I urge good men everywhere to read "The Woman Who was Poor" by Léon Bloy, a master of the art of darkness, which shows the ugliness of sin and illustrates its destructive consequences. His novel is indeed a masterpiece of the genre. It is said that all is necessary for the triumph of evil is [...]
Alexander Salter’s "The Political Economy of Distributism" is a much-needed scholarly work on the ideas of distributism, as presented in the writings of Hilaire Belloc and G.K. Chesterton. Written in such a way that it will pass muster in the ivory towers of academe, it is also accessible for any reader interested in politics and [...]
In a recent essay, Veronique de Rugy focuses her ire on Alexander Salter, author of a forthcoming book entitled "The Political Economy of Distributism." She apparently seeks to discredit the book by discrediting its author as an admirer of the "antisemitic" Hilaire Belloc. This is really all too silly to be taken seriously. We live [...]
Perhaps it could be argued that the English monarch is nothing but an effectively powerless figurehead and that, therefore, his or her words are of little consequence. The real power resides with Parliament, not with the Monarch. Not so, I would reply. Or at least not necessarily so. I honestly cannot remember the last time [...]
The story of Riccardo Bacchelli’s classic novel "The Gaze of Jesus" is seen through the eyes of one man who had suffered the gaze of Jesus and had suffered its consequences. The man in question is Ithamar, who is better known to readers of Scripture as the Gerasene demoniac, from whom Christ had exorcized the [...]
I discovered an old letter last week, hidden between the pages of an old book, the content of which has been haunting me ever since. It was addressed to me at an old address in Florida and I seem to have tucked it away for safekeeping. What I read astounded me as it contains revelations [...]
The sobering reality remains that this glorious world of life-after-death is not ours for the taking but only ours for the asking. If we will not ask to be admitted, we cannot enter. It is not ours by right but is offered as a gift. If we won’t accept the gift, we won’t be forced [...]
In a world where love is replaced with lust, the number of damsels in distress will increase. In such a world, we need to rescue our maidens from the dragons of the culture of death. In The Hobbit, Thorin Oakenshield gives Bilbo Baggins a beginner’s lesson on the nature of dragons, a sort of dragons for [...]
Shakespeare stands as a colossus who straddles the centuries. It is not merely that he has survived the test of time; it is that his plays, and the truth and morality contained within them, transcend time. He was not of an age, but for all time! —Ben Jonson on William Shakespeare These famous words of [...]
It is all too easy in the darkened days and daze in which we live to become despondent. It is all too easy to forget the happy ending that is promised to those who keep faith in the God of the happy ever after. We who are not dumb and witless do not always need [...]
The indomitable Jane Austen has no love for “Bloody” Mary, but it’s intriguing and amusing that she sees her in the light, or should we say the shadow, of “Bloody” Bess, who would be her successor. There is no denying Jane Austen’s status as one of the greatest novelists of all time. Her works are [...]
Throughout the centuries Spain has done more than any nation to fight the Long Defeat and, in her heroism, has shown us many fleeting glimpses of the Final Victory. The poet Roy Campbell declared that Spain was “a country to which I owe everything as having saved my soul.”[i] Received into the Catholic Church in [...]
George Orwell’s "1984" was so successful and so influential that he was seen as something of a prophet. This dystopian novel was considered a cautionary prophecy of what would come to pass if future generations ceased to be vigilant in the guarding of their freedom. Someone to claim us, someone to follow Someone to shame [...]
Having celebrated the “mere genius” of C.S. Lewis, the wise man will want to spend more time in his presence and will invite others to do likewise. He is, for those who know him, the best of friends and the wisest of guides. C.S. Lewis was no mere Christian, nor was he a “mere genius”. [...]