The citizen's job is to be rude - to pierce the comfort of professional intercourse by boorish expressions of doubt.

Faith: The opposite of dogmatism.

The undoubted sign of a society well under control or in decline is that language has ceased to be a means of communication and has become instead a shield for those who master it.

The Unconscious Civilisation There is a certain terrifying dignity to the big ideologies. With the stroke of an intellectual argument the planet is put in its place. Only the bravest or the most foolish of individuals would not become passive before such awe inspiring destinies.

Obviously we don't have 300 million people. We haven't got a big army. We don't have Hollywood. We're a medium small-sized country. We have to do what medium small-sized countries do, which-even though we're not smarter than other people-is to make ourselves seem to be smarter. We have to work harder and know more than other people.

An individual who stands out, or disagrees or takes risks is a danger to such systems and is effortlessly and, unconsciously sidelined.

Our belief in salvation through the market is very much in the Utopian tradition. The economists and managers are the servants of God. Like the medieval scholastics, their only job is to uncover the divine plan. They could never create or stop it. At most they might aspire to small alterations.