Catholics From Italy

"Non è differenza da i grandi, a gli uomini privati, mentre che dormono."

"Gli scrittori maledici sono con molta più attentione letti, che non sono quelli che vanno adulandi."

"Tanto nuoce il voler pigliare occasione troppo acerba, quanto lasciarla maturar troppo."

"Ogni stato, come s’è detto, dee haver desiderio di pace, e fame con l’opere e con le parole dimostratione, ma con tutto ciò ne gli apparati militari, dee mostrarsi bellicoso, percioche la pace non armata è debole."

"L’haver buone leggi è nato, come dice il proverbio, da cattivi costumi."

"Quanto più i luoghi son forti, tanto dee il principe esser più accurato in guardargli, perciochè non si sta da parte alcuna iu maggior pericolo, che da quella, d’onde gli par esser sicuro."

"Chi ha nimici potenti, dee per salvar se et ofTender loro, credere ferniamente due cose, verso di se contrarie; l’una che sieno arditi e prudenti, l’altra che con tutta la prudenza loro possano essi parimente errare."

"Non è cosa che voglia tutta la diligenza dell’ uomo e che meno patisca gli errori, etiandio piccoli, quanto fa la guerra."

"(talking about his children) I'm interested in avoiding two types of behaviour: one is the sense of guilt and the other is a sense of entitlement. If these two are avoided, then the rest is up to them."

"In moments of crisis, when you don't really know where things are going, I need to have trusted contacts. He's one of them."

"John spends a lot of time, in a very thoughtful and deliberate way, forming his opinions and then considering how these future trends are going to affect his companies. It's not surprising that he does this, but I'd say the quality with which he does it is very impressive."

"Re-structuring and modernizing a media business in the current environment is a challenge; if anybody can make it work in Italy, that is John. He has vision with no illusion, a great passion for Italy, a set of principles rooted in tradition, which helps him being an innovator, and has a great business sense about opportunities.” Robert Thomson La Dolce Vita dei Media, Air Mail, October 2020."

"John was in exactly the right place at the right time to understand manufacturing at its deepest level — at a cellular level. His apprenticeship culminated in an insight that was critical to Fiat’s survival. He noticed a persistent gap between what happens on the factory floor of, say, a headlight plant in Birmingham, and what information filters up to headquarters."

"He is extremely intelligent and has a great sense of responsibility. I've seen, in the past few years, he has managed several crises with extreme dignity and wisdom."

"The advice to young people is, first of all, they need to be optimistic about the future because the future is theirs and they have the responsibility of building that future. And that's not daunting, it's exciting. On a more practical, I think the advice that my grandfather gave me remains true. To listen and ask questions, and in some ways curiosity and learning are really what you need to start young at."

"A great CEO is someone who's really interested in the job, not the title. And who's really interested in competing in the pure sense of what it means, and really likes not only the company, but likes the people with whom he works. A great CEO is also someone who has the ability of thinking long term, but also acting now. Being strategic, but yet being operational."

"Responsibility is something that you have. And I've, I've personally always felt responsible, felt responsible since a very, very early age as we were growing up in many different countries and we had divorced parents and were very much very close to my siblings. And always trying to be responsible in school settings, sport settings and taking on responsibility was definitely something that I always was drawn to. Difficulties are the moments in which you can show courage and you can show responsibility for others. And over the course of more than 20, so getting close to 30 years, that I've been involved as a director of Fiat back in 1997, there have been many moments of time where that responsibility was acted on."

"Artists have a sensibility that others don't have. They have a way of reading into the future."

"I learnt not to be desperate in bad times, and I am learning not to be bullish when times are good."

"The lesson I have learnt is that when a family and a business function, they function together. You have to have a family that works and a business that works and the two will end up working well alongside."

"As an entrepreneur you have responsibilities in trying to operate well in what you have to do. There is a positive effect if you end up doing that. That’s where I try to spend most of my efforts."

"I am a big believer of what Darwin discovered in the Galapagos, proving that the species most responsive to change will survive over apparently stronger or more intelligent competitors."

"I was born in New York, then I went to the UK, then I went to Brazil, then I went to France, then I studied in Italy. My life was always about being confronted with an environment where you had to adapt."

"Many things are linked to being able to live with uncertainty, ...with paradoxes. But this can be a strength of an organisation and a situation."

"LaStampa has always been a free newspaper because of its economical sustainability, and we're proud of it. It's the only way for a newspaper to be independent."

"Today Gianni would be disappointed as all we Ferrari fans are. But I am optimistic because we have two young drivers: they are not 'used to winning' but they have a great desire to 'train to win' with their humility and determination, they are infecting the whole team with this."

"We have been reflecting on the journey we have taken since the foundation of FIAT back in 1899 because, though we are proud of our past achievements, we are most interested in what we can learn from them, and also what we can learn from our mistakes."

"Juventus is a great love, and this is its secret. A love from everyone, and obviously from my family, which is passed down from generation to generation; these colors are part of my children's lives too."

"To me, technology serves as an answer to the curiosity of humans. Looking back to history, human curiosity has driven progress, increased awareness, and knowledge, ultimately leading to the discovery of new applications that we now define as technology."

