Jacob A. Riis (1849–1914). Theodore Roosevelt, the Citizen. 1904.
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| ALL summer I have been fighting for leeway to sit down and write about Theodore Roosevelt, and glad am I that I have come to it at last. For there is nothing I know of that I would rather. But let us have a clear understanding about it. I am not going to write a “life” of him. I have seen it said in print that that was my intention. Well, it was. That was the shape it took in my mind at the start; but not for long. Perhaps one of the kindest things the years do for us as they pass is to show us what things we can not do. In that way they have been very kind to me. When I was twenty, there was nothing I could not do. Now I am glad that there are stronger and fitter hands than mine to do many things I had set my heart on. They must do this, then. |