The works of the great writers of the past are very beautiful even from without. And yet their visible beauty is sheer ugliness, compared with the be… - Leo Strauss

Political philosophy was concerned with the best or just order of society which is by nature best or just everywhere or always, while politics is concerned with the being and well-being of this or that particular society (a polis, a nation, an empire) that is in being at a given place for some time.

“Culture” means … the cultivation of the mind, the taking care and improving of the native faculties of the mind in accordance with the nature of the mind. Just as the soil needs cultivators of the soil, the mind needs teachers. But teachers are not as easy to come by as farmers. The teachers themselves are pupils and must be pupils. But there cannot be an infinite regress: ultimately there must be teachers who are not in turn pupils. Those teachers who are not in turn pupils are the great minds.

[T]hough in all practical matters it is indispensable, either always or mostly, to follow custom, to do what is generally done, in theoretical matters it is simply untrue. In practical matters there is a right of the first occupant: what is established must be respected. In theoretical matters this cannot be. Differently stated: The rule of practice is 'let sleeping dogs lie,' do not disturb the established. In theoretical matters the rule is 'do not let sleeping dogs lie.' Therefore, we cannot defer to precedent . . . .