What is History? Part 35
You can do anything you like in London as long as you don’t do it in the street and don’t frighten the horses. —Mrs. Patrick Campbell
There is nothing so stupid as a gallant British officer. —Wellington
I am one Southerner who is not obsessed with the Civil War. I am too busy planning for the next one. —Florence King
I only drink when I am on duty. —Gene Hackman
Man was made at the end of the week's work, when God was tired. —Mark Twain
The correct term for an original thinker is heretic. . . . —Thomas Fleming
Modern politics is a chapter in the history of religion. —John Gray
It always makes me proud of my country to see all those fine young men in the U.S. Army. —crooked banker in Stagecoach
This cult of the standard of living . . . is a disorder of spiritual perception of an almost pathological nature, a misjudgment of the true scale of vital values, a degradation of man . . . —Wilhelm Röpke
O for an hour of Wallace wight
Or well-trained Bruce
To lead the fight,
And cry St. Andrew and our right.
—Quoted by Jefferson Davis to the Sons of Confederate Veterans
The flag which he [my grandfather, Francis Scott Key] had then so proudly hailed, I saw waving at the same place over the victims of as vulgar and brutal despotism as modern times have witnessed. —Francis Key Howard, a prisoner of Lincoln, 1861
Entries(RSS)
Dr. Wilson,
Your quote:
"'This cult of the standard of living . . . is a disorder of spiritual perception of an almost pathological nature, a misjudgment of the true scale of vital values, a degradation of man . . .' —Wilhelm Röpke"
Röpke emphasized "Sitte" or "Custom," that which was the organic expression of a society, as the framework in which the free market should operate. As the state and the banks within a given culture dealt with the markets, they should do so in the context of the "custom" of the society. He was opposed to the welfare state; yet, he also rejected the "mere functioning of the markets" as a "moral agent" as some proponents thereof do.
Röpke's "Middle Way" was, for a while, best and well embodied in the Free Democratic Party (FDP) of Germany. However, the FDP has been marginalized, never having been a majority party but having been in government coalitions in Germany, and has, in an attempt at electability migrated to the left. Röpke's Middle Way has been distorted into a socialist hybrid in which the state in collusion with the banks controls private ownership - fascism according to Mussolini himself.
Röpke helped Adenauer find the middle way through the socialist camps vying for power in post-Hitler Germany. Röpke was no idealist, but he held that the optimal opportunity for peace and wealth was in a market economy functioning within the framework of the "Sitte" of a given society, with a stable currency, the rule of law, private property and a federated system in which he had lived in Switzerland.
A quote from Röpke:
“Nobody who votes National Socialists on September 14 may tell later on that he had not known what could be the result. He must know that he votes for chaos instead of order, destruction instead of building up ... for war inwards and outwards."
Take "National Socialists" out of the quote and insert "Democrat" or "Republican," and his warning rings as true today as it did then.
Mrs. Patrick Campbell's quote is one of my favorites.
The world shall yet decide
In truth's clrear far off light
That those who rode with Lee as guide
Were heroes in the right.
inscribed on the war memorial in front of Rappahannock County courthouse in Little Washington VA
O for an hour of Wallace wight
Or well-trained Bruce
To lead the fight,
And cry St. Andrew and our right.
—Quoted by Jefferson Davis to the Sons of Confederate Veterans
How appropriately posted on the 201st anniversary of OUR President's birth. He also said "The principle for which we fight is bound to arise again at another time."
My own prayer is that he might know the fight continues to this day and will as long as man has a centime of decency within him.
This cult of the standard of living . . . is a disorder of spiritual perception of an almost pathological nature, a misjudgment of the true scale of vital values, a degradation of man . . . —Wilhelm Röpke
Hillary Belloc said the modern age represents the victory of quantity over quality. In fact, it has made discussion of those things that truly distinguish us as human impossible, because modernist analysis is limited to only the sense-bound, only the empirical and accepts only empirical categories. As a consequence the whole experience of man has been subjected to a complete redefining in only empirical terms, and tortured definitions have followed by the score–––making of the dual experience of man into a single gray goo of confusion.
Under this univocal mind-set our children have been educated into imbecility.
The flag which he [my grandfather, Francis Scott Key] had then so proudly hailed, I saw waving at the same place over the victims of as vulgar and brutal despotism as modern times have witnessed.
Yeah sure, if only Mr Key could see the Inner Harbor of Baltimore today he would not have bothered o pen the Star Spangled Banner because every night is a combat zone. Lately Balmer Merlin has ben averaging over one murder per day, and it's not confined the the 'hood anymore. In a recent survey, Baltimore put Detroit into second place as murder capital of the USA. In other news, last year a policeman was drummed off the force for dealing with punk youth, and now the criminals (mostly black) mug tourists (mostly white) in broad daylight. Where is Officer Barbieri when you need him?
Grumpy Old Man, mine too. I had always believed the remark was made by an anonymous old Irish woman on first hearing why Oscar Wilde went to prison. She had thought he was an Irish patriot.