Life Under Compulsion: Ten Ways to Destroy the Humanity of Your Child by Anthony Esolen

Life Under Compulsion: Ten Ways to Destroy the Humanity of Your Child Reviews

• 
  Daniel Moss

  Because of the way Esolen uses classic literary texts and poems to setup his greater point, there were times when reading this book I thought: "Get on with it! What's your point? What's the compulsion you're leading me to a greater understanding of?" And I say to you, reader of this review, that Esolen is a genius in making his reader think this. It's a trap, a good one, one that when snared by it the reader realizes that he too is what Esolen calls a "mass man"; that is, a man who, in my words, remains surface-level and is in constant pursuit of stimulation.
  
  Make no mistake, this is not a book for kids. It's a book for those that are responsible for the type of institutions, environments, and parameters that kids experience. It's for you! It's a red pill. Take the pill, and realize that you're in the rat-race, you're on the hamster wheel, you're a slave to compulsions, and what's worse, you're kids are - and it's hurting them.
  
  The following is a post I wanted to share on Facebook but, unfortunately, it's the kind of post that "mass man" can't handle and would in all likelihood get aggressive over. So, choosing not to upset all my Facebook peeps, I've decided to attach it to this review. By the way, Esolen has something to say about that too: "...where people cannot speak the truth, because the force of mass compulsions makes it dangerous or even inconceivable, there can be no real friendship."
  
  Facebook Post:
  
  ----
  This book has forced me to take inventory of my life. I find myself truly questioning the type of father I am, the type of husband, and friend. I feel convicted, strengthened, and refreshed simultaneously. There's a lot about me that can use some tweaking. But when it comes to the shared passage below, and many of the themes of this book, my heart is speared as I see so many people I care about making evident through Facebook that they are indeed "mass men" to some degree or another.
  
  As I scroll through my feed and see click bait luring folks to learn what food Tom Brady is willing to eat if Holzhauer loses on Jeopardy (So exciting!). I see mind-numbing arguments on both sides of the abortion debate; some better than others, but nothing regarding UNDER-the-surface concepts of federalism or common law. I see constant mention of sports and TV shows; nothing on great books (prooftexted scripture aside). I see posts of adults cheering on kids - who probably spend more time with their phones than their loved ones - for earning awards at school; welcome to the mass, young one! I see progressivism and pragmatism dominating almost all Facebook discourse; both of which are nothing more than opinions, turned ideology, turned religion.
  
  Enjoy the snippet...
  
  "Mass man has no culture, no real home, no transcendent object of devotion, no aim but what is given to him in and through mass education, mass entertainment, and mass politics. He floats on the seas willy-nilly, like a jellyfish, without a mind and a North Star to guide him. He gives in, he goes along. He lives, easily and uneventfully, Life Under Compulsion."
  
  End Facebook Post
  ------
  
  Now, I will say that there are certain things Esolen says that I disagree with. At one point Esolen says that freedom, which he defines as "fullness of heart" or love, implies hierarchy, or more specifically: government. I think this is the classic case of confusing freedom from interference with libertinism. It's a non-sequitur to suggest that freedom of interference leads to a libertine lifestyle. Much more can be said about this particular things, but I won't dwell on it.
  
  Another thing I noticed, (this is not so much what he said, but what he didn't say) is that he doesn't make mention of the ways in which government creates the incentives for the kinds of compulsions mentioned in the book. In other words, I would argue that many of the compulsions, nasty as they are, exist because government brings them into existence through inflationary monetary policy, warring, crony capitalism, and authoritarianism, which has destroyed the family, the community, and the central place that churches historically played in both. This destruction has created a great void, which has lead to the compulsions that "mass man" feels.
  
  Overall, I'd give this book a 4.5/5. It's heartfelt, cutting (in a good way), and timely.
• 
  Amy

  Contrary to the title, this book is not just for parents, but for anyone interested in restoring sanity and grace to her life, especially if she is a little too cozy with facebook or twitter. I love a book that challenges me to think about things in a different way, to see things as I had not seen them before--in this case, all the compulsions that crowd my life, and what they might be doing to interfere with my freedom (for the opposite of compulsion is freedom). So many good things to think about in here. Plus Esolen quotes Jacques Maritain, which earns him an extra star from this philosophy major. He weaves references to literature, art, and even the "Twilight Zone" into his writing, and I am glad to have ideas for more authors to read (like Sigrid Undset--how have I missed her?). In the end, one is left with hope, and gratitude.
• 
  Amelia Jones

