Category: Thought

We try to make virtues out of the faults we have no wish to correct.

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.

The fool who does not know his own folly may be doing nothing, and the philosopher who is trying to darken knowledge may be doing worse than nothing; but every sincere attempt to grapple with real difficulties made by a man not utterly incompetent has its value.

Leslie Stephen, from his preface to The Science of Ethics (1882).

Let those who would use the political process to impose their preferences on the behavior of others be wary of the threat to their own liberties, as described in the possible components of their own behavior that may also be subjected to control and regulation. The apparent costlessness of restricting the liberties of others through politics is deceptive. The liberties of some cannot readily be restricted without limiting the liberties of all.

James M. Buchanan, “Politics and Meddlesome Preferences,” in Smoking and Society: Toward a More Balanced Assessment, edited by Robert D. Tollison, page 340.

We can no longer be content with refuting our opponents; we are also bound to explain them. The vitality of any doctrine supposed to be erroneous proves that it cannot be entirely erroneous.

Leslie Stephen, The Science of Ethics (1882), page 2.