Grace Church, then and now

• 1905
• 2009

Seven quick takes

• There's nothing better than beef & noodles on mashed potatoes.
• I'm currently on an American history kick (one of my ever-revolving cycle of interests) with this and this. The former is inspired by the Texans who are talking secession - I'm trying to see whether that idea makes sense. The latter is the first in my in-depth note-taking course in American history. Every time I find a date I note it in a file, the goal being a comprehensive database of American history. A happy consequence is that it slows my reading down so more of it sinks in and I have time to make connections and explore side roads. I chose that book more or less at random - I had trouble finding a list of early histories of America, and this one covered the pre-Revolutionary period I wanted to start in. As I come across references to other books and build a bibliography, I'll uncover more early histories.
• Mmm... fresh clean socks.
• Why could a cat pee on a dvd?
• Lisa's off to a Mom's night out - her Mom's group is meeting to assemble meals to take home & freeze.
• When covering Greek myths with the kids, follow Edith Hamilton rather than Robert Graves. He gives all the sick depraved details; she politely glosses over them.
• Did you know the northern states were seriously planning secession back when Jefferson was president?

A lot of rain

It's been raining all day.

I guess I can trust Highlights

"Crimson Harvest" - that's the title of an article 11yo Secunda is reading in the current Highlights magazine. When I saw the title I thought "oh great - some liberal bigot going on about how the Inuit seal harvest is so damned cruel, lots of bloody pictures, lefty propaganda for the kiddies, etc." Well, no - it's an article about harvesting cranberries. It seems we really can trust Highlights. Unlike the sadly politicized National Geographic, which is basically a polysyllabic Time magazine. We cancelled that crap after a few months' subscription.

Ha! I just went to the National Geographic website - the title of the homepage is "National Geographic - Inspiring People to Care About the Planet." In other words, we have a BBC-style climate-nut agenda we'll push in every article.

Final Exit

I'd bet a paycheck that sometime in the next 10 years, before the end of 2019, there'll be a "reality" show on teevee featuring a different suicide every week. Each suicide will be a noble person with some dread affliction of the week, taking the brave way out accompanied by a loving tearful family who agrees that it's the right thing to do. It could be followed each week by the funeral/casket/ash bucket equivalent of Say Yes to the Dress.

What could you do with half a million bucks?

recovery.gov says they've stolen 16 billion dollars to create (or save) 30 thousand jobs. If you dare to do the math, that's about half a million dollars per job. So that's what the government can do with $500,000. I think I could do a hell of a lot better than that, all by my little own lonesome.

UPDATE: see subsidiarity, a word from which King Obama's czars, sultans and potentates recoil in horror.

A disappointing discovery

Sugar hides the taste of what it's in. I don't know why I didn't notice this sometime in the last 20 years. I've been drinking fresh-brewed tea without sugar for a few months, but recently I idly added a couple of teaspoons to sugar to a cup. It was disappointing to find half the tea's flavors gone, replaced by vile sweet sugar.

Liberty once lost, or, The Prophetic Mr Adams #1

John Adams to his wife Abigail, July 7, 1775:

Your Description of the Distresses of the worthy Inhabitants of Boston, and the other Sea Port Towns, is enough to melt an Heart of stone. Our Consolation must be this, my dear, that Cities may be rebuilt, and a People reduced to Poverty, may acquire fresh Property: But a Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty once lost is lost forever. When the People once surrender their share in the Legislature, and their Right of defending the Limitations upon the Government, and of resisting every Encroachment upon them, they can never regain it.

The greatness of Christopher Columbus

In what does the greatness of Christopher Columbus consist?

We say not that he was unmoved by perfectly honourable aspirations after knowledge, and deserving well of human society; nor did he despise glory, which is a most engrossing ideal to great souls; nor did he altogether scorn a hope of advantages to himself; but to him far before all these human considerations was the consideration of his ancient faith, which questionless dowered him with strength of mind and will, and often strengthened and consoled him in the midst of the greatest difficulties. This view and aim is known to have possessed his mind above all; namely, to open a way for the Gospel over new lands and seas.

And this is precisely why Columbus is portrayed as one of history's greatest monsters in today's government schools.

Randolph's library

An account of John Randolph's library, sometime after its scattering to the winds, as remembered by Hugh Grigsby in the February 1854 Southern Literary Messenger.

