The military spirit does not mean obeying the strongest and wisest man. On the contrary, the military spirit means, if anything, obeying the weakest and stupidest man, obeying him merely because he is a man, and not a thousand men. Submission to a weak man is discipline. Submission to a strong man is only servility.

Most common things will be found to be highly complicated. Some men of science do indeed get over the difficulty by dealing only with the easy part of it: thus, they will call first love the instinct of sex, and the awe of death the instinct of self-preservation. But this is only getting over the difficulty of describing a peacock [plume] by calling it blue. There is blue in it… The materialists analyze the easy part, deny the hard part, and go home to their tea.

For an aristocracy is always progressive; it is a form of going the pace. Their parties grow later and later at night; for they are trying to live tomorrow.

In the modern world we are primarily confronted with the extraordinary spectacle of people turning to new ideals because the have not tried the old. Men have not got tired of Christianity; they have never found enough Christianity to get tired of. Men have not wearied of political justice; they have wearied of waiting for it.

The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.