  "In a good home, a true home, people do not merely eat and sleep, or pursue their private interests behind closed doors; they dwell with one another and for one another. A home is like a church, as G. K. Chesterton would put it: bigger on the inside than on the outside. The farther you fly, comet-like, from the gravitational pull of home, the more you must submit to all the arbitrary edicts of the social machine." Anthony Esolen in the chapter "Fleeing the Family": Life Under Compulsion
  
  Esolen's vision of the home and the God-given role of man is so good.
• 
  Stef

  if you read only one book this year, make this IT.
• 
  Luke Deacon

  Founded on the premise that virtue leads to freedom and vice to compulsion, Esolen’s book is a magnificent and delightful celebration of the abundance of a well-lived life. The way the modern world functions (from schools to politics to technology) pushes us towards a Life lived Under Compulsion - flitting from this commitment to that event to the other meeting on our busy schedules. We leave no time for the cultivation of virtue, for the building of family life, for the delight in simply Being. Ultimately, we have forgotten how to be human. Some favourite commonplaces:
  
  To dismiss the essential for the ephemeral is to introduce dementia into a nation or what remains of a culture. (54)
  
  On this matter the great pagans and the Christians, the poets and the philosophers, speak with one voice. The soul in love grows wings, and this is actually the purpose of a truly human education. Freedom [is] the unimpeded capacity of a creature to make real the fulfillment that is built into its very nature... what enslaves us is not the will of another but our own will when we turn to vice. (21)
  
  This "work of culture" springs from the haven of the home, and no number of titanic sculptures in a public square can make up for it. Paul blames men for the loss, because they allow women who are indispensable as culture makers in the home to become dispensable and interchangeable in the workplace. (65)
  
  We cannot educate young people, because we no longer understand what people are for. (79)
  
  In a single breathtaking contradiction, proclaim your liberty to do the evil you please and your having been compelled to it by the way you were born or how you were raised. Say in one sentence that you are free and that you can do no otherwise. (109)
  
  Manhood is mocked, although women are praised mainly for impersonating it. (123)
  
  The New Pharisee, in bondage to one favorite sin or another, demands judgment in favor of the sin. In the new dispensation, we are justified not by what we do but by our thinking and saying the approved thing about what other people do, particularly if that approved thing is itself wrong. We are compelled to condone. (137)
  
  He who sins is a slave to sin. We have become the slaves of slaves. (140)
  
  The libido dominandi makes common cause with the dominium libidinis. (147)
  
  The computer, like the television, blares forth the present and buries the past. The wise and morose Preacher warns us that there is nothing new under the sun; the screen fairly shouts that there are only new things under the sun. (148)
  
  While the smug are nervously trammeled up in their self-opinion, the humble are free to rejoice in what is genuinely great or noble or beautiful. (150)
  
  The family can thrive only when the sexual powers are restrained and disciplined and held accountable to those realities that toddle about and are called “children.” Therefore the family, since the time of Plato, has ever and correctly been seen as the first thing to be eradicated if the state is to assume its godlike role. (168)
  
  When was the last time you heard that every law we pass, every ship we sail, every mine we dig, every tower we build, and every war we fight, we do so ultimately so that a woman can rock her child to sleep within the profound haven of steadfast married love? Has it not been the reverse? Have we not said instead that women should have children–if they feel like it–because we are going to need the lawyers, sailors, miners, construction workers, and soldiers? (173)
  
  You can no more cut yourself off from mankind than you can stand on air. You must join them in love, freely given, or be joined to them by compulsions, whether you like it or not. (188-189)
  
  We sow something more destructive than differences. We sow indifferences. (199)
• 
  Matt Simmons

  A very, very Roman Catholic, Thomist, natural law-driven version of the critique made by Wendell Berry, G. K. Chesterton, C.S. Lewis, the Nashville Agrarians, and, in a way, Michel Houllebecq, amongst others: Western man's putative 'freedom' is not truly liberating, but rather merely license to indulge in things our cultural, economic, and political elites compel us into believing we must indulge in. Though he never mentions them, Esolen's critique suggests that the classic mid-20th century dystopias created by Bradbury, Orwell, and Huxley are, indeed, correct assessments of modern man; we take our soma and think we are fulfilled, not realizing that our freedom is our slavery, not recognizing that in denying all the things that circumscribe and announce human existence as finite, we have lost the very things that make us truly human and provide for us intermediaries for approaching the infinite and transcendent.
  
