"J'ai décidé de vivre"

Title of a book by Philippe Croizon, who swam the English channel after losing both arms and both legs in an electrical accident, and who has also skydived, quoted on MSNBC September 19, 2010

“In the heart of the remotest mountains rises the little Kirk…”

Thomas Carlyle The French Revolution

Jim Hacker: “Was I good?” (about a TV interview) Sir Humphrey Appleby: “A most remarkable performance.”

Yes Minister, “Big Brother” episode

In my latest National Post column I say art galleries should not hide paintings after some Muslims call them blasphemous.

"If the only way around distress is to stop loving, well, then, let us be men about it and settle for distress.”

Robert Capon The Supper of the Lamb (the reference is not just or even primarily to romantic love but to fondness for all good things such as food, whiskey etc.)

“the acknowledged Elizabethan habit of viewing history as a series of object lessons for present conduct.”

Sylvan Barnet’s “Overview” in the 1986 Signet Classic edition of William Shakespeare Julius Caesar