Saturday Fodder

Here's a little Saturday food for thought from a Rod Schaffter email at Chaos Manor (just scroll down) David Warren came across some excellent observations by Nicolás Gómez Dávila, a Catholic writer from Colombia: -- Democratic parliaments are not places where debate occurs but where popular absolutism registers its edicts. -- Love of the people is an aristocratic calling. The democrat only loves the people at election time. -- The individual shrinks in proportion as the state grows. -- The one who renounces seems weak to the one incapable of renunciation. -- Violence is not necessary to destroy a civilization. Each civilization dies from indifference towards the unique values which created it. -- To have opinions is the best way to escape the obligation of thinking. -- Nothing multiplies the number of fools so much as the example of celebrities. -- The importance of an event is inversely proportional to the space which the newspapers devote to it. -- An individual declares himself a member of some group with the goal of demanding in its name what he is ashamed to claim in his own name. -- The anger of imbeciles is less frightening than their benevolence. -- "To be useful to society" is the ambition, or excuse, of a prostitute. Chew on those observations for a while...