Just as the banqueteers are drunk from wine, the citizens are drunk from fears, hopes, desires, and aversions and are therefore in need of being rule… - Leo Strauss

Men must always have distinguished (e.g. in judicial matters) between hearsay and seeing with one’s own eyes and have preferred what one has seen to what he has merely heard from others. But the use of this distinction was originally limited to particular or subordinate matters. As regards the most weighty matters—the first things and the right way—the only source of knowledge was hearsay.

It is of the essence of traditions that they cover or conceal their humble foundations by erecting impressive edifices on them.

The problem inherent in the surface of things, and only in the surface of things, is the heart of things.