"A pessimist’s blood type is always b-negative." One of "Gilbert!’s Top Dozen Very Bad Puns" in Gilbert! magazine Vol. 5 #8 (July/August 2002)

"If you cannot mould yourself as you would wish, how can you expect other people to be entirely to your liking?" Thomas à Kempis, quoted as "Thought du jour" in Globe and Mail October 21, 2002

"What has happened, can happen." Aristotle, quoted by Conor Cruise O’Brien in The Siege (with specific reference to the Holocaust)

"If something cannot go on forever, it will stop." "Stein's Law", named for economist Herb Stein (cited by Robert J. Samuelson in National Post January 1 1999)

In my latest National Post column I praise Prince Philip for his character, modesty and acid wit, three things the modern world needs badly.

"It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious." A.N. Whitehead

"An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?" Michel de Saint-Pierre according to "Thought du jour" in Globe and Mail January 18, 2001

"We have a very weak supply of words of praise as compared with our rich and varied output of terms of abuse." G.K. Chesterton, "Both sides of the Looking Glass" in The Spice of Life, quoted in Gilbert Magazine Vol. 8 #1 (September 2004)