“In effect, none of the most important countries which must build a new world order have had any experience with the multi-state system that is emerging. Never before has a new world order had to be assembled from so many different perceptions, or on so global a scale.”

Postcolonial countries. All have sought to overcome the legacy of colonial.

Woe to the statesman whose arguments for entering a war are not as convincing at its end as they were at the beginning, Bismarck had cautioned.

Poor old Germany. Too big for Europe, too small for the world

Americans hold that every problem has a solution; Chinese think that each solution is an admission ticket to a new set of problems.

We live in a wondrous time, in which the strong is weak because of his scruples and the weak grows strong because of his audacity.

The reason that university politics is so vicious is because stakes are so small

The absence of alternatives clears the mind marvelously.

Americans have a tendency to believe that when there’s a problem there must be a solution.

For Roosevelt, if a nation was unable or unwilling to act to defend its own interests, it could not expect others to respect them. Inevitably,

If you don’t know where you are going, every road will get you nowhere.

Don’t be too ambitious. Do the most important thing you can think of doing every year and then your career will take care of itself.

Covert action should not be confused with missionary work.

For nations, history plays the role that character confers on human beings.

If Chinese exceptionalism represented the claims of a universal empire, Japanese exceptionalism sprang from the insecurities of an island nation borrowing heavily from its neighbor, but fearful of being dominated by it.

The issues are too important to be left for the voters.

A diamond is a chunk of coal that did well under pressure.

I think life experiences are different for people who know what they want as children.

Everyone’s trying to reach the top. Tell me how far is it from the bottom.

I find meditative partnership with my horse, being one with another being is such as exhilarating experience

The feeling of awed wonder that science can give us is one of the highest experiences of which the human psyche is capable.

Your parents don’t teach you how to heal, experience does.

All the ups and downs you’ve experienced in your life were only preparing you for what’s to come.  

You experience a lot of new things by being silent.

I’d rather have a lot of talent and a little experience than a lot of experience and a little talent.