No greater nor more affectionate honor can be conferred on an American than to have a public school named after read more

No greater nor more affectionate honor can be conferred on an American than to have a public school named after him.

I'm the only person of distinction who has ever had a depression named for him.

I'm the only person of distinction who has ever had a depression named for him.

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

The past grows gradually around one, like a placenta for dying.

The past grows gradually around one, like a placenta for dying.

Happy is the nation without a history.

Happy is the nation without a history.

It is not the literal past, the "facts" of history, that shape us, but images of the past embodied in read more

It is not the literal past, the "facts" of history, that shape us, but images of the past embodied in language.

History teaches us that whenever a weak and ignorant people possess a thing which a strong and enlightened people want, read more

History teaches us that whenever a weak and ignorant people possess a thing which a strong and enlightened people want, it must be yielded up peaceably.

The causes of events are ever more interesting than the events themselves.

The causes of events are ever more interesting than the events themselves.

A man can be a hero if he is a scientist, or a soldier, or a drug addict, or a read more

A man can be a hero if he is a scientist, or a soldier, or a drug addict, or a disc jockey, or a crummy mediocre politician. A man can be a hero because he suffers and despairs; or because he thinks logically and analytically; or because he is "sensitive;" or because he is cruel. Wealth establishes a man as a hero, and so does poverty. Virtually any circumstance in a man's life will make him a hero to some group of people and has a mythic rendering in the culture -- in literature, art, theater, or the daily newspapers.