Chaucer, like Homer, writes about a journey, but as a Christian he has a different goal. Homer wanted to go home, but Chaucer’s pilgrims want a place of man’s true home: paradise.

A culture will tolerate criticism of its idols only when the criticism is made by those who worship the idols.

Boethius moved from considering history from the actor’s point of view to a “timeless” eternal view. From the divine perspective, nothing is ever utterly lost, because all of life is possessed by God in the eternal now. Though time was gnawing away at Boethius and stealing all he valued, God was beyond time and loss. Gaining this philosophical vantage allowed the last Roman to become one of the first men of the Middle Ages.

For Aristotle, it’s not enough simply to act in accordance with the reason once in a while. We must cultivate habits of virtue that develop into a firmly established moral character over a lifetime.

Can we really fix ourselves? Can we really see what needs to be seen and do what needs to be done? Tolstoy suggests we can, even though the road will be long and arduous. He is Orthodox enough to see that humans are sinners in need of mercy, but not Orthodox enough to get to the root of the problem. The prophet does not plunge deeply enough into the human heart. Tolstoy was Christian enough to see that evil exists but not Orthodox enough to get to the root of the problem.

In the time of to Augustine, the conversation in the West mostly had been a Christian reaction to outside ideas. After Augustine, the Great Conversation would be about his ideas for centuries.

Boethius moved from considering history from the actor's point of view to a "timeless" eternal view. From the divine perspective, nothing is ever utterly lost, because all of life is possessed by God in the eternal now. Though time was gnawing away at Boethius and stealing all he valued, God was beyond time and loss. Gaining this philosophical vantage allowed the last Roman to become one of the first men of the Middle Ages.

Being will-read is not sufficient, and it isn't the highest virtue to which we can strive, but it is both necessary and practical. We are, after all, people of the Great Book; no Christian leader ought  to choose the illiteracy or intentionally fail to develop the  intellectual skills  needed to read well.

Plato understood love as a powerful engine that can destroy mankind or turn us to the good. Christ made that turn possible, and Spenser shows what can be done in the human soul if we take it.

I cannot recognize Christianity in his (Nietzsche's) rants against the church, but I do recognize too much of myself.