Bennett Williams Quotes

Happiness is like a cat. If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you. It will never come. But if you pay no attention to it and go about your business, you'll find it rubbing up against your legs and jumping into your lap.

There are no menial jobs, only menial attitudes.

Remorse is a heavy burden, but in its weight, it has great power to awaken men's souls.

To me, love is like listening to an album. Some people skip to their favorite songs and ignore the rest. Other people listen to the entire album over and over until it's familiar and cherished and they know every note by heart. That's how Dr. Bennett and I loved each other. He was music I could listen to forever.

If we do nothing but to remove a rock upon which someone might have tripped, though they may never know we did it, is this not our cause, our reason for life?

Good nature, or what is often considered as such, is the most selfish of all virtues: it is nine times out of ten mere indolence of disposition. William Hazlitt, ‘On the Knowledge of Character’ (1822)

The essence of education is, in the words of William James, to teach a person what deserves to be valued, to impart ideals as well as knowledge, to cultivate in students the ability to distinguish the true and good from their counterfeits and the wisdom to prefer the former to the latter.

Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order,

Despite our wonders and greatness, we are a society that has experienced so much social regression, so much decadence, in so short a period of time, that in many parts of America we have become the kind of place to which civilized countries used to send missionaries. - quoting William Bennett

American soldiers were dying in frigid Korea. One of our greatest generals told us that the president and his team were not trying to win. And some strident voices were saying that that was because they didn't want to win,

William Bennett expressed it this way: “Happiness is like a cat. If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you. It will never come. But if you pay no attention to it and go about your business, you’ll find it rubbing against your legs and jumping into your

and line of cases. Justice Byron R. "Whizzer" White, a JFK appointee, dissented, calling Doe an act of "raw judicial power," as it took these decisions from the states and enshrined their determination in the Supreme Court's reasoning.

One good way to understand what conservatism is really about is to use the acronym FLINT to remember five core concepts: Free enterprise, Limited government, Individual liberty, National defense, and Traditional values. These five principles are a good summary of conservative thought in America today.

John Stuart Mill, the British philosopher, said, “War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

Are spirits so involved in men's lives? Marley asked. Mankind is inolved in men's lives. We only help them know how. ...Jacob, all around you, every day, as you walk the miles of earth, there are calls to your spirit and to all others' spirits as well. They come from your fellow beings and from life itself: the way the sun highlights a tree, a bird song lilting across the morning, the smell of flowers. All these are for your joy, but also for more. They call you.

Jacob, love does not prosecute. It seeks neither revenge nor dominance. It does not win at the cost of someone else’s loss. Love only accepts, completely and without reservation.

To feel the pain of unresolvable regret-- this, Jacob is hell. It is far worse than any fire and brimstone man has conjured.

You finally saw, and with that vision, you did something of infinite worth. You apologized. And you forgave. These are two of the greatest gifts one man can give another.

Simply put, war restores in man the belief that there are some things worth fighting and dying for; things like love, liberty, and faith.

law professor Joan C. Williams in her book What Works for Women at Work:

The day Americans stop viewing explicit patriotism as a virtue and begin to view it as something “eccentric and foolish” is the day we cease to be a great country.

Therefore we must give a certain character to our activities. . . . In short, the habits we form from childhood make no small difference, but rather they make all the difference.

There is no end to the good you can do if you don’t care who gets credit for it.

We all ascend or descend in steps, the journey to the high road or the low taken in many increments, the sum total determining our eventual destination.

Tis a lesson you should heed, Try, try again; If at first you don’t succeed, Try, try again; Then your courage should appear, For, if you will persevere, You will conquer, never fear; Try, try again.

While the Bible was the definitive reference point for settling questions of doctrine and practice, questions not clearly settled by Scripture that were of theological importance were numerous (and difficult), and churches could not always look to precedents in church history as a guide. The difficulty of resolving disputes is evident in an even more serious controversy from the late second century.

