5.

Cynicism salves the pain of unrealized hope. If we convince ourselves that nothing can change, we don't have to risk acting on our dreams. But the more we accept this, the more we deny core parts of ourselves. We deny even the possibility that our choices can matter....

As the poet and essayist Lewis Hyde points out, [cynicism] becomes "the voice of the trapped who have come to enjoy their cage." Accordingly, we might think of a modern cynic as someone who's given up all hope of finding a door, much less a key. And we might remember that there are better ways to live.

from Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time, by Paul Loeb, St. Martin's Press, 1999. Read the whole excerpt here, at Earth Island Journal. Thanks to Chris Clarke for the link.