“Moral decay contributed to the dissolution [of the Roman Empire]. The virile character that had been formed by arduous simplicities and a supporting faith relaxed in the sunshine of wealth and the freedom of unbelief; men had now, in the middle and upper classes, the means to yield to temptation, and only expediency to restrain them. Urban congestion multiplied contacts and frustrated surveillance; immigration brought together a hundred cultures whose differences rub themselves out into indifference. Moral and esthetic standards were lowered by the magnetism of the mass; and sex ran riot in freedom while political liberty decayed. The greatest of historians held that Christianity was the chief cause of Rome’s fall.”

Will Durant Caesar and Christ [the greatest of historians is of course Edward Gibbon - but it is not immediately obvious that Christianity caused any of the things Durant just listed including unbelief or sex running riot]

Because of the infamous crowded, dirty, rowdy streets of Rome, and tendency of cheap shoddy apartment “insulae” buildings to collapse, and people throwing solid or liquid objects out upper-storey windows “All in all, he [Juvenal] thought, only a fool would go out to dinner without making his will.”

Will Durant Caesar and Christ

“GAUGUIN AND OTHER EXPERIMENTAL ARTISTS have devoted themselves not merely to the study of savage subjects, but to some extent to the imitation of savage art. Some of them, or some of their imitators, have deliberately set out not merely to paint Hottentots, but to paint as badly as Hottentots would paint. Some of them look as if they had succeeded. I suppose Gauguin would not approve of his own imitators, for he said, ‘In art one is a revolutionary or a plagiarist.’ Remembering the old schools and traditions, we might answer that the great artists have been the plagiarists.”

G.K. Chesterton “Gauguin and the Art of the Savage” reprinted in Gilbert: The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #6 (July-August 2024) [and if Gaugin’s dictum were true it would leave very little room for anyone actually to do art]

In my latest Epoch Times column I say Canadian authorities’ feeble justifications for cancelling concerts because they don’t like the singer or the lyrics show just how little they understand free speech… or even think about it.

In the Epoch Times I summarize my C2C Journal argument against photo radar and encourage everyone to fight these frivolous tickets. If they’re really a safety measure the state will happily spend more collecting them than it actually collects. But if they’re a cash grab that cost more than they rake in, it will stop. As it should.

“In methods, tactics, and instruments of war, Germany took the initiative in 1914. The war was to bring a revolution in the European spirit and, as a corollary, in the European state structure. Germany was the revolutionary power of Europe. Located in the centre of the continent, she set out to become the leader of Europe, the heart of Europe, as she put it. Germany not only represented the idea of revolution in this war; she backed the forces of revolution everywhere, whatever their ultimate goals. She helped Roger Casement and the Irish nationalists in their struggle against Britain, and shipped Lenin back to Russia from Switzerland to foment revolution in Petrograd. What was important above all for Germans was the overthrow of the old structures. That was the whole point of the war. Once that had been achieved, the revolutionary dynamic would proceed to erect new structures valid for the new situation.”

Modris Eksteins Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Era

In my latest C2C essay I explain why people hate photo radar: it’s a brazen violation of the rule of law and the social contract to fine citizens for normal behaviour.

“Such is the quality of many of the ‘experts’ presented to the public in recent years; buffoonish, delusional, and wrong. Experts are not neutral players, and nearly all have an agenda that they want to see advanced. The cult of the ‘expert’ is an epidemic that must be rooted out like a weed, for their frequently wrong predictions have exposed that their credentials have not made them any less clueless than the rest of us about the future. In an ideal world, we can rely upon experts to provide measured advice to help guide and shape policy. When they fail in that consistently, their credibility is shot, and right now, a good deal of them could use a few slices of humble pie.”

Geoff Russ in National Post August 29, 2024