"No theory, no history."

Werner Sombart, quoted in Theodore Von Laue The World Revolution of Westernization

In my latest National Post column I say that not attacking North Korea is a lot riskier than it sounds.

"Those who talk of 'tolerating all opinions' are very provincial bigots who are only familiar with one opinion."

G.K. Chesterton in Illustrated London News Feb. 24, 1912, quoted in Gilbert Magazine Vol. 9 #6

"The first impression that one gets of a ruler and of his brains is from seeing the men that he has about him."

Machiavelli, quoted in Dan Rather The Palace Guard

"Patience is the finest and worthiest part of fortitude, and the rarest too... Patience lies at the root of all pleasures, as well as of all powers. Hope herself ceases to be happiness when Impatience companions her."

- John Ruskin, quoted in Samuel Smiles Self-Help

"Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened."

- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn in his 1983 Templeton Address re the disastrous history of Russia in the 20th century, quoted in Philip Yancey Soul Survivor

"the Baudelaires felt they were encountering some very large potatoes indeed."

Lemony Snicket The Vile Village (after explaining the meaning of the expression "small potatoes")