“Has there ever been a country that, once colonized, avoided civil war?”

“I can assure you that no kingdom has ever had as many civil wars as the kingdom of Christ.”

“This isn't to deny that there were fierce arguments, at the time and ever since, about the causes and goals of both the Civil War and the Second World War. But 1861 and 1941 each created a common national narrative (which happened to be the victors' narrative): both wars were about the country's survival and the expansion of the freedoms on which it was founded. Nothing like this consensus has formed around September 11th.... Indeed, the decade since the attacks has destroyed the very possibility of a common national narrative in this country.”

“Nations have recently been led to borrow billions for war; no nation has ever borrowed largely for education. Probably, no nation is rich enough to pay for both war and civilization. We must make our choice; we cannot have both.”

“Semi-colons only prove that the author has been to college.”

“If civilization has an opposite, it is war.”