  Esolen doesn't write with the élan of Chesterton, the poetry of Berry, the withering brutality (and nigh-pornography) of Houllebecq, the black comedy of Walker Percy--but he writes in a tradition in which they, and so many other, serious writers have participated in over the last hundred years. And, if one is put off by Esolen's strident anti-progressivism or his ardent Roman Catholicism, one is perhaps better suited to read one of those other critics. Nevertheless, Esolen produces a lucid, compelling, offensive, overly-earnest, and damning assessment of our modern (notice I say modern, not 'contemporary') malaise: that we, libido-driven cogs in the neoliberal machine, confuse an existentially-deadening licentiousness and consumerism with the freedom of meaning, home, wonder, and awe at existence.
• 
  Trace

  I'm thinking that this might be the best book I've read all year - definitely one of the very best!! Not just for parents as the title suggests - but really recommended reading for everyone.
• 
  Michael Fitzgerald

  It was not long ago that this would have been firmly in the realm of speculative fiction. How quickly things change.
• 
  Bennett

  Challenging read, like all of Esolen's books. Richly textured, a goldmine of references for further reading. Quotable in his own right, on every other page. If you've never read him, please do. Start with Ten Ways to Ruin the Imagination of your Children.
• 
  Rory Fox

  I didn’t enjoy this book. It makes some fair points but it is a wordy read, and simplistic to the point of oversimplifying.
  
  Some points are well made. Chapter 5 tells us that there is a problem with the objectification of sexuality in society. Yes. And some Sex Education programmes may indeed end up being Sex Promotion ones. Points like that are clearly made, and are clearly worth thinking about.
  
  But the majority of the book seemed to be a nostalgic bemoaning of the modern age. Every age thinks things were better in the good old days. Even the Romans did. So, when that is the premise for the book it raises some obvious questions about biases and perspectives.
  
  The central idea of the book seemed to be a claim that we have the wrong concept of freedom. We focus on a licentious freedom ‘from’ rather than a rightful freedom ‘for’ (6%). There may be elements of truth in that, but it is also an issue which many ages have grappled with. Almost a thousand years ago Dominicans and Franciscans debated the same kinds of issues. And they found that they are much harder to separate than initially seems the case.
  
  Communism (and some versions of socialism) can be argued as enabling freedoms ‘for’ as they try to remove the work, housing, health (etc) debilitations that prevent people exercising their other freedoms. Yet the author clearly isn’t in sympathy with that kind of freedom for. This suggests that merely distinguishing between a freedom from and a freedom for is too simplistic.
  
  In much of the rest of the book there is criticism, but with little by way of suggested alternative. We hear that schools and school curricular are wrong. But what would a right one look like? The author clearly wants to see more Classics in the curriculum, to prompt imagination; and less Sciences and Technology. But is that just an unfair stereotyping? And do we really want to go back to a yesteryear curriculum, with yesteryear’s medicine and mortality rates?
  
  And why should Sciences and technologies be branded as having less scope for imagination than the classics. Great Scientists like Einstein, Tesla, (etc) all report insights coming in day dreams and imaginative leaps. The Benzene ring was discovered staring into a fire and imagining a snake biting its tale. The periodic table came together in a dream. Its just too simplistic to contrast a good imaginative classics, with a bad brain numbing technological education.
  
  In places the ‘olde worlde’ nostalgia tips over into an arguable sexism. The author complains about the thought police who insist that ‘thou shalt not think that women should not be soldiers’ (59%). To which the obvious rejoinder is why indeed shouldn’t they? Is the problem that it is the thin edge of the wedge for those who want to see women controlled by fathers and husbands… like in the old days (?).
  
  The author thinks that none of the things demanded by the thought police ‘has the power to make us good’ (59%). That's arguable but perhaps some of what they are demanding has the power to prevent us from being bad (or, at least, worse) than we otherwise would be? Once again, the issues are far more complex than they are portrayed, so that conclusions are oversimplified.
  
  Overall, this is not a book which I would recommend.
  
• 
  Josiah DeGraaf

  Despite the title, this book really has nothing to do with child-rearing. It has everything to do with what it means to be human.
  
  Esolen has a good way with words and makes a lot of interesting and helpful points in this book. I particularly liked his discussion of how the meaning of the word "rhetoric" has changed over the past century or so, and he also made a lot of good points on what true compulsion actually is. There was a lot of underlining done in this book.
  
