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… is from page 279 of the 1996 Johns Hopkins University Press edition of H.L. Mencken’s immensely enjoyable 1941 autobiographical volume, Heathen Days [2]; here, Mencken recalls when he, upon entering journalism, first encountered politicians:
They shocked me a little at my first intimate contact with them, for I had never suspected, up to then, that frauds so bold and shameless could flourish in a society presumably Christian, and under the eye of a putatively watchful God. But as I came to know them better and better I began to develop a growing admiration, if not for their virtue, then at least for their professional virtuosity….
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