Uncategorized
Perfect Fear
Michael Oakeshott (Hobbes on Civil Association, 38-39) states Hobbes’s solution to the dilemma of human violence in…
Democide
“During the first eighty-eight years of [the 20th] century,” writes R. J. Rummel (Death by Government) “almost…
Microtime
Jimena Canales has written a history of A Tenth of a Second. It seems an arbitrary cut-off. Why…
Example, Father, Type
What is the thrust of the argument in Romans 4? Is Paul mainly concerned to present Abraham as…
Psalms of Justification
Attacked by his enemies, David cries out, asking God to judge. He prays for favorable judgment for himself,…
Administrative Law
Columbia Law School professor Philip Hamburger’s The Administrative Threat makes a powerful case that the executive branch…
Greatest Poem
From Whitman’s Preface to the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass: The Americans of all nations at…
On Trump and Trumpism
Like many Americans, I’ve spent an inordinate proportion of the past two years thinking about Donald Trump.…
Chemnitz on Abraham’s Justification
In what context does “justification” fit? Does the word describe what happens to sinners when they are…
The OlivierBrando
Reflecting on the retirement of actor Daniel Day-Lewis at Variety, Owen Gleiberman suggests that “What retired . .…
Finding Your Voice
My son Woelke sent this along, from Louis Menand: The real basis for the metaphor of voice in…
Shakespeare and Montaigne
In the course of reviewing Philippe Desan’s Montaigne: A Life, Jane Kramer speculates on the fraught question…
Sex in Eden
Stephen Greenblatt writes in The New Yorker about “How St. Augustine Invented Sex.” How typical of The New…
Not Listening
Luke Bretherton argues (Christianity, Democracy and the Shadow of Constantine) that “For the church, listening is the…
Canon and Communio
In her essay in Christianity, Democracy, and the Shadow of Constantine, Mary Doak unpacks some features of a…
