This list may point to mere events, but if you reflect closely on the events themselves, you will find that each gives expression to the youthful persona of a distinct generation—a generation with its own location in history, its own worldview, and its own sense of “essential destiny.” If you belong to America, you belong to an American generation. The same is probably true of most of your ancestors and heirs. All of history is nothing more than a sequence of collective biographies like yours and theirs.
