Tea at Trianon: Please...

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Please...

Do not try to learn history from Glenn Beck. Share

4 comments:

MadMonarchist said...: I agree with Glenn Beck on a great many things but when it comes to history (especially regarding Europe) and religion -not so much. It is worth pointing out that he is a Mormon and a former Catholic. Most former Catholics obviously do not have a favorable view of the Church and, though this is just a guess, the suicide of his mother might have had something to do with it. I have known a number of people and families who have left the Church because of the reaction to the suicide of a loved one.

I don't hear much of this type of history from him, ordinarily my disagreements with him involve the over-simplification of early US history. Such as, acting as though the British were anti-all religion but the CofE whereas dissenting Protestants had been tolerated for quite some time and numerous restrictions against Catholics were lifted by none other than King George III (so much so that some in Britain feared he might be 'going Roman'). It was the colonial agitators who regarded the Quebec Act, giving religious freedom to Catholics, as one of the "Intolerable Acts" and of course without the help of the Catholic King of France the USA would never have survived. The image he likes to give of the colonial patriots also does not jive with such things as the "Tory Act" which, if anyone would bother to read, sounds more like the sort of thing Beck would furiously condemn were it to come from Obama and be targeted at, say, the Tea Party people.; June 10, 2010 at 4:39:00 AM EDT
elena maria vidal said...: Thank you, MM, for the excellent points. I agree with Glenn Beck on some things, too, but it is creepy to me how he has the giant words FAITH, HOPE, and CHARITY emblazoned beneath the pictures of Samuel Adams, George Washington and Ben Franklin. This is the pseudo-religion of Americanism, condemned by the Church.; June 10, 2010 at 8:25:00 AM EDT
MadMonarchist said...: I agree, and I also do not like the numerous comments about the Constitution being "divinely inspired" etc. I am fairly picky about what written works I regard as coming from God. As for the those pictures, oddly enough for a monarchist perhaps, it made me think of the warning, "put not thy faith in princes".; June 10, 2010 at 11:48:00 AM EDT
elena maria vidal said...: That's what it made me think of, too....; June 10, 2010 at 11:52:00 AM EDT