Old Wisdom for Decaying America 3

Our responsibility to history is clear---to rid the world of evil. - Bush minor: (Does he understand the meaning of words like responsibility, history, and evil?)

Nothing doth more hurt in a state than that cunning men pass for wise. - Francis Bacon

As societies grow decadent, the language grows decadent too. Words are used to disguise, not to illuminate action: You liberate a city by destroying it. - Gore Vidal

Empires crumble. There are no exceptions. - Oscar Wilde

If you can’t do it with one shot, don’t do it at all. - H. Ryder Haggard

An American President can wreck his country and blow up the world, but he cannot recreate either of them. - Chilton Williamson

A people which no longer remembers has lost its history and its soul. - Solzhenitsyn

There is a great deal of ruin in a nation. - Adam Smith

The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. - Kundera

We Americans did first
Conceive the soul’s language as a commerce,
And we celebrated ever after that new learning,
. . . . . .
No, Calvin Coolidge,
The business of America is not business

- Caryl Johnston

I think little of people who will deny their history because it doesn’t present the picture they would like. - George Macdonald Fraser

A thing cannot be other than it is. - Aristotle

As to the species of exercise, I advise the gun. While this gives a moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, independence, and enterprise to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body, and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun, therefore, be the constant companion of your walks. - Thomas Jefferson. (After advising his nephew on hounorable behaviour and on a large program of classical and scientific studies, suggests two hours of exercise per day.)

How could we help falling on our knees, all of us together, and praying God to pity and forgive is all. - Union Gen. Joshua Chamberlain at Apomattox

The Southern Flag
Round the World bear the flag of our glory,
While the nations look on and admire,
And our struggle, immortal in story,
Shall the free of all ages inspire.
- Gen. Albert Pike

Freedom called and called in vain!
Furl that banner sadly, slowly,
Treat it gently, for ‘tis holy;
Till that day---yes, furl it sadly;
Then once more unfurl it gladly.
- Sir Henry Houghton, English Poet

Ah, realm of tombs! But let her bear
This blazon to the last of times:
No nation rose so white and fair,
Or fell so pure of crimes.
- Philip Stanhope Worsley, English Poet