Eisenhower has been much criticized for his failure publicly to endorse the Court's decision. But he felt that doing so would set an undesirable precedent. If a president endorsed decisions he agreed with, might he feel compelled to oppose decisions he did not agree with? And what would that do to the rule of law? "The Supreme Court has spoken and I am sworn to uphold ... the constitutional processes.... I will obey."3

In 1989 the former drug czar and TV talk-show fool, William Bennett, suggested de jure as well as de facto abolition of habeas corpus in “drug” cases as well as (I am not inventing this) public beheadings of drug dealers.

We Americans are so good at critiquing our own nation, so determined to make it better, that sometimes we neglect to acknowledge all that is wonderful about it. Let us not commit the sin of ingratitude for so many blessings.

The jury was composed of eight blacks and four whites. Hoffa and his attorney, the legendary Edward Bennett Williams, struck only white jurors in the selection process. Hoffa had a black female lawyer flown in from California to sit at counsel table. He arranged for a newspaper, The Afro-American, to run an ad praising Hoffa as a champion of the “Negro race.” The ad featured a photo of Hoffa’s black-and-white legal team. Hoffa then had the newspaper delivered to the home of each black juror. Finally, Hoffa’s Chicago underworld buddy Red Dorfman had the legendary boxing champion Joe Louis flown in from his Detroit home. Jimmy Hoffa and Joe Louis hugged in front of the jury as if they were old friends. Joe Louis stayed and watched a couple of days of testimony. When Cye Cheasty testified, Edward Bennett Williams asked him if he had ever officially investigated the NAACP. Cheasty denied he had, but the seed was planted. Hoffa was acquitted. Edward

To me, love is like listening to an album. Some people skip to their favorite songs and ignore the rest. Other people listen to the entire album over and over, until it’s familiar and cherished and they know every note by heart. That’s how Dr. Bennett and I loved each other. He was music I could listen to forever.

For half a century we sought happiness,” Elias’s wife says in this story, “and as long as we were rich we never found it. Now that we have nothing left, and have taken service as laborers, we have found such happiness that we want nothing better.” This simple yet profound story is a good one for anybody choosing a career, job, or task. There’s certainly nothing wrong with working to get money, but there may be something very wrong if you think getting the money gets you happiness.

I asked God for strength, that I might achieve; I was made weak, that I might learn to humbly obey. I asked for health, that I might do greater things; I was given infirmity, that I might do better things. I asked for riches, that I might be happy; I was given poverty, that I might be wise. I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men; I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God. I asked for all things that I might enjoy life; I was given life, that I might enjoy all things. I got nothing I asked for but everything I had hoped for. Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered. I am, among men, most richly blessed.

At the end of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, a Philadelphia lady asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a republic or a monarchy?” Franklin replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.” It takes a nation of patriots to keep a republic. Especially this republic. The United States, with all its might, isn’t likely to be conquered from the outside anytime soon. If American liberty loses its luster, the dimming will come from within. It will be due to our own lack of attention and devotion. Without patriotism, there cannot be a United States. It falls upon us—upon you and me—to take care of this miraculous American democracy, to make it work, to love it.

register in people’s minds. When I say people, I mean millions of them, because Macey Williams,

Singer’s lethal potion is concocted of hundreds of outlandish facts and quotes—he is a tenacious reporter—and a style that barely suppresses his own amusement. It works particularly well on the buccaneers who continue to try the patience of the citizenry, as proved by his profile in The New Yorker of the developer Donald Trump. Noting that Trump “had aspired to and achieved the ultimate luxury, an existence unmolested by the rumbling of a soul,” Singer describes a visit to Mar-a-Lago, the Palm Beach spa converted by Trump from the 118-room Hispano-Moorish-Venetian mansion built in the 1920s by Marjorie Merriweather Post and E. F. Hutton: Evidently, Trump’s philosophy of wellness is rooted in a belief that prolonged exposure to exceptionally attractive young spa attendants will instill in the male clientele a will to live. Accordingly, he limits his role to a pocket veto of key hiring decisions. While giving me a tour of the main exercise room, where Tony Bennett, who does a couple of gigs at Mar-a-Lago each season and had been designated an “artist-in-residence,” was taking a brisk walk on a treadmill, Trump introduced me to “our resident physician, Dr. Ginger Lee Southall”—a recent chiropractic-college graduate. As Dr. Ginger, out of earshot, manipulated the sore back of a grateful member, I asked Trump where she had done her training. “I’m not sure,” he said. “Baywatch Medical School? Does that sound right? I’ll tell you the truth. Once I saw Dr. Ginger’s photograph, I didn’t really need to look at her résumé or anyone else’s. Are you asking, ‘Did we hire her because she trained at Mount Sinai for fifteen years?’ The answer is no. And I’ll tell you why: because by the time she’s spent fifteen years at Mount Sinai, we don’t want to look at her.

