“I don’t know why we are here, but I’m pretty sure that it is not in order to enjoy ourselves."
Ludwig Wittgenstein on BrainyQuote (https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/ludwig_wittgenstein_103576)
“And if any other document is henceforth produced which was made heretofore and which in any kind of way seems to gainsay what is here established, that document shall be cast to mice to gnaw or into the fire to be burned, and he who produces it, whatever his rank, shall be regarded as the sweepings of ashes and confounded with the most ignominious shame and with one accord shunned by all the men who are nearby.”
King Canute, to the monks of Canterbury as part of “The Endowment of a Monastery, 1023” in William L. Sachse English History in the Making
“Nothing is poetical if plain daylight is not poetical; and no monster should amaze us if the normal man does not amaze.”
G.K. Chesterton, “On Experience,” in All Is Grist, quoted in Gilbert! magazine Vol. 4 #3 (Dec. 2000)
“I came to the conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself."
G. K. Chesterton, quoted on Thinkexist.com
“Few Christian thinkers have so well understood [as Luther] the abyss of despair that is the alternative to the utterly gratuitous love of God in Christ.”
Richard John Neuhaus in First Things January 2004
“Only miracle is plain; it is the ordinary that groans with the unutterable weight of glory.”
Robert Farrar Capon The Supper of the Lamb
In my latest National Post column I remind politicians that John Stuart Mill’s classic defence of free speech applies every bit as much to social media as to the spoken, written or broadcast word.
(You can watch the beginning and hear the rest of my testimony on the subject to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights on June 4, as well as that of Mark Steyn and Lindsay Shepherd, on ParlVu (my prepared remarks begin at 9:09).
On June 4 I appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights to testify on online hate, and urged them not to censor even loathsome opinions because truth will prevail in a contest of ideas. You can watch the beginning of the session and hear the rest including my testimony on ParlVu (my prepared remarks begin at 9:09).
See also my June 5 National Post column adapted from that testimony.