Little of beauty has America given the world save the rude grandeur of God himself stamped on her bosom; the human spirit in this new7 world has expressed itself in vigor and ingenuity rather than in beauty.

Americans think of themselves as a huge rescue squad on twenty-four-hour call to any spot on the globe where dispute and conflict may erupt.

America is a land of creators and rebels.

Europe has what we [Americans] do not have yet, a sense of the mysterious and inexorable limits of life, a sense, in a word, of tragedy. And we have what they sorely need: a sense of life's possibilities.

What passes for identity in America is a series of myths about one's heroic ancestors.

The making of an American begins at that point where he himself rejects all other ties, any other history, and himself adopts the vesture of his adopted land.

Numerous cities will emerge from the bosom of these immense deserts; our ships will cover the seas, abundance will reign within our walls; and two words only will be seen over our altars and in our tribunals: humanity and liberty.

When American life is most American it is apt to be most theatrical.

In America, with all of its evils and faults, you can still reach through the forest and see the sun. But we don't know yet whether that sun is rising or setting for our country.

On my visits to America, I discovered that the old Marxist dictum, "From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs," was probably more in force in America-that holy of holies of capitalism-than in any other country in the world.