Like Irenaeus, Tertullian defended the apostolic line of succession as the principle for determining true Christian doctrine, claiming that only those churches that were founded and perpetuated in the apostolic lineage were teaching the truth: “all doctrine must be prejudged as false which savours of contrariety to the truth of the churches and apostles of Christ and God.”23 To Tertullian, the church at Rome, having been founded directly by two apostles, was also imbued with a special ability to preserve the correct doctrine:

where the Apostle John was first plunged, unhurt, into boiling oil, and thence remitted to his island-exile!

By Tertullian’s time, the catholic (universal) church was recognized as a collection of any churches that had an affection for each other based on a shared theology passed down from apostolic times.

The Montanists claimed that they were receiving direct revelation, or prophecy, from the Holy Spirit,

The tradition holds that Hippolytus was torn in half by wild horses at this time, as was Martina, “a noble and beautiful” young woman.36 A presbyter named Calepodius was drowned in the Tiber.

Margaret Sanger, a public health nurse who challenged laws against distributing birth control information, embraced eugenics. Sanger founded Planned Parenthood, ostensibly to encourage poor immigrants and other Americans to limit the number of children they bore.

The last great dispute of the era was a heavily theological affair between Hippolytus, one of the most influential theologians at Rome, and Callistus, the bishop of that city.

Behold, into how great impiety that lawless one has proceeded, by inculcating adultery and murder at the same time! And withal, after such audacious acts, they, lost to all shame, attempt to call themselves a Catholic Church!

Lastly, Callistus granted church membership to individuals from breakaway sects who desired to be part of the Catholic Church but had not performed penance first.

Inverness,

All Hale Kate: Her story is as close to a real-life fairy tale as it gets. Born Catherine Elizabeth Middleton, the quiet, sporty girl next door from the small town of Bucklebury - not quite Cinderella, but certainly a "commoner" by blue bloods' standards - managed to enchant the most eligible bachelor in the world, Prince William, while they were university students 15 years ago. It wasn't long before everyone else fell in love with her, too. We ached for her as she waited patiently for a proposal through 10 years of friendship and romance (and one devastating breakup!), cheered along with about 300 million other TV viewers when she finally became a princess bride in 2011, and watched in awe as she proceeded to graciously but firmly drag the stuffy royal family into the 21st century. And though she never met her mother-in-law, the late, beloved, Princess Diana, Kate is now filling the huge void left not just in her husband's life but in the world's heart when the People's Princess died. The Duchess of Cambridge shares Di's knack for charming world leaders and the general public alike, and the same fierce devotion to her family above all else. She's a busy, modern mom who wears affordable clothes, does her own shopping and cooking, struggles with feelings of insecurity and totes her kids along to work (even if the job happens to involve globe-trotting official state visits) - all while wearing her signature L.K. Bennett 4 inch heels. And one day in the not-too-distance future, this woman who grew up in a modest brick home in the countryside - and seems so very much like on of us- will take on another impossibly huge role: queen of England.

Christians in North America and Europe have always looked forward to celebrating Christmas.

