intellectual heroes

What common strands of intellectual endeavour, style, or approach do these two wonderful writers share? Or, perhaps the question should be: what do I perceive to be the common themes that draws me to both. I had never thought about that when I put their iamges together like that, spontaneously. The power of the image to inspire thought or to remind one of long-lost affinities.

Augustine, of course! A studied fascination with, and horror of, extremism. The 'studied' bit is important. But it's more than that, a certain temperament that is perhaps best encapsualted by the phrase, 'for the love of the world' , which means: a proper love of the world, the interweaving of, the expression of, one's humanity in society, politics; charm as the last corner of the human world; the importance of restraint, continuity, durability against the enemies of civilisation: the flights of fancy, the seepage of reality, that occurs in dark times.