Tea at Trianon: In the Spirit of St Dominic

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

Friday, August 8, 2025

In the Spirit of St Dominic

From Blackfriars:

He passed through the South of France, where many people had abandoned the Catholic faith for the teachings of the Cathars. The Cathars taught that there were two gods, one good and one evil, and that this material world was created by the evil god. And, so, this material world was in itself evil, through and through. Dominic stayed at an inn, where the innkeeper was a Cathar. It was out of his compassion for this man that Dominic spent the whole night trying to persuade him of the Christian truths of God and creation.

Dominic easily perceived that Catharism was mistaken about these things, but he also saw how dangerous its errors could be for people, while Christianity taught that this material world, including our bodies, were good, the creation of one good God. St Dominic did not live in an artificial distinction between theology and living faith. He studied and preached, but also lived a life of heroic virtue. (Read more.)

My book on the Cathars, HERE.