The study of statesmanship is not a subject for leaders in politics alone. It is the study of the whole human being in thought and action.

The classics teach us of the difficult choices that must be made, an activity that guides lives and forms character. This collection of writings includes ancient, Medieval, Renaissance, and modern scholarship on statesmanship from Xenophon, Aristotle, Cicero, Augustine, Erasmus, Niccolo Machiavelli, George Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and more, selected and with an introduction by the president of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, John A. Burtka.