Slumming as Only Pharisees Can Do, by Anthony Esolen

“Tony,” said a high school friend to me, and he meant it, “you’ve got the brains and the good looks, but you don’t know how to dress.” That was in our Catholic school, and the boys all wore jackets and ties, and kept themselves clean-shaved, too, or else our good and wise Dean, Mr. Buzad, would call them into his office where they could perform that operation with an old razor and cold water.

That came just at the end of a time when boys and girls took some care to dress in a somewhat formal way, at all appropriate occasions, lest they embarrass themselves. I see now that it was far more important than I knew.

These proprieties, in school, were small acts of submission to something greater than us, and acts of charity toward one another. A …