The good is, like nature, an immense landscape in which man advances through centuries of exploration.

To be surprised, to wonder, is to begin to understand.

The characteristic of the hour is that the commonplace mind, knowing itself to be commonplace, has the assurance to proclaim the rights of the commonplace and to impose them wherever it will.

We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.

Today's fathers are having a rough go being kindly portrayed in the media. Thank God, we do we have President Barack Obama for a national model. He both dotes on and takes a firm loving hand to our first-family daughters.

It's not just that individuals have lost faith in the integrity of their leaders, it's that they no longer believe society's most powerful institutions are acting in their interests.

Even if a unity of faith is not possible, a unity of love is.

At different points in my life, I had grappled with the idea of going into the priesthood - in high school or law school. Where it ends, I'm not quite sure. Perhaps it ends with death, grappling with one's spirituality.