“Rome has had no rival in the art of government. The Roman state committed a thousand political crimes; it built its edifice upon a selfish oligarchy and an obscurantist priesthood; it achieved a democracy of freemen, and then destroyed it with corruption and violence; it exploited its conquests to support a parasitic Italy, which, when it could no longer exploit, collapsed. Here in there, in East and West, it created a desert and called it peace. But amid all this evil it formed a majestic system of law which through nearly all Europe gave security to life and property, incentive and continuity to industry, from the Decemvirs to Napoleon. It molded a government of separated legislative and executive powers whose checks and balances inspired the makers of constitutions as late as revolutionary America and France. For a time it united monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy so successfully as to win the applause of philosophers, historians, subjects, and enemies. It gave municipal institutions, and for a long period municipal freedom, to half a thousand cities. It administered its empire at first with greed and cruelty and then with such tolerance and essential justice that the great realm has never again known a like content. It made the desert blossom with civilization, and atoned for its sins with the miracle of a lasting peace. Today our highest labours seek to revive the Pax Romana for a disordered world.”

Will Durant Caesar and Christ

“There’s no standard dress code for events any more, which always leaves me wondering: Is it better to overdress or underdress? At a film opening recently, two guys wearing baseball caps and chore jackets were the coolest people in the room. But the few times I’ve gone casual for an event, I’ve worried that I came off as impertinent at worst and out of place at best. Is there a right way to be underdressed? — Rachel, Brooklyn/ This is like ‘Hamlet,’ the S.N.L. version. You can just imagine a host wandering around a set crying, ‘to overdress or underdress, that is the question?’ as they beat their breast and rend their doublet. In truth, there are two camps here. On one side, there are those who hew to what could be called the school of Coco Chanel. The famous French designer believed it was always better to be underdressed and was fond of issuing such maxims as ‘Elegance is refusal’ and ‘Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off.’ On the other side are the heirs of Iris (Apfel), the geriatric influencer who died earlier this year. She lived her life according to the conviction that more is more: more prints, more bracelets, more fun. Also in this camp is the designer Christian Siriano, who just made the purple pantsuit Oprah wore for her speech at the Democratic National Convention. ‘I truly feel that it is always better to be overdressed than underdressed,’ he said when I asked. ‘I’m a designer who loves the glamour of it all, so for me there really isn’t a right way to be underdressed unless you are actually laying by the pool or at the beach.’ Even then, he said, the look should include ‘a fabulous big hat and bag.’ As with most belief systems, however, the choice between over- or underdressing is not really about which option is objectively better or worse; it’s about what is right for you.”

New York Times August 26, 2024 [https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/26/style/under-over-dressed-events.html] (and more from the bottomless navel of relativism)

“Maybe [Paul] Martin should also adopt the slogan on a pin offered to [Kim] Campbell at the 1993 leadership rally: ‘I don’t know what I’m doing but I’m good at it.’”

John Ivison in National Post June 19, 2004

“when people work at jobs that require the inhibition of imagination and creativity, any activity that permits those qualities - no matter how difficult or demanding - is experienced as play, not work.”

Lillian Breslow Rubin Worlds of Pain: Life in the Working-Class [re hobbies like tinkering with cars].

“Like most thinkers of his time, [Marcus] Aurelius conceived philosophy not as a speculative description of infinity, but as a school of virtue and a way of life. He hardly bothers to make up his mind about God; sometimes he talks like an agnostic, acknowledging that he does not know; but having made that admission, he accepts the traditional faith with a simple piety. ‘Of what worth is it to me,’ he asks, ‘to live in a universe without gods or Providence?’”

Will Durant Caesar and Christ

“People are shocked when they find out I’m not a good electrician”

Emailed by a friend without attribution

“Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.”

2 Timothy 3:7 [King James Version]

After noting that French Canadians put up passively with the Stamp Act “Carlton had to deal with the problem of the law: the French liked the swiftness and low cost of court access under the French system, but it was a different law, governed by French precedent, which was irritating in itself and practically incomprehensible to the administration in Quebec and difficult to obtain. The substitution of English criminal law had been popular with the public, as it instituted habeas corpus and put an end to the rack and interrogation under torture. London sent legal officers to go back to make a recommendation, and this issue dragged on for a few years, but Carlton became convinced that Quebec needed to devise its own Civil Code, to keep what was familiar, incite pride, and emancipate the province from recourse to French precedents.”

Conrad Black Rise to Greatness: The History of Canada from the Vikings to the Present