“At a repast given in 63 [AD - he’s describing the increasingly high living as the Roman Republic fell apart] by a high priest, and attended incongruously by Vestal Virgins and Caesar, the hors d’oeuvres consisted of mussels, spondyles, fieldfares with asparagus, fattened fowls, oyster pastries, sea nettles, ribs of roe, purple shellfish, and songbirds. Then came the dinner – sows’ udders, boars head, fish, duck, teals, hares, fowl, pastries, and sweets.”

Will Durant Caesar and Christ [and I was going along salivating pretty happily until we got to the udders]

“That history bore witness to a war between light and darkness, aeons old, and demanding from those on the side of good an unstinting watchfulness against evil, was a conviction that Tolkien shared with the Nazis. Admittedly, when articulating the mission of National Socialism, its leaders tended not to frame it in such terms. They preferred the language of Darwinism. ‘A cool doctrine of reality based on the most incisive scientific knowledge and its theoretical elucidation.’ So Hitler had defined National Socialism, a year before invading Poland and engulfing Europe in a second terrible civil war.”

Tom Holland Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World

“I have noticed that, with few exceptions, men bungle their affairs. Everywhere I see incompetence rampant, incompetence triumphant.”

Raymond Hull’s introduction to Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull, The Peter Principle

In my latest Epoch Times column I ridicule government pride and priorities in sending one of our few remaining naval assets to Antarctica to confirm the state’s views on climate instead of defending Canada.

“Government = a punchline without a joke.”

Comment by @mikeymike3760 on the Climate Discussion Nexus video “The Hottest Day Never” Oct. 16, 2024 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erBkSGvbZNs&lc=Ugw7r8cN9esgXuI-8HB4AaABAg].

“That human beings have rights; that they are born equal; that they are owed sustenance, and shelter, and refuge from persecution: these were never self-evident truths. The Nazis, certainly, knew as much – which is why, in today’s demonology, they retain their starring role. Communist dictators may have been no less murderous than fascist ones; but they – because communism was the expression of a concern for the oppressed masses – rarely seem as diabolical to people today. The measure of how Christian we as a society remain is that mass murder precipitated by racism tends to be seen as vastly more abhorrent than mass murder precipitated by an ambition to usher in a classless paradise. Liberals may not believe in hell; but they still believe in evil.”

Tom Holland Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World

“A remarkable quirk of our current moment in history is how hard people work to assure themselves and others that those they disagree with have no valid point – nor even a perspective of their own. Ever since the October 7 attacks on Israel last year, I’ve tried my best to adhere to a very simple rule: my time and energy are finite. I have demands upon both. I’m not going to spend a single moment of time or calorie of energy trying to change anyone’s mind about the situation in the Middle East. I’m not going to argue or reply to anyone who disagrees with me, beyond a polite acknowledgment. There is simply no value for me in a debate. That being said, I have been genuinely surprised over these last almost 12 months by how little even Israel’s many harsh critics seem to value understanding the Israeli perspective.”

Matt Gurney on The Line October 3, 2024 [in places frankly he flirts with relativism, but you can understand a differing point of view without succumbing to mental or moral paralysis]

“Even the Jacobins, the revolution’s dominant and most radical faction, had initially been welcoming to the clergy. For a while, indeed, priests were more disproportionately represented in their ranks than any other profession. As late as November 1791, the president elected by the Paris Jacobins had been a bishop. It seemed fitting, then, that their name should have derived from the Dominicans, whose former headquarters they had made their base. Certainly, to begin with, there had been little evidence to suggest that a revolution might precipitate an assault on religion.”

Tom Holland Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World