postmodern putin’s Reviews > A Study of History, Vol 1: Introduction; The Geneses of Civilizations > Status Update

Knowing that God would not or could not refuse the wager if it were offered, the Devil did not observe that God was hoping, silently but eagerly, that the offer would be made. In his jubilation at obtaining an opportunity to ruin one of God's choicest creatures, the Devil did not foresee that he would be giving God Himself an opportunity to renew the whole work of creation. And so God's purpose is fulfilled...

If and when a civilization begins to lose its creative power, the people below its surface and beyond its borders begin to resist assimilation, with the result that the society which, in its age of growth, was a social unity with an ever expanding and always indefinite fringe, becomes divided against itself by the sharp lines of division between a dominant minority and an internal and external proletariat.