A reader is upset that his girlfriend has broken things off. He believes that his behavior was the cause of it, and has been trying to repair the perceived damage. He wonders if there is something he could have done, or should have done. Nothing is working out, however. We offer some opinions about the situation.
Continue reading
In this podcast we discuss H.G. Wells’s fable The Beautiful Suit. It was originally published in 1909 under the title A Moonlight Fable. You may never have heard of the story, but it imparts a powerful message. What does it mean? What is the author trying to communicate to his readers? And what lesson can we take from the tale, and incorporate into our own lives?
Continue reading
Recent events have encouraged, or should have encouraged, some reflection on general principles of conflict. In this podcast, we propose ten of them.
Continue reading
I had the privilege of doing a recent interview with Ms. Anya Leonard of Classical Wisdom, a publication that focuses on classical learning and education. The interview can be seen here:
Continue reading
In this podcast we discuss love, sloth, and free will in the context of Canto 18 of Dante’s Purgatorio. What is the nature of love, and how does it affect our souls? What is the true meaning of sloth? What place does free will have in our lives? We explore these questions.
Continue reading
We begin with a few recommendations on books and resources to use in understanding Dante’s Divine Comedy. Then we switch gears, and get into the meat of the podcast. It seems we become substantially different people every seven to ten years, more or less. We may feel self-conscious or uncomfortable about the things we said, wrote, or believed when we were younger. Is it normal to feel this way? And is it better to preserve a record of one’s thought, or to renounce beliefs one no longer holds? We discuss both sides of the question.
Continue reading
Rights and liberties that have been won by past generations will not remain won without active and forceful advocacy by successive generations. Why? Systems of power and control will inevitably regroup and counterattack, and seek to roll back the clock. This is happening all around us now. Those who are unwilling to assert their rights, and unwilling to protect what past generations earned, will find themselves stripped of their patrimony.
Continue reading
In an 1842 letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson, the Scottish writer Thomas Carlyle chastised Emerson, saying, “A man has no right to say to his generation, turning away from it, ‘Be Damned!’ It is the whole past and the whole future, this same cotton-spinning, dollar-hunting, canting and shrieking, very wretched generation of ours. Come back into it, I tell you.” What did he mean by this? And what importance does Carlyle’s admonition have for us today? It turns out that it has a great deal of importance. We discuss.
Continue reading
In this podcast I describe unforgettable images that have emerged from the aftermaths of certain battles. We discuss Livy’s description of the battlefield after Cannae, a scene in Dante, and an anecdote from the American Civil War.
Continue reading
In this podcast we take a quote from Seneca, discuss its meaning, and apply it to some modern life lessons.
Continue reading
Quintus Curtius 
You must be logged in to post a comment.