… is from pages 3-4 of Joseph Epstein’s 1999 book, Narcissus Leaves the Pool:
As for how easy my physical life has been, let me count the ways: I have never been tortured; I have never been shot or stabbed; I have never, after the age of ten, been in a serious fight; I have never fallen from a horse; I have never been hungry or thirsty for more than a few hours. Perhaps only an American in the twentieth century can make such a happy claim, but in the physical realm I have known almost nothing of pain, deprivation, or humiliation.
In the sixteenth century, certainly no one would have been so privileged.


As for how easy my physical life has been, let me count the ways: I have never been tortured; I have never been shot or stabbed; I have never, after the age of ten, been in a serious fight; I have never fallen from a horse; I have never been hungry or thirsty for more than a few hours. Perhaps only an American in the twentieth century can make such a happy claim, but in the physical realm I have known almost nothing of pain, deprivation, or humiliation.
