“The only way to end a quarrel is to get on both sides of it. We must have not merely a calm impartiality, but rather a sympathy with partiality as it exists in both partisans. We must be not so much impartial as partial to both sides.”
G.K. Chesterton in Illustrated London News June 25, 1932, quoted in “Chesterton for Today” in Gilbert! The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #5 (May/June 2024)
“Keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Start with typewriters.”
Frank Lloyd Wright, quote in “Random Foolish Quotations” in Gilbert Magazine Vol. 7 # 7 (June 2004)
“Every morning, I put on a pair of rubber boots, and not just because they are stylish.”
Letter from Fred Olthius, a hog farmer, in Maclean’s June 24, 1996, complaining about people who consider workfare demeaning.
In my latest, and last, piece for Mercator I celebrate its mission while lamenting its passing, victim of an age far too prone to take frivolous things seriously and ignore the eternal verities. But I urge everyone to do the reverse.
“Truth is not a lifestyle choice”
Me July 1, 2024 [prompted by an ICMDA email subject line that day “The Surprising rebirth of belief in God”]
“Stupidity gets up early in the morning.”
Someone named Karl Kraus, quoted (apparently from a wire story) in Gilbert! magazine Vol. 4 # 6 (April/May 2001)
“There are certain birds, like the kite and the crow, that people disregard entirely and would never bother to criticize; it is precisely because the uguisu is usually held in such high regard that people find fault with it when they can.”
Sei Shonagon The Pillow Book
“what St. John Paul II reminded us so many years ago: that ‘There is no evil to be faced that Christ does not face with us. There is no enemy that Christ has not already conquered. There is no cross to bear that Christ has not already borne for us … on the far side of every cross we find the newness of life in the Holy Spirit … This is our faith. This is our witness before the world.’”
Eric de Meuse in Gilbert! The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #4 (March/April 2024)