George Crabbe was a minor poet, floruit the couple of decades on each side of 1800. He made most of his living as a country clergyman. He published nothing but verse, took no part in public affairs, and had no interest in science, philosophy, art or music. He seems not to have noticed the Napoleonic... Read More

Robert Solomon is a Professor of Philosophy ("and Business" — go figure) in the University of Texas at Austin. His particular beat is the philosophy of emotions ("and business ethics" — this must surely be some kind of brazen play for corporate funding). His latest book is a collection of eleven essays loosely united by... Read More

There is a certain kind of atheist — we have all met him — who is not merely indifferent to organized religion, or puzzled by it, or scornful of it, but who is inflamed to purple rage by the contemplation of it. My own father was of this kidney. He would open conversations with perfect... Read More

Before I get along with my review, let us just linger for a moment on this book's title, and on the names of the authors. The title I think we should blame on David Frum, author of, inter alia, books titled Dead Right, What's Right, and The Right Man; though possibly Frum was inspired by... Read More

Robert Baden-Powell's book Scouting for Boys, first published in 1908, was a world-wide best-seller for several decades thereafter. In his 1990 biography of the Chief Scout, Tim Jeal says that this book "has probably sold more copies than any other title during the twentieth century with the exception of the Bible." Sales did not begin... Read More

In imperial China there was a popular handbook titled Twenty-Four Exemplars of Filial Piety. It contained improving little tales, from dynasties all the way back into dim antiquity, of persons who had been exceptionally dutiful towards their parents. (These fables can still be found in condensed form in the peasant almanacs sold in Chinatown around... Read More

We all have our political preferences. According to Professor Steven Pinker, those preferences are largely genetic in origin, and therefore pretty much immune to fundamental change. Even when a person switches party allegiance, his broad outlook remains the same. Winston Churchill went from being a romantic Tory imperialist to being a romantic Whig imperialist (and... Read More