Why do buildings keep getting uglier, more ungainly and decadent? Why can’t we today match the artful simplicity of ancient Egyptian and Near Eastern monumental architecture?

"[T]he only thing in life which is interesting is truth, and the only thing in life which is admirable is goodness."

Malcolm Muggeridge "About Kingsmill" in Ian Hunter, ed., The Very Best of Malcolm Muggeridge

"A common error, however, is to regard the civilizing process and the humanizing process as synonymous. A correlation between the two has yet to be demonstrated. (The first glance was enough to let you see the flabby devil was running that show.)"

Mark Slade in Mosaic magazine (re Conrad’s Heart of Darkness), quoted in Marshall McLuhan “Man and Media” in McLuhan Understanding Me 295.
 

In my latest National Post column I offer good news and bad: we know what's needed to fix our broken governments. 

"I can listen patiently to a Communist repeating for hours at a time that Property is unnecessary, because men must surrender selfish interests to social ideals. I only begin to break the furniture when somebody starts to prove that Property is necessary, because men are all selfish and every man must look after himself. The case for Property is not that a man must look after himself; but, on the contrary, that a normal man has to look after other people, if it be simply a wife and family. It is that this unit should have an economic basis for its social independence. If he were considering only himself, he might be more independent as a vagabond; he might be more secure as a serf. But the point at the moment is that I like Property because it is a noble thing. I can respect the revolutionist who dislikes it because it is an ignoble thing. But I have no truck with the cynic who likes it because it is ignoble."

G.K. Chesterton in "The New Dark Ages" in G.K.’s Weekly May 21 1927, quoted in Gilbert Magazine Vol. 9 # 8, Issue 73 (July-August 2006) p. 9.

"That old saying – 'You're as happy as your saddest child' - anybody who has been a parent understands that."

Then-U.S. Ambassador to Canada David Wilkins quoted by Donna Jacobs in Ottawa Citizen Oct. 3 2005

"He who waits to do a great deal of good at once, will never do anything."

Samuel Johnson, 1709-1784”