[Washington had won] a war for independence and then gone home. [He embodied] the legend of the Roman who returned to his plow after saving his country.

Madison loathed Hamilton and loved Jefferson above all.

Aaron Burr was like a new refrigerator. He was bright, cold and empty.

Depression manifests itself in a lack of will.

Some lawns have all the cheer of old cemeteries.

Only the stupefying ignorance of young women prevents them from comprehending the stupefying emptiness of the men who cluster round them.

Routine is supposed to be the great deadener of souls; how much worse is the half-completed task, the broken round, the unfulfilled routine?