Senior year...
This is an excellent time to have stumbled on a version of a handout that Mr. Shewell gave us way back when in AP US History.
"Toward the end of his tragic, devoted life, Robert E. Lee attended the christening of a friend's child.The mother of the child asked Lee for words that would help her guide the child along his path to manhood. Lee’s answer was brief: 'Teach him to deny himself.' We don’t emphasize self-denial much these days, either for our children or for ourselves. Instead we concentrate on our wants. We seem to have the notion that the world owes us all manner of good things, and we feel abused when we don’t get them. Self-discipline is a bore; and as a result we are perilously close to winning an unwelcome fame as a land known for its spoiled children and discontented adults....Americans, for the most part, have never learned how to do without stuff. The lesson we have never learned very well is that what the world demands of us is a great deal more important than what we are entitled to demand of it."
That's all.