Between the Levite at the gate and the judicial systems of our day is a long journey in courthouse government, but its basic structure remains the same - law, judge and process. Of the three, process is the most unstable - procedure and facts. Of the two, facts are the most intractable. While most of the law in books may seem to center about abstract theories, doctrines, princi ples, and rules, the truth is that most of it is designed in some way to escape the painful examination of the fa...

It was an afternoon in early June 1952. The school was turning out for the summer break, and our community was about to experience an exciting first. My older sister Deloris and several other students from our community were graduating from high school. That afternoon, my mother, five brothers, baby sister, and I waited eagerly on the front porch to congratulate my sister. As we waited, we started a conversation about careers. My mother spoke of one of the boys, who had several opportuniti...

Improve your service. While many claim to offer models of leadership suitable for contemporary society, this book goes a notch higher by doing so through the prism of Jesus's servant leadership. As the servant-leader par excellence, Jesus not only taught but demonstrated service by stooping down and washing his disciples' feet. This book distills the experience and wisdom of men and women who have practically benefited from Jesus's leadership. Reflective of the global church, all the autho...

Since its founding in 1943, Medievalia et Humanistica has won worldwide recognition as the first scholarly publication in America to devote itself entirely to medieval and Renaissance studies. Since 1970, a new series, sponsored by the Modern Language Association of America and edited by an international board of distinguished scholars and critics, has published interdisciplinary articles. In yearly hardcover volumes, the new series publishes significant scholarship, criticism, an...

In the realm of poetry, where emotions dance and words paint vivid tapestries, "A Book of Twenty-four Sonnets" by Laurens Maynard emerges as a timeless masterpiece. This collection of sonnets, each a sonnet, explores the depths of human experience, from love's ecstasy to sorrow's embrace. With exquisite language and profound insights, Maynard's sonnets captivate the reader, inviting them on a journey through the labyrinth of the human heart. Prepare to be moved, inspired, and forever chang...

When The Culture of Narcissism was first published, it was clear that Christopher Lasch had identified something important: what was happening to American society in the wake of the decline of the family over the last century.The book quickly became a bestseller. This edition includes a new afterword, "The Culture of Narcissism Revisited."

Should laws about sex and pornography be based on social conventions about what is disgusting? Should felons be required to display bumper stickers or wear T-shirts that announce their crimes? This powerful and elegantly written book, by one of America's most influential philosophers, presents a critique of the role that shame and disgust play in our individual and social lives and, in particular, in the law.Martha Nussbaum argues that we should be wary of these emotions because th...

Arguably the most decisive shift in the history of ideas in modern times was the complete demolition during the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries - in the wake of the Scientific Revolution - of traditional structures of authority, scientific thought, and belief by the new philosophy and the philosophes, culminating in Voltaire, Diderot, and Rousseau. In this revolutionary process which effectively overthrew all justicfication for monarchy, aristocracy, and ecclesiastical power, as ...

Is benevolence a virtue? In many cases it appears to be so. But when it comes to the enlarged benevolence” of the Enlightenment, David Stove argues that the answer is clearly no. In this insightful, provocative essay, Stove builds a case for the claim that when benevolence is universal, disinterested and external, it regularly leads to the forced redistribution of wealth, which in turn leads to decreased economic incentives, lower rates of productivity, and increased poverty.As St...

The eighteenth century Enlightenment marks the beginning of the modern age when the scientific method and belief in reason and progress came to hold sway over the Western world. In the twentieth century, however, the Enlightenment has often been judged harshly for its apparently simplistic optimism. Here a master historian goes back to the sources to give us both a more sophisticated and intriguing view of the philosophes, their world and their ideas.

How do we know what happened in the past? We cannot go back, and no amount of historical data can enable us to understand with absolute certainty what life was like “then.” It is easy to demolish the very idea of historical knowing, but it is impossible to demolish the importance of historical knowing. In an age of cable television pundits and anonymous bloggers dueling over history, the value of owning history increases at the same time as our confidence in history as a way of...