Reprising this open letter Douglass wrote in 1848 to Thomas Auld, his former master, on the tenth anniversary of his escape from slavery to freedom. TO MY OLD MASTER. Thomas Auld, Sir: The long and intimate, though by no means friendly, relation which unhappily subsisted between you and myself, leads me to hope that you […]
Frederick Douglass’s letter to his former master Read More »
Reprising this series of quotations, collected over the years, on the theme of pessimism about the present in relation to the past: Plato, 360 BCE: “In that country [Egypt] arithmetical games have been invented for the use of mere children, which they learn as pleasure and amusement. I have late in life heard with amazement
The constant decline of civilization? Read More »
Reprising this post about the early death of Franz Schubert, the great lyrical composer of the early nineteenth century. He died at age 31. While his music is usually too melancholy for my taste, what a sadness. Franz was lucky to get that many years. Biographer Christoper Gibbs reports that Schubert’s parents had fourteen children
Franz Schubert’s early death Read More »
Refreshing this from Thomas Sowell’s classic Ethnic America: I am struck by this comparison he makes between the desperate state of the Irish peasantry in Ireland and the black slaves in America: “A French traveler in the early nineteenth century returned from a trip that included America and Ireland and wrote: ‘I have seen the
Irish peasants and black slaves Read More »
In his open letter to the Grand Duchess Christina (1615), Galileo offered a defense of science against the prevailing heavy hand of religious orthodoxy: “But I do not feel obliged to believe that that same God who has endowed us with senses, reason, and intellect has intended to forgo their use and by some other
Galileo’s modern compromise: Letting science work *with* religion Read More »
Reprising these reflections from reading Eric Axelson’s Congo to Cape: Early Portuguese Explorers. Always an interesting question to ask how great ventures begin: Why did they start when and where they did? Why were they initiated by those individuals or groups and not others? The circumnavigation of Africa was a great achievement over many decades.
Why did Portugal become a great exploring nation? Read More »
Reprising this about Mozart’s Abduction from the Seraglio [Die Entführung aus dem Serail], which has a charming scene indicating England’s eighteenth-century reputation in Europe as a land of liberty. A woman named Konstanze and her English servant Blonde have been abducted by pirates and sold to Pasha Selim. In Act II, the Pasha’s crude overseer,
English liberty and Mozart’s opera Read More »
Reprising this from when I read E. G. West’s fascinating Education and the Industrial Revolution, which is a powerful argument for the conclusion that … well, let’s first look at some data. Here’s a table comparing school enrollments in various parts of the world with enrollments in England and Wales a century earlier. The table