The more things improve the more pessimistic we become. Violence-related deaths at the nation’s schools dropped to a record low during the 1996—97 academic year (19 deaths out of 54 million children), and only one in ten public schools reported any serious crime. Yet Time and U.S. News & World Report both ran headlines in 1996 referring to “Teenage Time Bombs.” In a nation of “Children Without Souls” (another Time headline that year), “America’s beleaguered cities are about to be victimized by a paradigm shattering wave of ultraviolent, morally vacuous young people some call ‘the superpredators,’” William Bennett, the former Secretary of Education, and John Dilulio, a criminologist, forecast in a book published in 1996.11

1948 President Truman signs legislation establishing the Marshall Plan.

to declare that all those things must have been the work not of men but of angels.16

Trinity College (Dublin) library,

THE CHRISTIANIZATION OF THE KIEVAN RUS

William Bennett Jr. He’s thirty-five years old. Admitted from a multi-trauma the same night the blue Dodge collided with that tree. He’s in bed twelve in the surgical ICU.

George Washington Goethals as the canal’s new chief engineer

I can’t believe that there are any heights that can’t be scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true,” Walt Disney said. “This special secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four Cs. They are curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence.

This country is a lot better at teaching self-esteem than it is at teaching math.

Conservatives recognize that free enterprise—or capitalism, as it’s also known—is the best system the world has ever seen for creating jobs and good living conditions. It has lifted countless millions of people out of poverty and made their lives better.

These souls were eternally disconnected, forever separated with a force that would not allow any interchange. They were like another race with no societal tie to each other, bound on their own miserable, independent journeys, alike only in the obvious countenance of pain.

But if his sorrow does not become resolve, and his resolve give birth to action, then his lot has not changed. You saw him try to extinguish the light of Christmas Past. He did as he has done most of his life. He has tried to put out the light and, finding it insufferable, he has covered it.

Government has important work to do, but in the task of helping society remain intact, much work takes place in the families, neighborhoods, churches, temples, schools, and voluntary groups that make communities good, healthy places to live.

Competition between businesses creates better products and services, as well as lower prices. It encourages entrepreneurship and fosters good, hard work. The competition of free enterprise is a major reason businesses are usually more efficient and productive than government.

The first public gas streetlight in the United States is lit in Baltimore, Maryland.

Government has important work to do, but in the task of helping society remain intact, much work takes place in the families, neighborhoods, churches, temples, schools, and voluntary groups that make communities good, healthy places to live. Individual

Tim Graham Tim Graham has specialized in photographing the Royal Family for more than thirty years and is foremost in his chosen field. Recognition of his work over the years has led to invitations for private sessions with almost all the members of the British Royal Family, including, of course, Diana, Princess of Wales, and her children. Diana had none of the remoteness of some members of royal families. Along with several of my press colleagues, I felt I came to know her quite well. She was a superstar, she was royal, but she was also very approachable. I have had various sessions with members of the Royal Family over the years, but those with her were more informal. I remember photographing Prince William at Kensington Palace when he was a baby. I was lying on the floor of the drawing room in front of the infant prince, trying to get his attention. Not surprisingly, he didn’t show much interest, so, without prompting, Diana lay down on the floor close to me and, using one of those little bottles of bubbles, starting blowing bubbles at him. Perfect. As he gazed in fascination at his mother, I was able to get the picture I wanted. I can’t think of many members of the Royal Family who would abandon protocol and lie on the carpet with you in a photo session! Funnily enough, it wasn’t the only time it happened. She did the same again years when she was about to send her dresses to auction for charity and we were sifting through prints of my photographs that she had asked to use in the catalog. She suggested that we sit on the floor and spread the photographs all around us on the carpet, so, of course, we did. I donated the use of my pictures of her in the various dresses to the charity, and as a thank-you, Diana invited me to be the exclusive photographer at both parties held for the dresses auction--one in London and the other in the United States. The party in New York was held on preview night, and many of the movers and shakers of New York were there, including her good friend Henry Kissinger. It was a big room, but everyone in it gravitated to the end where the Princess was meeting people. She literally couldn’t move and was totally hemmed in. I was pushed so close to her I could hardly take a picture. Seeing the crush, her bodyguard spotted an exit route through the kitchen and managed to get the Princess and me out of the enthusiastic “scrum.” As the kitchen door closed behind the throng, she leaned against the wall, kicked off her stiletto-heeled shoes, and gasped, “Gordon Bennett, that’s a crush!” I would have loved to have taken a picture of her then, but I knew she wouldn’t expect that to be part of the deal. You should have seen the kitchen staff--they were thrilled to have an impromptu sight of her but amazed that someone of her status could be so normal. She took a short breather, said hi to those who had, of course, stopped work to stare at her, and then glided back into the room through another door to take up where she had left off. That’s style!

