It never thunders but it rains.

Any new financial order for the world must tackle the three chief challenges of our age.

There are signs that the age of petroleum has passed its zenith. Adjusted for inflation, a barrel of crude oil now sells for three times its long-run average. The large western oil companies, which cartellised the industry for much of the 20th century, are now selling more oil than they find, and are thus in the throes of liquidation.

What Youth deemed crystal, Age finds out was dew.