Tea at Trianon: Mistakes Men Make

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

Monday, June 2, 2014

Mistakes Men Make

From James Sama:

Holding your standards too high.

We all want the woman (or man) who we’ve drawn a photo of in our mind. The “perfect” partner. We are in a society of replacement. Phone screen broken? Get a new one. Computer running slow? Get a new one. You’ve had that iPad for 6 months? Here’s the next version.

It’s always more, and better. But the reality is, people aren’t consistently updated pieces of equipment, we are real life humans with real life feelings, and nobody is perfect (not even you).

No, you shouldn’t take this as a hint to settle for less than you deserve or enter into a relationship with someone you don’t truly have feelings for – but don’t spend so much energy searching for the “perfect” person, that you miss the person who is perfect for you. Because that’s what really counts. (Read more.)