“Every generation of Americans since has had to reenact the loss of our innocence. Smog over L. A. was the loss of our innocence. Vietnam was the loss of our innocence. Gettysburg was the loss of our innocence. Ingrid Bergman’s baby was the loss of our innocence. Oklahoma City was the loss of our innocence. The World Trade Center was the loss of our innocence. Other nations are cynical. America has preferred the child’s game of “discovering” evil—Europe’s or Asia’s, her grandfather’s, even her own.”

Rameau's Nephew (1762)

World War Z
Context: You wanna know who lost World War Z? Whales. I guess they never really had a chance, not with several million hungry boat people and half the world's navies converted to fishing fleets. [... ] So the next time someone tries to tell you about how the true losses of this war are "our innocence" or "part of our humanity"... Whatever, bro. Tell it to the whales.

"The Road to West Egg" (2000).
2000s, 2000, Unacknowledged Legislation: Writers in the Public Sphere (2000)

"Advice to a Lady in Autumn", published in A Collection of Poems in Six Volumes. By Several Hands. Vol. I. (1763), printed by J. Hughs, for R. and J. Dodsley

Book I, ch. VI, Stay at the New Year's Islands. Discovery of lands to the southward. Return to the Cape of Good Hope.
A Voyage Round the World (1777)

2000s, 2002, State of the Union address (January 2002)

Source: Man’s Search for Himself (1953), p. 56

Maxim 1060
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