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You Don’t Know To A Certainty (Podcast)
Some guys look upon knowledge with a purely utilitarian view. They think that if something is not helping them that very instant, then it has no value. This view is shortsighted and terribly wrong. You never know what life has in store for you, and if you’re presented with an opportunity to learn, you take…
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The Captives Of The “Starry Crown”
The Canadian explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson, who lived from 1879 to 1962, changed his birth name when he was in college. He was originally known as William Stephenson, and was born in Manitoba, Canada. His biographers do not know exactly what prompted him to make such a startling reinvention of identity.
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Lost In The Lapse Of Years
The name Jacob August Riis is an obscure one today, known only perhaps to scholars of American journalism and photography. He was a Danish-American journalist, and he lived from 1849 to May 26, 1914. He produced excellent work in his day; his photographs of the New York slums were influential in helping promote social reforms…
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I Am A Whirlwind, I Am War And Deluge
The philosopher Philo of Alexandria, in the second book of his treatise On Dreams (II.18.123), relates a story about a despotic governor of Egypt. “It is only a very short time ago,” he says, “that I knew a man of very high rank, one who was prefect and governor of Egypt, who, after he had…
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The Kings Of Nothing
The war between Julius Caesar and Pompey engulfed the Roman world between 49 and 48 B.C. Historians, seeking concision and brevity at the expense of accuracy, call it a “civil war”; and in one sense it is. But to those who lived through it, or fell under the long shadow of its aftershocks, it was…
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All Men Seek Their Divine Origins
By 331 B.C. Alexander the Great had reached Egypt and brought it under his control. He already had a string of incredible military victories to his credit, including those at Granicus, Issus, and Tyre. He must have sensed, in the marrow of his bones, that he possessed some indefinable quality that separated him from other…
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Apelles, The Greatest Painter Of Antiquity
Painting is a perishable art. Pigment fades and flakes with the centuries; and the passage of millennia leaves us nothing of painting but dust and memories. From antiquity have survived statues, tombs, mosaics, some murals here and there, artifacts of all kinds, and the sublime monuments of architecture; but of the great Greek and Roman…
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Acknowledging The Debts To Our Predecessors
In his treatise On the Nature of the Gods, Cicero points out a shameful personal weakness of the philosopher Epicurus. What was this character flaw? It was Epicurus’s congenital inability to admit that he had ever been influenced by the thinkers that preceded him. Cicero states:
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Heaven And Hell Can Change Places Very Quickly (Podcast)
Most people never realize that good fortune can be suddenly and brutally replaced by bad fortune. What once seemed like heaven can quickly be transformed into a hell. The reverse is also true: a man can find himself in terrible straits, but can extricate himself through consistent efforts, and reach a kind of “heaven.” This…
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What Was It That Allowed Odysseus To Return Home?
Oliver Stone’s memoir Chasing the Light, which I began reading two weeks ago, relates an interesting anecdote. After returning from military service in Vietnam, the future director enrolled in film school at New York University; one of the classes he attended, taught by a professor named Tim Leahy, dealt with classical drama.
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Disaster And Heroism At Maiwand
On July 27, 1880, General George Burrows led just under 2,500 British and Indian troops into the field near Maiwand, Afghanistan, to intercept an Afghan force led by Ayub Khan. Burrows, however, was not aware that he was confronting a force that numbered around 25,000 Afghan warriors. The terrible engagement that followed, known to history…
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Clausewitz’s “Coup d’Oeil”: That Special Knack (Podcast)
The military theorist Carl Von Clausewitz used the term coup d’oeil to describe a special, innate ability to grasp the military possibilities presented by a specific situation. We may broaden this idea to describe an instinctive talent in some field of endeavor. Each of us possesses a special skill that distinguishes us from others; too…
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On Whether Alexander Could Have Conquered Rome
It is said that after Alexander the Great completed his conquests in Asia, he intended eventually to turn his gaze westward to the Mediterranean region, and bring those lands under his control. Death, of course, overtook him before he could begin this campaign. Either the lingering effects of his battlefield wounds, or his dissolute living…
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The Moral Corruption Of The Elites
The military historian Polyaenus, in his Stratagems of War (II.17), relates the following anecdote. There was once a man named Dinias, the son of Telesippus, who lived in the city of Cranon, which is located in the region of Thessaly in Greece. He was originally from the town of Pheraea. He was a poor man,…
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Focusing On What Matters (Podcast)
In this podcast we discuss the importance of focusing on what matters, not on what does not matter. We illustrate this principle with a few anecdotes.
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Escape From Libby Prison (Part II)
As February 10, 1864 dawned at Libby Prison, the remaining inmates awaited the inevitable hurricane of outrage and disbelief that they knew was coming. All through the night, men had made their way through Col. Thomas Rose’s tunnel and out of Rat Hell to the dark streets of Richmond. Now they would have to face…
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Escape From Libby Prison (Part I)
The greatest prison camp escape in American history took place at Libby Prison in Richmond, Virginia, in February 1864. On a cold winter night, 109 Union officers crawled through a suffocating, claustrophobic tunnel from a Confederate hell-hole to an empty lot near the building, and from there tried to make their way through hostile country…
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The Mysterious Death Of Lord Kitchener
By 1916, the year of his death, Lord Horatio Kitchener had for years been a venerated and legendary figure throughout the British Empire. The campaigns in Gallipoli and Mesopotamia had dimmed some of his luster, but his name remained a revered one. The official announcement of his death thus came as a deep shock; and…
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The Top 10 Articles Of 2021
It’s time to review the top ten articles and essays that have appeared here at Fortress of the Mind in 2021. The following list is ranked by page views, with the greatest number beginning at the top.
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Obstacles And Pitfalls For The Youthful Student Of Philosophy
I was recently asked in correspondence to provide some thoughts on the pitfalls and obstacles to the study of philosophy. I have to admit that it was something of a relief to get this request, as it offers me a pretext to describe my own ideas on this subject. All of us seek a greater…
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The Weird Tale Of Jenkins’s Ear
Governments looking for a pretext to justify a predetermined course of action will undoubtedly find one. Some outrage can be seized upon, some barbarity can be dangled before the public, or some looming danger can be created to whip up support for a policy. It is an ancient stratagem, and an effective one. A convincing…
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“I’m Not Sure If She’s The Right One” (Podcast)
A young reader from Britain has a question about his relationship with his girlfriend. He wants something long-term, but has some nagging doubts as to whether his girlfriend is the right one. He’s not certain how to proceed. I read his email, and offer my thoughts.
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The Complete G Manifesto Tweet Readings
Bookmark this page. In one place, you have links to every G Manifesto tweet reading. The first one was made in 2018, and the last in 2020. Since the G Man has deleted his Twitter account and blog, I consider these tweet readings to be an important part of the historical record on one of…
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Epic Journey: Lord Roberts Marches From Kabul To Kandahar
The late 19th century saw an intense competition between the British and Russian empires for influence in central Asia. Once act of this “Great Game” was the Second Afghan War, which was fought between 1878 and 1880. Britain’s goals were two-fold: to keep tsarist forces out of Afghanistan, and to create a friendly buffer state…
Original copy of Cicero’s De Officiis (On Duties) published in Holland in 1642. From the collection of Fortress of the Mind.
Quintus Curtius 
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