In many of her books Himmelfarb writes 'against the current' and gives her own contrary view to some widely held opinion of an author or public figure. That is certainly the case with this book, and in most cases she brings it off well. The essays in this book are reprinted from older publications (some from quite some time ago) and some are in fact book reviews (e.g., the essays on the Knoxes and Churchill). The most thoughtful are those on Mill (in which H. uncovers an utterly different philosopher from the one you thought you knew), Lionel Trilling (which offers some useful explanation to Trilling's famous remark on conservative ideas), and John Buchan (which defends B. against all sorts of silly charges of racism).