Of what does politics consist except the making of imperfect decisions, many of them unjust and quite a few of them deadly?

History is not what happened 200 or 2,000 years ago; it's a story about what happened 200 or 2,000 years ago.

A certain kind of rich man afflicted with the symptoms of moral dandyism sooner or later comes to the conclusion that it isn't enough merely to make money. He feels obliged to hold views, to espouse causes and elect Presidents, to explain to a trembling world how and why the world went wrong.

The future is an empty canvas or a blank sheet of paper, and if you have the courage of your own thought and your own observation you can make of it what you will

The practice of our democracy depends on a sense of, and knowledge of, history in the same way that playing in the World Series requires a bat and a ball.

A society that presumes a norm of violence and celebrates aggression, whether in the subway, on the football field, or in the conduct of its business, cannot help making celebrities of the people who would destroy it.

Of what does politics consist except the making of imperfect decisions, many of them unjust and quite a few of them deadly?