The Great and Tolerable Empire

The Great and Tolerable Empire

Imperial Legacies: The British Empire Around the World by Jeremy Black Encounter Books, 2019. Hardcover, 216 pages, $26. Reviewed by James Baresel When a book is advertised as a “wide-ranging and vigorous assault on political correctness” one can usually expect that...
The Education of Clarence Thomas

The Education of Clarence Thomas

Clarence Thomas and the Lost Constitution by Myron Magnet. Encounter, 2019. Hardcover, 168 pages, $24. Reviewed by Peter Wood Clarence Thomas graduated cum laude from the College of Holy Cross in Massachusetts in 1971 and received a J.D. from Yale University in 1974....
Language, Chance, and Science

Language, Chance, and Science

The Language Hoax: Why the World Looks the Same in Any Language by John H. McWhorter. Oxford University Press, 2016. Hardcover, 208 pages, $20. Reviewed by Gene Callahan John H. McWhorter is a linguist at Columbia University, and a fascinating and sometimes...
Good Taste May Save the World

Good Taste May Save the World

Aesthetics: Volume I by Dietrich von Hildebrand. Hildebrand Press, 2016. Paperback, 508 pages, $20. Aesthetics: Volume II by Dietrich von Hildebrand Hildebrand Press, 2019. Paperback, 608 pages. $20. Reviewed by Andrew Thompson-Briggs One of the rituals peculiar to...
Natural Law Globalism

Natural Law Globalism

Tanaka Kōtarō and World Law: Rethinking the Natural Law Outside the West by Kevin M. Doak. Palgrave Pivot, 2019. Hardcover, 127 pages, $67. Reviewed by Jason Morgan The word “globalism” has become a—perhaps the—shibboleth of our age. Whatever the issue, globalism is...
The Grandiose Moralist

The Grandiose Moralist

The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life by David Brooks. Random House, 2019. Hardcover, 384 pages, $28. Reviewed by Paul Brian David Brooks has a new book full of old ideas—and a lot of self-righteous platitudes thrown in for good measure. The Second Mountain...