There were people who said the Society of Cincinnati in the American revolution, of which George Washington was one of the shining lights, was a branch of the Illuminati.

The history of the last century shows, as we shall see later, that the advice given to governments by bankers, like the advice they gave to industrialists, was consistently good for bankers, but was often disastrous for governments, businessmen, and the people generally.

In addition to their power over government based on government financing and personal influence, bankers could steer governments in ways they wished them to go by other pressures.

When goods are exchanged between countries, they must be paid for by commodities or gold. They cannot be paid for by the notes, certificates, and checks of the purchaser's country, since these are of value only in the country of issue.

It is not easy to tear any event out of the context of the universe in which it occurred without detaching from it some factor that influenced it.

A civilization is complicated, in the first place, because it is dynamic; that is, it is constantly changing in the passage of time, until it has perished.

The instrument of expansion of Classical civilization was a social organization, slavery.