Quotes from William J. Bennett

Home is a shelter from storms — all sorts of storms.

Happiness is like a cat. If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you. It will never come. But if you pay no attention to it and go about your business, you'll find it rubbing up against your legs and jumping into your lap.

There are no menial jobs, only menial attitudes.

The essence of education is, in the words of William James, to teach a person what deserves to be valued, to impart ideals as well as knowledge, to cultivate in students the ability to distinguish the true and good from their counterfeits and the wisdom to prefer the former to the latter.

Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order

John Stuart Mill, the British philosopher, said, "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

American soldiers were dying in frigid Korea. One of our greatest generals told us that the president and his team were not trying to win. And some strident voices were saying that that was because they didn't want to win

While the Bible was the definitive reference point for settling questions of doctrine and practice, questions not clearly settled by Scripture that were of theological importance were numerous (and difficult), and churches could not always look to precedents in church history as a guide. The difficulty of resolving disputes is evident in an even more serious controversy from the late second century.

One good way to understand what conservatism is really about is to use the acronym FLINT to remember five core concepts: Free enterprise, Limited government, Individual liberty, National defense, and Traditional values. These five principles are a good summary of conservative thought in America today.

and line of cases. Justice Byron R. "Whizzer" White, a JFK appointee, dissented, calling Doe an act of "raw judicial power," as it took these decisions from the states and enshrined their determination in the Supreme Court's reasoning.

Simply put, war restores in man the belief that there are some things worth fighting and dying for; things like love, liberty, and faith.

Therefore we must give a certain character to our activities. . . . In short, the habits we form from childhood make no small difference, but rather they make all the difference.

The day Americans stop viewing explicit patriotism as a virtue and begin to view it as something "eccentric and foolish" is the day we cease to be a great country.

We Americans are so good at critiquing our own nation, so determined to make it better, that sometimes we neglect to acknowledge all that is wonderful about it. Let us not commit the sin of ingratitude for so many blessings.

Tis a lesson you should heed, Try, try again; If at first you don't succeed, Try, try again; Then your courage should appear, For, if you will persevere, You will conquer, never fear; Try, try again.

There is no end to the good you can do if you don't care who gets credit for it.

Mao would hardly be deterred by the universal condemnation of the civilized world. He saw Stalin as his model. In the agrarian reforms, Stalin had killed seven million; Mao himself killed an estimated forty million Chinese in his reforms.49

They will preach what we want them to preach," said Hitler's memo. "If any priest acts differently, we will make short work of him. The task of the priest is to keep the Poles quiet, stupid, and dull-witted.

That love, which fails of perfect utterance here, Lives on to fill the heavenly atmosphere With its immortal song.

This editorial appeared in The New York Times on June 14, 1940, to mark Flag Day, a holiday that seems to have fallen into neglect in more recent years. Flag Day commemorates the day in 1777 when the Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes as the official flag of the United States.

Hayek was never a popular author to the extent that everyone was reading him at the corner newsstand. But the Austrian refugee showed how the roots of Hitler's tyranny and the bases of Marxist collectivism were one and the same. His work had a profound influence on a generation of freedom loving young conservatives. Even

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.

United States military profession as early as 1863 in General Order number 100 of the United States Army Field Manual: "Men who take up arms against another in public war do not cease on this account to be moral beings responsible to one another." Individuals always remain ethically responsible for their actions, for the choices they make among conflicting moral obligations, as well as for the consequences which result from them.

He went back into his room to wait for his breakfast; and took up his book which he had been reading the night before, but the minute he touched it, it was solid gold. "I can't read it now," he said, "but of course it is far better to have it gold.