I am convinced, the longer I live, that life and its blessings are not so entirely unjustly distributed as when we are suffering greatly we are inclined to suppose. – Mary Todd Lincoln
Our new Constitution is now established, everything seems to promise it will be durable; but, in this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes. – Benjamin Franklin, letter to Jean-Baptiste Leroy, 1789 November 13th
As individuals and as a nation, we now suffer from social narcissism. The beloved Echo of our ancestors, the virgin America, has been abandoned. We have fallen in love with our own image, with images of our making, which turn out to be images of ourselves. – Daniel J. Boorstin