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About this quote

What does it mean?
People often think the past was better than the present, a belief that has existed throughout history.
In plain terms
We tend to idealize the past.
What can you take from it?
Beware of nostalgic bias.

Where it applies

  • when evaluating policy
  • when reminiscing

Putting it to work

  • use data to assess progress
  • challenge romanticized narratives

Questions to consider

  • Why do we romanticize earlier times?
  • How can we objectively compare eras?

Another view

Sometimes the past truly was worse, making nostalgia misleading.

More from Horace Greeley

  1. The masses of our countrymen, North and South, are eager to clasp hands across the bloody chasm which has so long divided them.

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  2. The Republic needed to be passed through chastening, purifying fires of adversity and suffering: so these came and did their work and the verdure of a new nati…

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  3. A widow of doubtful age will marry almost any sort of a white man.

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