"He sometimes thought of the life she might have been living ever since he had known her,—and the one she had chosen to live. From that disparity, he believed, came the sublest thrill of her fascination. She mocked outrageously at the proprieties she observed, and inherited the magic of contradictions."

—Willa Cather, A Lost Lady

A guitar recital by David Russell:

An illustrated rendering of the ancient city of Cahokia, whose ruins--or mounds--are found in present-day Illinois, across the river from St. Louis. David Reynolds, writing in America, Empire of Liberty: "Archeologists now believe that Cahokia was virtually an Indian metropolis covering nearly six square miles, which flourished in the late eleventh century when the Normans were conquering England. Row houses and courtyard mansions lined streets that led to large public plazas. The huge platform mound were capped by temples, tombs, or palaces--the top of the largest mound is the size of a soccer field--and Cahokia did not stand alone because satellite mounds spread out across the fertile floodplain of the Mississippi. In fact, Cahokia is the biggest prehistoric earthwork still surviving anywhere in the Americas."

Richard III, Shakespeare: "Thus I clothe my own naked villainy with odd old ends stolen out of holy writ and seem a saint...Then I sigh, and with a piece of Scripture tell them that God bids us to do evil for good."

Montaigne on Education:

...this education is to be carried on with severe gentleness, not as is customary. Instead of being invited to letters, children are shown in truth nothing but horror and cruelty. Away with violence and compulsion! There is nothing to my mind which so depraves and stupefies a wellborn nature. If you would like him to fear shame and chastisement, don't harden him to them. Harden him to sweat and cold, wind and sun, and the dangers that he must scorn; wean him from all softness and delicacy in dressing and sleeping, eating and drinking; accustom him to everything. Let him not be a pretty boy and a little lady, but a lusty and vigorous youth.

William James in The Sentiment of Rationality:

He who commands himself not to be credulous of God, of duty, of freedom, of immortality, may again and again be indistinguishable from him who dogmatically denies them. Scepticism in moral matters is an active ally of immorality. Who is not for is against. The universe will have no neutrals in these questions. In theory as in practice, dodge or hedge, or talk as we like about a wise skepticism, we are really doing voluntary military service for one side or the other.

"You're a skeptic, Mike. You know what my boss says? He says that skepticism is a good watchdog if you know when to take off the leash."

—Archie in Rex Stout's Fer de Lance