  That being said, I felt like Esolen fell into the trap of idealized agrarianism that people have been following into since Virgil (and before Virgil as well). Technology and urban life aren't that bad. Agrarian life isn't the romantic, idealized version you're painting. While I read a lot about how technology affects us and certainly agree on the dangers, I felt like Esolen painted with too broad strokes in his bashing of technology and idealization (or perhaps idolization?) of rural life.
  
  On a similar train of thought, you kind of need to agree with Esolen's basic points already in order to enjoy this book. While I liked a lot of this, I don't think Esolen would be persuasive to someone who didn't already agree with him since he brushes off objections aside too quickly and is pretty dismissive of alternate viewpoints. If you're not already gung-ho about the classical paradigm and all that entails, this probably isn't the book for you.
  
  The book also felt a bit repetitive by the end and could have been shortened by 20% without losing much.
  
  Overall, Esolen is really good at painting a beautiful picture of what he believes the ideal life looks like, but not really effective at making a case for it (at least in this book). I enjoyed the parts where I was already in agreement with him since he cast it in a new, appealing light, but where I disagreed with him, it felt like he painted with too-broad strokes and idealized things.
  
  Rating: 3.5 Stars (Good).
• 
  Laura

  You... probably shouldn't read this book.
  
  It almost offended me every once in awhile, and I'm pretty conservative. Esolen is like the Jon Stewart of conservatives. It's that level of snark, only turned against those who live without God, those whom he considers "a commuter at best, or a tourist, or a prisoner" riding on the bus of Evolutionary Progress or The Right Side of History or whatever other contemporary brand of self-assurance might seem to offer purpose and meaning to life without God.
  
  And yet, I was continually in awe of Esolen's knowledge of history. I read so few books that appeal to historical precedent with such confidence, and even fewer books where Shakespeare is quoted so casually, so perfectly, and so frequently. Perhaps the best way I can describe Esolen's work is to say that he unplugs all the buzzing machinery of the current age, and you can suddenly hear the quiet hum of crickets again. Esolen is trying to strip away the distractions and get to the simple core of what it means to be alive.
  
  I kept wanting to put it down, but I kept picking it back up again, curious to see what he would tackle next with his sometimes clever and sometimes scathing critiques. It was refreshing at times, bracing at others, and downright irritating on occasion, too.
  
  If you believe that Conservative is a code word for ignorant, selfish, or uneducated, perhaps Esolen will change your mind? But I think he's probably too bellicose to really speak to anyone who is outside of his fold. (I send my kids to public schools, and he dismisses this as an option in pretty much every chapter, so I'm certainly out.) Read it for curiosity, read it for shock value (which seems obvious given the title), but just don't expect to get many solutions out of him. He's just here to ridicule.
• 
  Drew Norwood

  Esolen's book helps us answer important questions which face all parents in our day: "How to raise children who can sit with a good book and read? Who are moved by beauty? . . . Who have no compulsions--who don't have to attend to the constant buzzing of a smartphone, or click on the next link and the next link, or buy the latest gadget, or submit to the instant urge?"
  
  He begins by discussing the concept of freedom, and highlighting the fact that freedom is not primarily a negative concept (freedom from), it is, more importantly, a positive concept (freedom to).  Based on this understanding, he walks through several spheres of life (education, work, the home, history, literature, etc.) and shows how we might avoid life under compulsion. He barely scratches the surface on each of these topics. He seems to be more interested in encouraging the reader to start thinking about these things, and less about persuading of any specific thesis or leading you to a plan of action.
  
  As to the negative aspects, the book could have been better organized. Esolen has so much he'd like to say that he often strays into tangents. It's also not clear exactly who this book is addressed to. Immediately, I thought it was for parents (based not he title and the introduction), but as the book moves on it becomes less cohesive. Much of the book is not really directed to parents, or to children, but rather for people in general.
  