Limited government that protects rights and freedoms is another important ingredient. For example, it is government’s job to protect property rights, keep markets as free and fair as possible, and oppose discrimination in the workplace.

Mao would hardly be deterred by the universal condemnation of the civilized world. He saw Stalin as his model. In the agrarian reforms, Stalin had killed seven million; Mao himself killed an estimated forty million Chinese in his reforms.49

Hayek was never a popular author to the extent that everyone was reading him at the corner newsstand. But the Austrian refugee showed how the roots of Hitler’s tyranny and the bases of Marxist collectivism were one and the same. His work had a profound influence on a generation of freedom loving young conservatives. Even

Focusing on the public school system, former Secretary of Education, William Bennett explains the moral crisis in that institution by contrasting the concerns of teachers in two different eras: 'Over the years teachers have been asked to identify the top problems in America's schools. In 1940 teachers identified them as talking out of turn; chewing gum; making noise; running in the hall; cutting in line; dress code infractions; and littering. When asking the same question in 1990, teachers identified drug abuse; alcohol abuse; pregnancy; suicide; rape; robbery; and assault.' During the thirty-year period of 1960 to 1990, 'there has been a 560 percent increase in violent crime; more than a 400 percent increase in illegitimate births; a quadrupling in divorces; a tripling of the percentage of children living in single-parent homes; more than a 200 percent increase in the teenage suicide rate; and a drop of 75 points in the average SAT scores of high-school students.' We do not believe it is a coincidence that the increase of moral mayhem described by Bennett corresponds with an increased acceptance of moral relativism. In fact, relativism has been officially incorporated in the educational curriculum, known as values clarification.

History is a ribbon, always unfurling. History is a journey. And as we continue our journey, we think of those who traveled before us . . .

And yet we are a resilient people, caretakers of a blessed nation. It has become a commonplace that we always rise to the occasion in this country. That is still true. And we surprise ourselves, never knowing with exact certainty from whence our next leader or hero will come—good reason to respect and defend one another as Americans, as fellow countrymen dedicated to a great proposition. Allow me a few simple illustrations. If you were sitting in a saloon in 1860, and someone told you that while he did not know who would win that year's presidential election, the next elected president after him was right then a little known leather tanner in Galena, Illinois, he would be laughed out of the saloon. But then came Ulysses S. Grant. If you were sitting at Franklin D. Roosevelt's inauguration, in 1933, and someone told you the next president was a little-known judge in Jackson County, Missouri, he would have been made to look the fool. But then came Harry S. Truman. If you were a political consultant in California in 1950 watching the bitter Senate race between Richard Nixon and Helen Gahagan Douglas (where Nixon labeled Douglas "the pink lady"), and you said that actor Ronald Reagan (who was then campaigning for Douglas) would someday be a Republican president and would crush the Soviet Union, your career would have been over.

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

Besides. How’s a stranger going to tell me how to grieve my Bennett, my love that she never even met? You can’t cheat grief, Ricki. You have to work with it. Accommodate it.

On August 15, 1971 Nixon took the advice of a close circle of key advisers which included his chief Budget adviser, George Shultz, and a policy group then at the Treasury Department including Paul Volcker, and Jack F. Bennett, who later went on to become a director of Exxon. That sunny quiet August day, in a move which rocked the world, the President of the United States announced formal suspension of dollar convertibility into gold, effectively putting the world fully onto a dollar standard with no gold backing, and by this, unilaterally ripping apart the central provision of the 1944 Bretton Woods system. No longer could foreign holders of U.S. dollars redeem their paper for U.S. gold reserves.

