"Let us be cautious in making assertions and critical in examining them, but tolerant in permitting linguistic forms.[Carnap’s famous plea for tolerance to which W.V. Quine took exception.]."

"Your “everybody” probably represents even a smaller proportion of the population than your Rolodex. Psychologists have documented that our typical everybody— to which they refer as the “generalized other”—is usually a collection of about five or six people."

"We know that we cannot live together without rules which tell us what is right and what is wrong, what is permitted and what is prohibited. We know that it is law which enables men to live together, that creates order out of chaos. We know that law is the glue that holds civilization together."

"Defending the library service from the predations of ideologically-motivated public schoolboys who had immensely privileged childhoods isn’t ‘whining,’ it is the pursuit of passionately held beliefs."