If you want to win murmurs of approval, quote Anatole France: “The whole art of teaching is only the art of awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards.” If you would like to evoke little gasps of admiration, follow up with Albert Einstein: “It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry.”
Sympathy is merciful compassion for the other person; empathy is feeling what the other person feels. These two are often confused. How often have you heard the cynical remark that Mary’s sympathy for Clara is superficial or insincere just because she doesn’t feel what Clara feels?
What we call the U.S. Constitution is really our second constitution. The first, drafted during the War of Independence, was called the Articles of Confederation. So the battle over the ratification of the Constitution was not over whether the thirteen colonies should unite, because they were already united. It was about how to improve their cooperation.
“Who can give it any definition which would not leave the utmost latitude for evasion? I hold it to be impracticable; and from this I infer, that its security, whatever fine declarations may be inserted in any constitution respecting it, must altogether depend on public opinion, and on the general spirit of the people and of the government.”
We interrupt this series of blog posts for an important announcement.
Yesterday I considered whether anything about God’s general providence can be gleaned apart from revelation, just by the use of natural reason. The more difficult case is His particular providence.
Can anything about God’s direction of history can be gleaned just by the use of natural reason, apart from revelation? Nobody seems to believe this anymore, but not so long ago almost every intelligent person did.
I’ve been asked whether yesterday’s post, “Blaming the Victim,” was about the student at Georgetown University who wrote after being mugged that it happened because people like him are “privileged.” He said that until there is economic equality, “we should get comfortable with sporadic muggings and break-ins. I can hardly blame them.”
No, I wasn’t commenting on him. At the time I wrote the post I hadn’t even heard of him.