Read Literature to Learn and Love the Truth by Anthony Esolen

Read Literature to Learn and Love the Truth by Anthony Esolen

“Truth sometimes comes to us in a flannel shirt and denim trousers.” But only if we set our hearts upon the truth will we suspect that the farmer over there, who does not have sociological studies at his fingertips, is speaking it. The trick is to raise people who will not give the field over to the academics, the experts, the well-heeled recipients of grants for discovering what they knew they had damned well better discover in order to justify the grant. Academe is a cauldron of eels. It is stuffed full of poseurs and liars. The trick is to raise people sagacious enough to distinguish between a falsehood even if propped up by sophistication, and a truth even if naively or poorly expressed.

This guy writes of such beautiful ideas, I could almost cry for the sheer joy or reading his words.