Seven quick takes

• It's payday! Which means... it's grocery day! So maybe tomorrow I can make pizzas for supper. Can't today because we have no tomatoes - whole, canned, diced or pasted - for a tomato sauce, and no butter & Permesan for an alfredo sauce.
• 4yo Quinta has been banned to my office for excessive screaming and crying.
• 7yo Tertius wore his new Cub Scout uniform shirt to scouts last night, and got his Bobcat badge. Like 12yo Primus, he looks spiffy in his scout uniform. We have good-looking kids (of course).
• She's progressed to steady quiet whining.
• My favorite blanket used to be "Old Scratchy", made of a material that irritates my wife but is preternaturally warm, even when the material itself is cold. I've left Old Scratchy for a down comforter and now Harry the cat has adopted it.
• If it weren't for Aldi's we'd be sunk.
• 12yo Primus consistently produces whoopee-cushion-quality farts. Maybe he can get a high-paying job in Hollywood as a foley artist.

Patristic homilies for Sundays and feasts

Vide. Gregory the Great, Jerome, Bede, Ambrose, Augustine, Leo, Gregory Nazianzus, Hilary, Chrysostom, Chrysologus.

A young boy's books

John Randolph, born in 1773, described his boyhood reading:

One of the first books I ever read was Voltaire's Charles XII.; about the same time, 1780-1, I read the Spectator; and used to steal away to the closet containing them. The letters from his correspondents were my favorites. I read Humphrey Clinker, also; that is Win's and Tabby's letters, with great delight, for I could spell at that age, pretty correctly. Reynard, the Fox, came next, I think; then tales of the Genii and Arabian Nights. This last, and Shakespeare, were my idols. I had read them with Don Quixote, Gil Bias, Quintus Curtius, Plutarch, Pope's Homer, Robinson Crusoe, Gulliver, Tom Jones, Orlando Furioso, and Thomson's Seasons, before I was eleven years; also, Goldsmith's Roman History, 2 vols., 8 vo., and an old history of Braddock's war.

From an 1819 letter to a young relative which is signed, I have scribbled at a great rate. Do thou likewise.

Butler's Lives: October 14

• St Callixtus, or Callistus, Pope, Martyr
• St Donatian, Confessor
• St Burckard, Confessor, First Bishop of Wurtzburg
• St Dominic, surnamed Loricatus, Confessor

In Congress, December 2, 1799

Twenty-six-year-old John Randolph, representative from Virginia, first takes his seat in Congress at Philadelphia. William Plumer of New Hampshire described him in 1803:

Mr. Randolph goes to the House booted and spurred, with his whip in hand, in imitation, it is said, of members of the British Parliament. He is a very slight man but of the common stature. At a little distance, he does not appear older than you are; but, upon a nearer approach, you perceive his wrinkles and grey hairs. He is, I believe, about thirty. He is a descendant in the right line from the celebrated Indian Princess, Pochahontas. The Federalists ridicule and affect to despise him; but a despised foe often proves a dangerous enemy. His talents are certainly far above mediocrity. As a popular speaker, he is not inferior to any man in the House. I admire his ingenuity and address; but I dislike his politics.

William Henry Harrison, also 26, a new representative from the territory northwest of the Ohio River, arrived late that day and was sworn in after the other representatives.

Beveridge's John Marshall

Albert Beveridge's four-volume biography of John Marshall is available at the Internet Archive. Russell Kirk says Beveridge writes well about many aspects of rural Virginia life from 1755 to 1835.

• Volume 1: Frontiersman, Soldier, Lawmaker: 1755-1788
• Volume 2: Politician, Diplomatist, Statesman: 1789-1801
• Volume 3: Conflict and Construction: 1900-1815
• Volume 4: The Building of the Nation: 1815-1835

Butler's Lives: October 13

• St Edward, King and Confessor
• Ss Faustus, Januarius and Martialis, Martyrs
• Seven Friar Minors, Martyrs
• St Colman, Martyr
• St Gerald, Count of Aurillac, or Orilhac, Confessor

Get your laws off our sacraments

Just something I stumbled across in my archives from 2003:

I don't think government should claim any authority over marriage, which is not only a sacrament but an integral part of the natural law, which precedes and supercedes any claims of government. The government has no more right to define the nature of marriage than it has to define the nature of, say, the Eucharist.

Give the government that power [to regulate marriage], and soon enough it will attempt to define the nature of the Eucharist; it will define our prayers and worship as child abuse, our Scriptures as hate speech, our acts of charity as crimes against humanity, and so on.

Augustine's letter to Proba

The 1950s CUA translation is online, along with the nearly-complete collection of Augustine's letters.

• Letter 130, to Proba
• Letters Vol 2 (83-130)
• Letters Vol 3 (131-164)
• Letters Vol 4 (204-270)

Kirk's "Randolph of Roanoke"

Online! Nearly every day I'm astounded at what can be found at the Internet Archive. Today's astonishment was occasioned by the discovery of Russell Kirk's Randolph of Roanoke: A Study in Conservative Thought - intact, complete and free in a variety of formats.

I loves me the internet.