  We live in an ungodly age, and our children, if we allow it, will be gently led into a life of worldly compulsion, a life where their base, selfish desires are nourished and encouraged. This is no less true for us adults. Because cultural influence is subtle, it's incumbent on parents to understand how their kids are being influenced, that we might order our way rightly (Psalm 50:23). 
• 
  SiSApis

  Better than _Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child_; largely because Esolen drops the facetious (Screwtape-ian) concept of the earlier work and here shares his thoughts more directly and genuinely. Esolen's thoughts are a pleasure to spend time with; not since Neil Postman has cultural commentary been presented with such excellence of both observation and expression. Although he wobbles here and there (he can't resist an infrequent disparaging remark about climate change, for example), it is a wonder to experience this beautifully-disciplined mind treading the tightrope that the "narrow way" has become in this, our last days. Indeed, as when we watch the accomplished tightrope walker ply her hazardous art, the occasional wobble reminds us that she is only a mere mortal, a person just like us, and raises our appreciation of what she has been able to accomplish, and raises our own estimation, perhaps, regarding what we, too, might accomplish, with courage and dedication. So with Esolen's work. And although the overall content is generally sobering--even deeply sad--it is a comfort at least to know that we are not alone, and to be instructed in what freedom truly consists of in this culture of slavery ("compulsion").
• 
  Winston Elliott III

  Anthony Esolen challenges the reader to live a life of true freedom. Many Americans today worship "liberty" as a religion of choice. Esolen encourages the reader to avoid using "freedom/liberty" as abstract "virtue" terms as most do in the modern understanding where these terms are almost universally meant as choice without government compulsion, without the greater responsibility of moral duty. This concept of "liberty/freedom" is in direct contradiction to an understanding of the dignity of the human person. Reading this very fine book will help us to define liberty as including a substantive understanding of the human person as a creature of the Creator. Without that "freedom" is just another utilitarian path to the inferno.
  
  Dr. Esolen is a marvelous story teller and illuminates the way that we, and our children, may make to a fuller humanity through literature, art, and a well appreciated re-found leisure. This is a book to aid us as parents and educators as we seek to offer children the love of God found in family and faith. There is Hope in a fallen world, it is to be found in truth, beauty and goodness, the gifts of our Creator. In gratitude, let us pray.
  
  
• 
  Katie Fitzgerald

  Anthony Esolen is a conservative Catholic college professor and social commentator whose blog posts and articles about topics such as free speech have been very interesting to me following the 2016 election. In this book (published in 2015), Esolen uses lovely allusions to classic works of literature to build compelling arguments against much of the political correctness, revisionist history, and cultural corruption he observes in the US. He writes beautifully, confidently and passionately about the need for parents to protect their children from the influences of a Godless relativistic culture, and I found myself nodding along as I read, thrilled to have someone articulate so simply what has been bothering me for a long time. Esolen is a brilliant writer and thinker, and whether you have kids or not, this book is worth reading. I've heard that his 2010 book
  Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child is even better, and I can't wait to read that next!
• 
  Ietrio

  Wow! I usually do not read the marketing junk associated with a book. Sometimes, like in this case, it might be a mistake. This is a fundamentalist book about terrorizing the young. Talking about semantics: compulsion is the word for choice, the same way as freedom is the only freedom a backward individual with imaginary friends can have: the freedom to obey. Scary text. Humanity means the state of a tame pet.
• 
  Kelly

  Esolen analyzes modern culture in this thought-provoking and sometimes heart-wrenching book, describing what an ideal culture might look like and how far modern culture is from that ideal. A Lewis-like wandering writing style was my only complaint, but otherwise this book is well worth the read.
• 
  Aimee

  Every parent needs to read this one!!
  
• 
  Ed Lang

  A masterpiece.
• 
  Scott Kennedy

  In the introduction, Esolen explains his purpose: “I believe we are bringing our children up not for the freedom we enjoy but for the compulsions we suffer. Some of those compulsions we even mistake for freedom, so that the more of them we win, the more tightly we bind ourselves, body and soul.” Freedom according to Esolen is what Aquinas defined as not doing what one pleases, but realizing the fulfilment of your natural and created being, without impediments. Man’s nature should drive him toward love and truth. This is freedom; freedom for, not freedom from. Pinocchio is most the puppet and not a real boy when he goes his own way in heedlessness and folly!
  
  Esolen identifies that compulsions that enslave our children come from without and within. From without examples include government mandates determining what children are to be taught, how they are taught, and what they are allowed to eat in schools. Examples of from within compulsion are seen in the way we must respond to our cell phone buzzing, we must buy this latest vanity and so on.
  
  In his chapter on the school, Esolen makes the point that school is not for teaching children but for socializing children. This is striking, because one of the most common questions asked of people like my wife and I about homeschooling, is “How do you make sure your children are socialized?” The stupid thing is, what how do we think people were socialized before there was free public education – by their families and communities of course! He also investigate the way we are forgetting how to think, and talks about Newspeak (see Orwell’s 1984). Thus, writes Esolen, “You must think yourself into believing that there is a developing child in Sally’s womb, because Sally wants it, but only a parasitic blob in Sandy’s womb, because Sandy does not. Indeed, you must believe that it can alter its being at the whim of the mother, from child to blob or from blob to child, depending upon her state of mind at the moment. You must believe that what is obviously human is not human, and what is obviously alive is not alive. You must call things by improper names: birth control instead of birth prevention, clinic instead of abattoir. The blaring propaganda of the radio and the television screen assists you in this slow intellectual suicide.”
  
