Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed to narrow his deficit by cutting 40,000 public-sector jobs and selling off assets, including land worth £5 billion. The...

entitled to sack the politicians who serve them. But this was a dangerous moment for the voters of Spain to exercise that right. They have not only dispensed with a successful...

ANTHONY HOWARD 0 y now they must have finished sifting the 79 applications and be drawing up the actual 1 shortlist for the chairmanship of the BBC. Nothing as remotely...

CHRIS uf-A-1L:ft he Spectator is a broad church, so an issue devoted to faith and reason may surely reflect on the Budget. I propose that March 17, hitherto St Patrick's Day,...

mild terrorism turn the British political landscape on its head, koi,..,.. much as it has done in Spain? Government sources naturally / give this scenario short shrift. They...

got to do with it? Some 55 million foetuses are aborted each year. Why, then, all the fuss about destroying embryos in the course of stem-cell research? Mary Wakefield detects...

Andrew Kenny takes issue with uncritical believers and credulous non-believers T he thoughts of Richard Dawkins. the atheist, and Paul Johnson, the Christian. lie on my...

Theodore Dalrymple can find no better explanation for man's wicked behaviour than the doctrine of Original Sin F or personal reasons that it would be tedious to explain, my...

Statistics show that in the United States more people die in hospital because of medical blunders than from Aids, breast cancer and car accidents combined. But who carries the...

Roger Scruton tracks down the soul — the divine spark that distinguishes us from the rest of creation H uman beings are animals, composed of nerves and sinews, cardiovascular...

It is well known that patients swear blind that they have never been told a thing by their doctor about their illnesses and treatment immediately they leave the consulting room....

Jonathan Barnes records an after-dinner conversation about St Anselm's 'exquisite' ontological argument for the existence of God T hey had dined well and were warming their...

Sam Leith on Alexandre Grothendieck, the revolutionary number-cruncher who was last heard of in the Pyrenees raging about the Devil T he odds are that the name Alexandre...

Rod Liddle says that Islam appeals to liberal Western man for the very reasons it appals him 0 f all the many fashionable phobias that we are meant to reach inside ourselves...

Three things everyone knows about grammar are: that none always takes a singular verb; that it is wrong to carelessly split an infinitive; and that a preposition is the wrong...

Dan Hannan says no one could have foretold in the immediate aftermath of the bombs that Spain would vote for appeasement Valencia F ew election results are wholly unpredicted....

A weekly survey of world restrictions on freedom and free trade At last, some good news for the anti-war lobby. British servicemen will not be forced — in fact will not be...

Jonathan Ray was at Atocha station in Madrid when the bombs went off. Here he describes scenes of chaos and terror — and of calm resignation w :r e arrived at Atocha station in...

STEPHEN GLOVER A mid all the chatter about who may buy the Telegraph Group, the names one hears most often are those of the Daily Mail group, the Express group and Richard...

AUL jai-itstSON A true aristocrat is not born but becomes one by developing a special sort of courage: the ability to accept and rise above the vicissitudes of fate, to develop...

FRANK JiL r M r Chris Patten. in a newspaper interview the other day, said he wanted to be thought of as a 'troublemaker'. He added that one of the people who most inspired him...

From Bernard J. Baars Sir: What a fine day it is for Simon Jenkins ('Nothing to fear but fear itself, 13 March): 200 dead and over 1,000 wounded in Madrid. Ten bombs went off...

From Vernon Coleman Sir: 'I think he's about 62," writes Rachel Johnson in a piece about me which managed to be both bitchy and patronising (You have been warned, Mr Blair', 6...

From Hugh Lunghi Sir: I hesitate to go on flogging the Dresden bombing issue but feel it is only fair to do so for the record. Noble Frankland states that if the Russians asked...

From Elizabeth Scott Sir: Having read Deborah Ross's interview with Sir Andrew Green, founder and chairman of Migration Watch ('Green's pleasant land'. 6 March), I hope she will...

From Max Hastings Sir: At the risk of boring readers with the latest instalment of an obsession of mine (Diary, 14 February), I thought it worth reporting that I have at last...

From Sir David Davies Sir: In a recent article (And another thing, 21 February) in which he describes Curzon as 'snobbish, pompous, self-satisfied and accident-prone', Paul...

From Erica de Graaff-Hunter Sir: Roy Liddle et al, should not have this problem with the decimation of the bird population by cats (Thought for the day, 6 March). The fault lies...

E ncouraged by the success of her memoirs, which have captivated the nation thanks both to their literary excellence and the glittering launch party, Lady Annabel Goldsmith is...

Philip Hensher MY NAME IS LEGION by A. N. Wilson Hutchinson, £16.99, pp. 506, ISBN 0091795354 L ike many of A. N. Wilson's keen readers, I suspect, I'd slightly lost sight of...

Hugh Massingberd ANNABEL: AN UNCONVENTIONAL LIFE by Lady Annabel Goldsmith Weidenfeld & Nicolson, £20, pp. 274, I5BN0297829661 A fter all the hype about Lady Annabel...

Gerard Noel BERLIN EMBASSY by William Russell Elliott & Thomson, 27 John Street, London WC 1N 2LL £9.99, pp. 239, 1SBN1904027148 W illiam Russell was a young American who...

Douglas Murray A BAEDEKER OF DECADENCE: CHARTING A LITERARY FASHION, 1884-1927 by George C. Schooitield Yale, £30, pp. 415, ISBN 0300047142 o be fair to him, George C....

Charlotte Moore ONCE IN AUGUST LONG AGO by Liam Nolan Greylake Publications, £9.95, pp. 174, ISBN 0954386701 A utisin is in the air. Newspaper articles, television programmes...