Cord’s generosity with gratitude and reluctance at the same time. Cord considered the Olmsteds to be good friends of the Bennetts, and one of these days, Glory might be more than that, although he

It is a pleasure to stand upon the shore and to see ships tossed upon the sea; a pleasure to stand in the window of a castle and to see a battle and the adventures thereof below; but no pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage ground of truth (a hill not to be commanded, and where the air is always clear and serene), and to see the errors and wanderings and mists and tempests in the vale below; so always that this prospect be with pity, and not with swelling or pride.

I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance. The poet’s, the writer’s, duty is to write about these things. It is his privilege to help man endure by lifting his heart, by reminding him of the courage and honor and hope and pride and compassion and pity and sacrifice which have been the glory of his past. The poet’s voice need not merely be the record of man, it can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail.

Sweden, where he had traveled to accept the Nobel Prize for literature. It is foremost an exhortation to young writers, a reminder that artistic creation does have duties, and that forgetting those duties relegates one’s work to the ranks of mediocrity. But his words speak to every reader of literature as well. Faulkner reminds us that what we study in school and what we read in our precious spare time matters. Great literature—the kind we cannot afford to miss—speaks to problems of the spirit, the “human heart in conflict with itself,” and nothing less. It lifts our eyes to the virtues we possess and the nobility we would acquire, and helps us to prevail.

To be honest is to be real, genuine, authentic, and bona fide. To be dishonest is to be partly feigned, forged, fake, or fictitious. Honesty expresses both self-respect and respect for others. Dishonesty fully respects neither oneself nor others. Honesty imbues lives with openness, reliability, and candor; it expresses a disposition to live in the light. Dishonesty seeks shade, cover,

It is not for me to declare a winner in this fight,” he told them. “Truth and Falsehood are destined to struggle. Sometimes Truth will win, but other times Falsehood will prevail, and then Truth must rise up and fight again. Until the end of the world, Truth must battle Falsehood, and must never rest or let down his guard, or he will be finished once and for all.” And so Truth and Falsehood are fighting to this day.

O king, great is truth, and stronger than all things. Wine is wicked, the king is wicked, all the children of men are wicked, and they shall perish. But truth lasts forever. She is always strong, she never dies and is never defeated. With truth there is no respect of persons, and she cannot be bribed. She doeth the things that are just.

I also realized that God was not only just, but merciful. He knew we were weak and that we all found it easier to be stinkers than good sons of God, not only as kids but all through our lives. That clear picture, I’m sure, would be important to any kid who hates a teacher, or resents a person in charge. This picture of my relationship to man and God was what helped relieve me of bitterness and rancor and a desire to get even.

Don’t you believe it. As far as I’m concerned, and I think as far as most kids go, once religion sinks in, it stays there—deep down. The lads who get religious training, get it where it counts—in the roots. They may fail it, but it never fails them. When the score is against them, or they get a bum pitch, that unfailing Something inside will be there to draw on.

Lou returned to the team for the remainder of the 1939 season, slowly suiting up each day, taking McCarthy’s lineups to home plate to deliver to the umpires before each game. It was his only duty as captain. It was another winning season for the Yankees, but hardly for Lou. The short walk from the dugout to home plate and back exhausted him. But more exhausting was a cruel (but mostly true) story in the New York Daily News to the effect that some of his teammates had become afraid of drinking out of the Yankee dugout’s drinking fountain after Lou used it.

Laugh, and the world laughs with you; Weep, and you weep alone; For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth, But has trouble enough of its own. Sing, and the hills will answer; Sigh, it is lost on the air; The echoes bound to a joyful sound, But shrink from voicing care. Rejoice, and men will seek you; Grieve, and they turn and go; They want full measure of all your pleasure, But they do not need your woe. Be glad, and your friends are many; Be sad, and you lose them all— There are none to decline your nectared wine, But alone you must drink life’s gall. Feast, and your halls are crowded; Fast, and the world goes by. Succeed and give, and it helps you live, But no man can help you die. There is room in the halls of pleasure For a large and lordly train, But one by one we must all file on Through the narrow aisles of pain.