  As in his other books, Esolen will probably offend feminists and modernists who do not see the immense value of a woman making a home. And at this point I have to share a classic quote that Esolen introduced in his chapter on work. “Millions of women rose up, said G.K. Chesterton, to declare that they would no longer be dictated to, and promptly became stenographers.” Of women in work, he writes, “In other words, you are free if you must show up at a certain place at a certain time, to do a certain well-defined and usually narrow thing, for a certain salary, or else be fired. You are not free if you are Ruth’s grandmother in the home, ordering her days as she sees fit, sometimes washing and cooking, sometimes painting, making clothing for her children, teaching them songs, telling them stories while weaving, and doing those things out of love. You are free if you push papers for a boss for nine hours a day or scrape the plaque from the teeth of strangers with bad breath. You are not free if you take the time to write enchanting letters. You are free if you deliver other people’s letters in a mailbag.”
  
  On the family he writes, “Now if the father cannot provide for his children, and if his countrymen are not willing to support him in his need, then the mother must earn a wage. Against her natural inclination she must leave the child….A merciful society would see to it that that happened as infrequently as possible by encouraging the formation of stable families, with fathers strongly committed to their wives and their children. We should want the father in the family so that the mother can be with the infant. We want the real freedom that the family brings.”
  
  Regarding the new trend to outsource child care to ‘professionals’ he writes, “This is a new thing in the history of the world: that children should spend most of their waking hours among people who do not love them and who, after a little time has passed, will not remember their names. I am not blaming the people who run the centers, just as I do not blame people who forget the names of the dogs they have housed in their kennels. I am blaming the very idea of the thing.”
  
  I can hear the objection, “But these centers are necessary if the mother, or in some cases the father is to go to work. If they are necessary, they are necessary evils. But most of the clients do not view them as such. They are seen as liberating the parent, for work, from the child. And that is a strange liberty indeed. It is a headlong race away from love, and peace, and the only real world there is. And it is paid for by subjecting the small child to clockwork and impersonality. Time to get up, time to eat, time to go to the center, time to nap, time for playing in the playground under strict supervision, time for everything but simply to be?”
  
  Regarding evil, Esolen writes, we are to tolerate much, forgive all, and condone nothing. We have to tolerate much sin, because we ourselves are sinners. Pretending perfection is hypocritical. No society can be perfect. Jesus tells us to forgive all sin done against us. Finally, we should never condone evil. We are commanded to be holy as our Father is holy.
  
  In the chapter entitled Giving In, Esolen quotes Romano Guardini who spoke of the era of ‘mass man’. In this era the individual is submerged beneath the masses, and man has no real culture, home and no aim, but what he is given through mass education, entertainment and politics. Paul Elmer More writes of this kind of situation, “The world is not contradicted with impunity, and he who sets himself against the world’s belief will have need of all a man’s endurance and all a man’s strength…[He] will find himself subjected to an intellectual isolation and contempt almost as terrible as the penalties of the inquisition, and quite as effective in producing a silent conformity. If a man doubts this, let him try, and learn. Submission to the philosophy of change is the real effeminacy; it is the virile part to react.” I think this is where we are at now. It’s time for Christians and those who care to stand against the madness of our modern world that is destroying our families and ultimately our culture.
• 
  Marissa

  I made the mistake of reading this back to back with Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child, so I will forever be mixing up which book something was said in 😂
  
  This one causes more introspection for how we are living our lives and what we can do on an individual level to restore our own humanity, and preserve it in our children.
  
  I feel like I should come back and reread this, after reading all the books he references that I haven’t read yet (like Paradise Lost, Divine Comedy, and Phaedrus).
• 
  Danika Ybanez

  Loved the definition of freedom Esolen builds on in this book -- a great-heartedness that gives of oneself. He sums it up best: "Someone asks me, 'What is our life on earth for?' I would answer, 'It is for life in abundance, before the face of God.' " (p.197)
• 
  Robert W Luhrs Jr.

  Everything Esolen writes should be read by everyone.