An argument for gratitude...................

     Simply put, cultures that do not cherish their best selves die by their own hand.  We protect what we are grateful for.  That which we resent, we leave out for the trash man or let rot and decay in the elements, as the termites of human nature gnaw away at it.  Ingratitude is the spirit that inebriates us with despair and, in our dark moments, makes suicide seem heroic.
     "From whence shall we expect the approach of danger?" asked Abraham Lincoln.  "Shall some trans-Atlantic military giant step the earth and crush us at a blow?  Never.  All the armies of Europe and Asia . . . could not by force take a drink from the Ohio River or make a track in the Blue Ridge in the trial of a thousand years.  No, if destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher.  As a nation of free men we will live forever or die by suicide."

-Jonah Goldberg,  Suicide Of The West:  How The Rebirth Of Tribalism, Populism, Nationalism, And Identity Politics Is Destroying American Democracy