Category: Thought

Only when vitality is low do people find material things oppressive and ideal things unsubstantial.

George Santayana, Winds of Doctrine (1913).

Only when vitality is low do people find material things oppressive and ideal things unsubstantial.

George Santayana, Winds of Doctrine (1913).

In all history there is no war which was not hatched by the governments, the governments alone, independent of the interests of the people, to whom war is always pernicious even when successful.

Lev Nikolayevitch Tolstoy, Christianity and Patriotism (1895), as translated in The Novels and Other Works of Lyof N. Tolstoï, Vol. 20, p. 44

We will be defending our country, because our weapon is truth, and our truth is that this is our land, our country, our children, and we will defend all of this.

President Volodymyr Zelensky, quoted in ”Kyiv on heightened alert as Russian forces close in on all sides,” by Ivana Kottasová, Simone McCarthy, Tara John and Tim Lister, CNN (updated February 27, 2022).

Mr. Roosevelt is following the great principles established by the Fascist revolution and the genius of Il Duce. A just pride in the spirit and the trail-blazing work of Fascism prompts us to point this out. The situation recalls the Mussolinian phrase ‘Where we have shown the way, others will follow.’

Lá Stampa, Turin, as quoted in The New York Times, March 5, 1933, page 4.

Whenever you find a man who says he does not believe in a real Right and Wrong, you will find the same man going back on this a moment later. He may break his promise to you, but if you try breaking one to him he will be complaining ‘It’s not fair’ before you can say Jack Robinson.

C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (1952), as quoted for the 26 February entry in A Year with C.S. Lewis: Daily Readings from His Classic Works (2003), Patricia S. Klein, editor.