Excerpt from Lives and Portraits of the Presidents of the United States

How much, for instance, at the start was done for us as a people by the choice of Washington as our great leader, First in War, First in Peace, and First in the hearts of his countrymen. The nation, after more than half a century since his death, may be said, in a measure, to be living on his Virtues. He, more than any other hero, without fear or reproach, by the purity of his life and the devotion of his whole nature to public affairs, raised the land at once to a respectable position, as he was accustomed modestly to say, among the nations of the world. His example has reacted upon the people whom he was called to represent, and doubtless on innumerable occasions has brightened the flame of patriotism and public virtue. Every statesman, and especially every President, must feel himself called upon to follow and privileged in following in his footsteps.