Fatal Purity
Review
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice. The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization. We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal. Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good. The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Trappist monk, Father Thomas Merton
More Merton Quotes
Fatal Purity
Review
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice. The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization. We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal. Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good. The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Trappist monk, Father Thomas Merton
More Merton Quotes
"Santorum, Savonarola And The Pending Apocalypse Of The Republican Party"
Compendium Of Best Pax Posts On "Too Pure Principles" And The Collapse Of Conservatism
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2015/02/compendium-of-best-pax-posts-on-too.html
"Is Perfectionism A Curse? Paul Ryan Tells The Truth"
http://paxonbothhouses.
http://paxonbothhouses.
Alan: Here is an online statement I stumbled upon last night, followed by my reply.
Conservatives champion the rights and dignity of the individual, believing that every person has the right to succeed as far as talent will take him or her, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, or gender, or even social status. It is truly a color blind philosophy, despite the lies of the left. Racial identity politics, of either the right or the left, champions the rights and privileges (and often grievances) of the racial group. It is antithetical to conservatism.
21
What conservatives champion "in theory" -- and what they actually do "in practice" -- are two widely divergent things. In fact, their theoretical commitment to theory makes them all the more self-exculpatory in practice.
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