I've just begun a walk with Paul Johnson through his book Modern Times, which conversative stroll should take us quite until Christmas. My ears are perpetually flabby yet thin, like an elephant's; I can listen to Mr Johnson for nine paragraphs at a stretch, then we find the shade to sit and rest the inner drums.
At the poolside today, I heard him say something brilliant (as a tiny diamond of sun-sparkle that dropt in my hand from an overhanging palm leaf): "It is a commonplace that men are excessively ruthless and cruel not as a rule out of avowed malice but from outraged righteousness" (14). He is speaking of European nations going to war in WWI, but it applies equally to all men of any time; Tim Keller says all religion leads to war, we seek to force our righteous agenda on another person, and we war with God ultimately, to show him what a good thing we are for him; our Sunday School teacher says that we must repent not only of sin but of our good deeds.
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