[I]n school, character is fate. - Mary McCarthy

The Crucifixion and other historical precedents notwithstanding, many of us still believe that outstanding goodness is a kind of armor, that virtue, seen plain and bare, gives pause to criminality. But perhaps it is the other way around.

The Venetians invented the income tax, statistical science, the floating of government stock, state censorship of books, anonymous denunciations (the Bocca del Leone), the gambling casino, and the Ghetto.

[I]t is a mistake to think that an intellectual is required to be intelligent; there are occasions when the terms seem to be almost antonyms.