"The reason why I entered into a religious order is this: first, the great misery of the world, the wickedness of men, the rapes, the adulteries, the thefts, the pride, the idolatry, the vile curses, for the world has come to such a state that one can no longer find anyone who does good; so much so that many times every day I would sing this verse with tears in my eyes: Alas, flee from cruel lands, flee from the shores of the greedy. I did this because I could not stand the great wickedness of the blind people of Italy, especially when I saw that virtue had been completely cast down and vice raised up."

"Colui che scomunica me scomunica Dio."

"Ecce gladius Domini super terram, cito et velociter."

"Savonarola was not merely the expounder of righteousness. He claimed to be a prophet revealing things which, to use his own words, "are beyond the scope of the knowledge which is natural to any creature." This element would have been a sign of weakness, if it had not been associated with a great personality, bent on noble ends. The severity of his warnings was often so fearful that the preacher himself shrank back from delivering them. On one occasion, he spent the entire night in vigils and prayer that he might be released from the duty of making known a message, but in vain. The sermon, he then went forth to preach, he called a terrific sermon."

"The preacher himself was burning with religious passion. He felt deeply and he was a man of deep devotion. He had the eye of the mystic and saw beneath the external and ritual to the inner movements of spiritual power. The biblical element was also a conspicuous feature of his preaching. Defective as Savonarola's exegesis was, the biblical element was everywhere in control of his thought and descriptions. … He insisted upon the authority of Scripture. "I preach the regeneration of the Church," he said, "taking the Scriptures as my sole guide.""

"The Italian Dominican friar Girolamo Savonarola was a reactionary zealot and bigoted theocrat who vehemently opposed the humanism of the Florentine Renaissance. His ‘Bonfire of the Vanities’ burned books and art he deemed ‘immoral’. Savonarola’s ‘Christian and religious republic’ was an intolerant, sanctimonius and murderous reign of terror. His very name is a synonym for mad monks, and the crimes of theocracy and misguided virtue."

"Dizzy flights of fancy abounded in Savonarola's discourses and took the place of calm and logical exposition. On the evening before he preached his last sermon in Advent, 1492, Savonarola beheld in the middle of the sky a hand holding a sword with the inscription, Behold the sword of the Lord will descend suddenly and quickly upon the earth — Ecce gladius Domini super terram cito et velociter. Suddenly the sword was turned toward the earth, the sky was darkened, swords, arrows and flames rained down. The heavens quaked with thunder and the world became a prey to famine and death. The vision was ended by a command to the preacher to make these things known. Again and again, in after years did he refer to this prophetic vision. Its memory was also preserved by a medal, representing on one side Savonarola and on the other a sword in the heavens held by a hand and pointing to a city beneath. The inscription on the heavenly sword well represents the style of Savonarola's preaching. It was impulsive, pictorial, eruptive, startling, not judicial and instructive. And yet it made a profound impression on men of different classes."

"The terrorism exercised by Savonarola and his adherents grew daily more and more intolerable. The prophet declared that no one could be a good Christian who did not believe in him."

"The best, and the worst, that can be said of the tempestuous friar is that he loved God so passionately that he had very little love left for man."

"Ee quello che volesse fare Parlamento sarà de' Signori, gli sia tagliato il capo; se è altri, sia ribelle e confiscatigli tutti i beni … che quando i Signori vogliono fare Parlamento … e ognuno li possa tagliare a pezzi senza pena."

"E fu in quel tempo che io montai quassù, e dissi che io non era mandato a predicarti da uomo del mondo, né da signore alcuno, ma da colui che è signore dei signori e dalla santa Trinità."

"Io vi conforto di convertirvi a Dio, vivere come è obbligato ogni buon cristiano, dolervi del passato e ridurvi alla pietà. Altrimenti, io vi annunzio che è sopra di voi imminente un gran flagello, e sarete flagellato nella roba, nella persona e nella casa vostra. Vi annunzio ancora, che della vostra vita ce n' è per poco; che, se non farete quel che vi dico, anderete nell'inferno; e questa lettera vi sarà presentata innanzi al tribunale di Dio, nè vi potrete scusare."

"I am the hailstorm that shall break the heads of those who do not take shelter."

"Elegance of language must give way before simplicity in preaching sound doctrine."

"Do you wish to be free? Then above all things, love God, love your neighbor, love one another, love the common weal; then you will have true liberty."

"God is the best helper, but He loves to be helped. Be earnest in prayer, but do not neglect human means. You must help yourself in all manner of ways, and then the Lord will be with you."

"The Pope may err, and that in two ways, either because he is erroneously informed, or from malice. As to the latter cause we leave that to the judgment of God, and believe rather that he has been misinformed. In our own case I can prove that he has been falsely persuaded. Therefore any one who obstinately upholds the excommunication and affirms that I ought not to preach these doctrines is fighting against the kingdom of Christ, and supporting the kingdom of Satan, and is himself a heretic, and deserves to be excluded from the Christian community."

"Science that abdicates its cultural values risks being perceived as an extension of technology, an instrument in the hands of political or economic power. Humanity that disavows science risks falling into the hands of superstition."

"Science is incapable of supplying answers to ultimate questions about why things exist and what their purpose is."

"È uno de' vantaggi di questo mondo, quello di poter odiare ed esser odiati, senza conoscersi."

"Non sempre ciò che vien dopo è progresso."