There are no people on earth in whom a spirit of enthusiastic zeal is so readily kindled, and burns so remarkably, as Americans

First of all, you can make the argument that there's no such thing as the past. Nobody lived in the past.

Writing is thinking. To write well is to think clearly. That's why it's so hard.

I love all sides of the work but that doesn't mean it isn't hard.

I can fairly be called an amateur because I do what I do, in the original sense of the word - for love, because I love it. On the other hand, I think that those of us who make our living writing history can also be called true professionals.

To shut yourself from history is to shut yourself off from say music or painting or the theatre, literature for the rest of your life. It would be to cheat yourself of the pleasures of life.

He had kept his head, kept his health and his strength, bearing up under a weight of work and worry that only a few could have carried.