Americans have always believed that-within the law-all kinds of people should be allowed to take the initiative in all kinds of activities. And out of that pluralism has come virtually all of our creativity. Freedom is real only to the extent that there are diverse alternatives.

One of my less pleasant chores when I was young was to read the Bible from one end to the other. Reading the Bible straight through is at least 70 percent discipline, like learning Latin. But the good parts are, of course, simply amazing. God is an extremely uneven writer, but when He's good, nobody can touch Him.

If you have some respect for people as they are, you can be more effective in helping them to become better than they are.

It is hard to feel individually responsible with respect to the invisible processes of a huge and distant government.

If the modern leader doesn't know the facts, he is in grave trouble, but rarely do the facts provide unqualified guidance.

The first and last task of aleader is to keep hope alive.

One of the reasons people stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.