JAMES THOMSON

In Washington the semantics of the military muted the reality of war for the civilian policy-makers. In quiet, air-conditioned, thick-carpeted rooms, such terms as 'systematic pressure,' 'armed reconnaissance,' 'targets of opportunity,' and even 'body count' seemed to breed a sort of games-theory detachment.

The world rolls round forever like a mill; it grinds out death and life and good and ill; it has no purpose, heart or mind or will.

Rule, Britannia, rule the waves; Britons never will be slaves.

I know no subject more elevating, more amazing, more ready to the poetical enthusiasm, the philosophical reflection, and the moral sentiment than the works of nature. Where can we meet such variety, such beauty, such magnificence?

Ingratitude is treason to mankind.

For life is but a dream whose shapes return, some frequently, some seldom, some by night and some by day.

I think a bishop who doesn't give offence to anyone is probably not a good bishop.

When Britain first, at Heaven's command, Arose from out the azure main, This was the charter of the land, And guardian angels sung this strain: 'Rule, Britannia, rule the waves; Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.'

'Tis easier for the generous to forgive, than for offence to ask it.

That which makes people dissatisfied with their condition, is the chimerical idea they form of the happiness of others.

Health is the vital principle of bliss, and exercise, of health.

I know no subject more elevating, more amazing, more ready to the poetical enthusiasm, the philosophical reflection, and the moral sentiment than the works of nature. Where can we meet such variety, such beauty, such magnificence?

'Tis easier for the generous to forgive, than for offence to ask it.

Ingratitude is treason to mankind.

For life is but a dream whose shapes return, some frequently, some seldom, some by night and some by day.

But who can paint like Nature? Can imagination boast, amid its gay creation, hues like hers?

Rule, Britannia, rule the waves; Britons never will be slaves.

The world rolls round forever like a mill; it grinds out death and life and good and ill; it has no purpose, heart or mind or will.

Peace is the happy natural state of man; war is corruption and disgrace.

Statues and pictures and verse may be grand, But they are not the Life for which they stand.

More firm and sure the hand of courage strikes, when it obeys the watchful eye of caution.

I think a bishop who doesn't give offence to anyone is probably not a good bishop.

That which makes people dissatisfied with their condition, is the chimerical idea they form of the happiness of others.

When Britain first, at Heaven's command, Arose from out the azure main, This was the charter of the land, And guardian angels sung this strain: 'Rule, Britannia, rule the waves; Britons never, never, never shall be slaves.'

There is a final result of Vietnam policy I would cite that holds potential danger for the future of American foreign policy: the rise of a new breed of American ideologues who see Vietnam as the ultimate test of their doctrine. I have in mind those men in Washington who have given a new life to the missionary impulse in American foreign relations: who believe that this nation, in this era, has received a threefold endowment that can transform the world. As they see it, that endowment is composed of, first, our unsurpassed military might; second, our clear technological supremacy; and third, our allegedly invincible benevolence (our 'altruism,' our affluence, our lack of territorial aspirations). Together, it is argued, this threefold endowment provides us with the opportunity and the obligation to ease the nations of the earth toward modernization and stability: toward a full-fledged Pax Americana Technocratica. In reaching toward this goal, Vietnam is viewed as the last and crucial test. Once we have succeeded there, the road ahead is clear. In a sense, these men are our counterpart to the visionaries of Communism's radical left: they are technocracy's own Maoists. They do not govern Washington today. But their doctrine rides high.

In Washington the semantics of the military muted the reality of war for the civilian policy-makers. In quiet, air-conditioned, thick-carpeted rooms, such terms as 'systematic pressure,' 'armed reconnaissance,' 'targets of opportunity,' and even 'body count' seemed to breed a sort of games-theory detachment.