2 November 188 AD I never knew you, only your sad tragedy, little Epaphroditos. Eight years old, slave to the son-in-law of Leonides. I see you there, neglecting some dull...

Andrew Gilligan DISARMING IRAQ by Hans Mix Bloomsblay, f16.99, pp, 285, ISBN 0747573549 lyv hen Hans Blix first became the UN's chief Iraqi weapons inspector, journalists...

Jane Ridley SENTIMENTAL MURDER: LOVE AND MADNESS IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY by John Brewer I - farperCollins, £20, pp. 340, ISBN 0002571 34X L ate one night in April 1779 a...

Philip Mansel LORD CROMER by Roger Owen OUP, £25, pp. 436. ISBN 0199253382 A hundred and twenty years ago, the global hyper-power invaded a strategic Middle Eastern country. It...

John de Falbe PENGUIN LOST by Andrey Kurkov, translated from the Russian by George Bird Harril1,1110.99, pp.255. ISBN 1843430959 A nyone who gave themselves the pleasure of...

Claudia FitzHerbert GOING BUDDHIST: PANIC AND EMPTINESS, THE BUDDHA AND ME by Peter Conradi Short Books, £9.99, pp. 183, ISBN 1904095631 p eter Conradi is a retired academic...

Hermione Hobhouse PALACE OF THE PEOPLE by J. R. Piggott C. Hurst & Co., £2250, pp. 121, ISBN 1850657270 T his generously illustrated book serves two purposes. First of all, it...

Piers Paul Read THE SOCIETY OF OTHERS by William Nicholson Doubleday, £12.99, pp. 224, ISBN 0385606826 T he late J. G. Farrell, author of Troubles and The Siege of Krishnapur,...

Jonathan Sumption THE FIRST CRUSADE: A NEW HISTORY by Thomas Asbridge Simon & Schuster, £20, pp. 408, ISBN0743220838 T he First Crusade is one of the great historical...

'You are your job,' said a friend to me. I stopped and pondered what he'd said. 'Am I really morning meetings and cups of tea, A few long lunches and then I'm dead?' 'If not,...

P. J. Kavanagh THE CATHOLIC REVIVAL IN ENGLISH LITERATURE, 1845-1961 by Ian Ker Gracewing, 2 Southern Avenue, Leominster, Herefordshire HR 6 OQF, Tel: 01568 616835, f14.99,...

Montagu Curzon 1066: THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF THE BAYEUX TAPESTRY by Andrew Bridgeford Fourth Estate, £20, pp. 309, ISBN 184115041X THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS, 1066 by M. K. Lawson...

Daniel Barenboim on the relevance of Spinoza's Ethics to the Middle East and music I read Spinoza's Ethics for the first time when I was 13 years old. Of course we studied the...

Andrew Lambirth Gillian Ayres The Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, until 17 April T he RWA must be congratulated for staging this scintillating exhibition of recent...

Bruce Boucher Playing with Fire: European Terracotta Models, 1740-1840 The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, until 25 April; Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 12 May to 29...

Laura Gascoigrie Gerald Wilde: A Forgotten Genius The Millinery Works Gallery, 87 Southgate Road, London, Ni, until 4 April 4 A 11 modern art puzzles me. I don't t -...

Mark Steyn Open Range 124, selected cinemas T he last Kevin Costner movie I liked was Tin Cup, an amiable 1996 comedy about a golf bum all the more agreeable for its scuffy...

Michael Tanner Tosca English National Opera Hansel and Gretel Welsh National Opera Tbsca is one of the most surprising / operas, in that you never know how it will take you. I...

Lloyd Evans Ladybird Royal Court Come Out Eli Battersea Arts Centre Endgame Albey T he Royal Court is in love with losers. Last month it was a Maori ghetto, this month it's a...

Charles Spencer I 've been writing this column for twoand-a-half years now, and am uneasily aware that I have only ever mentioned the Beatles, the greatest of all pop groups,...

James Delingpole T he closest I ever came to splitting up with my wife was before my stepson the Rat went to boarding school and we had to go through the daily hell of...

Michael Vestey A friend emailed from abroad wonder ng there was no Test Match Special broadcasting the first Test against the West Indies at Sabina Park in Jamaica on Radio...

Charles Moore - rust before the end of the season, I am J hunting once more. Roosevelt was right about freedom from fear being the big thing. Fear is always somewhere in the...

Simon Courtauld r`tn leave in the foothills of the V./Himalayas, an Indian army officer and sportsman wrote in 1865: 'Unless I shoot something or other, I shall have to fall...

Alan Judd W hen I was three my passion was a bulbous blue Austin J40 pedal car. When Henry Pearman was three his was a red F-Type Jaguar, but a real one. He used to see it...

Taki T sat down and calculated that if I had I continued to live in London I would have died about seven years ago. Sixty is not a bad age to drop off, but I'll take 67 and...

Jeremy Clarke A fortnight ago my mother had a cancerous growth removed from her calf and a section of skin grafted over the hole. The doctor advised her not to put any weight...

Petronella Wyatt have to say that I feel real, gung-ho sym pathy for Beverley Hughes, the immigration minister. Hughes is under savage attack for allegedly misleading the...

ir had my niece — the little one. aged 5 — to stay again recently and her quote of the week came one night when I was putting her to bed and she asked of my partner. 'Do you...

m4-1 fiLNDERSON bane Warne is back and doing what he likes most — writing his own notices. The Australian wrist spinner, banned for a year after taking a diuretic to assist his...

Q. My wife and I recently attended a wedding after which we sat down to a formal dinner. It was all going very well until the best man's speech. This particular chap — a...