a just idea of the Deity perhaps none of his attributes are predominant, yet, to our imagination, his power is by far the most striking. Some reflection, some comparing, is necessary to satisfy us of his wisdom, his justice, and his goodness. To be struck with his power, it is only necessary that we should open our eyes. But whilst we contemplate so vast an object, under the arm, as it were, of almighty power, and invested upon every side with omnipresence, we shrink into the minuteness of our own nature, and are, in a manner, annihilated before him. And though a consideration of his other attributes may relieve, in some measure, our apprehensions; yet no conviction of the justice with which it is exercised, nor the mercy with which it is tempered, can wholly remove the terror that naturally arises from a force which nothing can withstand. If we rejoice, we rejoice with trembling: and even whilst we are receiving benefits, we cannot but shudder at a power which can confer benefits of such mighty importance. (II/6)

Trembling on the edge of reprisal, by Katie Holten.

2. God-terror as mental illness: recent research

People who believe in an angry, punishing God are much more likely to suffer from a variety of mental illnesses, a scientific study published in the April edition of Journal of Religion & Health finds....for those who think God is angry and preparing punishments for sinners, “that belief seems to be very much related to these negative symptoms,” [the study's author, Nava] Silton said.

“If you look at the previous research, they’ve connected it to depression and all sorts of other psychiatric disorders,” she said. “We were looking at social phobia, obsession, compulsion, paranoia and a lot of features of anxiety disorders.” (Raw Story)

My original plan here involved a discussion of Burke's gloomy theology that I read some weeks ago but now cannot find. If it was in the statesman's Wikipedia biography, which is how I remember it, then it has been scrubbed, who knows by whom. A quick look at the revision history for the entry suggests that this page is revised practically every day, and that passage may well be lost forever. I rarely experience this annoying side of Wikipedia, since the ideological Vikings who harry its coastlines rarely penetrate to the hill stations where my time with the project is mostly spent. What stupid people they are, Congresspersons censoring their own biographies and other enforcers of a particular subjectivity.