As a sickly, weak child of a wealthy New York family, Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) could certainly have found plenty of excuses to fall into a life of rich, idle ease. But that was not his way. With unyielding determination, he committed himself to rigorous physical exercise, turned himself into a devoted outdoorsman, and threw himself into a life of public service. Roosevelt gave this speech in Chicago in 1899, a few months after becoming governor of New York, and it has remained one of his most popular. Here he speaks to a nation just beginning to feel tremendous wealth and power, and he cautions against the temptation of the life of “ignoble ease” that prosperity and security can bring. He reminds us that the character of a nation—like that of an individual—appears through its work.

Who among you would teach your boys that ease, that peace is to be the first consideration in your eyes—to be the ultimate goal after which they strive? You men of Chicago have made this city great, you men of Illinois have done your share, and more than your share, in making America great, because you neither preach nor practice such a doctrine. You work yourselves, and you bring up your sons to work.

The book of Psalms was the ancient hymnal of the Jewish people. Most of the psalms were probably written for use in worship; one finds among them songs of praise, thanksgiving, adoration, devotion, doubt, and complaint. Martin Luther called the Psalter “a Bible in miniature.” Psalm 23, a hymn of trust in God, is probably the most widely loved. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

They will preach what we want them to preach,” said Hitler’s memo. “If any priest acts differently, we will make short work of him. The task of the priest is to keep the Poles quiet, stupid, and dull-witted.

United States military profession as early as 1863 in General Order number 100 of the United States Army Field Manual: “Men who take up arms against another in public war do not cease on this account to be moral beings responsible to one another.” Individuals always remain ethically responsible for their actions, for the choices they make among conflicting moral obligations, as well as for the consequences which result from them.

Those who follow that part of themselves which is great are great men; those who follow that part which is little are little men. To the mind belongs the office of thinking. By thinking, it gets the right view of things; by neglecting to think, it fails to do this. Let a man first stand fast in the supremacy of the nobler part of his constitution, and the inferior part will not be able to take it from him. It is simply this which makes the great man.

Whatsoever is not said in all sincerity, is wrongly said. And not to be able to rid oneself of this vice is only to sink deeper toward perdition. “Those who do evil in the open light of day—men will punish them. Those who do evil in secret—God will punish them. Who fears both man and God, he is fit to walk alone.

There was once a common understanding in our society among men that there are standards of action and behavior to which men should hold themselves. Men, the code dictates, among other things, keep their word, whether in writing or not, men do not take advantage of women, men support their children, and men watch their language, especially around women and children. The code of men is fading.

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

I thank you very sincerely for your letter and your offer to transport me towards freedom. I cannot, alas, leave [Cambodia] in such a cowardly fashion. As for you, and in particular your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would . . . [abandon] a people which have chosen liberty. You have refused us your protection, and we can do nothing about it. You leave, and my wish is that you and your country will find happiness under the sky. [If I die here] I have committed only this mistake of believing you.8 When the Communist Khmer Rouge seized Phnom Penh, they shot Matak in the stomach. Unattended, it took him three days to die.9

Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people, who have a right, from the frame of their nature, to knowledge, as their great Creator, who does nothing in vain, has given them understandings, and a desire to know. . . .

A house divided against itself cannot stand.

William Morris, " Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.

conceive that the people of America, in their present temper, or under any circumstances which can speedily happen, will choose, and every second year repeat the choice of, sixty-five or a hundred men who would be disposed to form and pursue a scheme of tyranny or treachery

James Madison takes up the question of whether a relatively small number of legislators can be trusted to safeguard the public liberty. Such a system can work, Madison argues, as long as the political and moral responsibilities of the people remain intact. Democracy presupposes the virtue of its individual citizens.