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> It blows my absolute mind that these books were written a hundred years ago.

The more you read history, and the actual written words or written speeches of intellectuals and politicians, you'll continue to be amazed. Much of their language is poetic, and their prose seems more coherent than today's, but that's probably because they wrote a lot more letters to one another.

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Also anything not memorable has been lost. There's a selection bias.

Why are so many old houses built so well? It's not just because craftsmanship was better. It's because the ones not built so well didn't get old. (I owned a house built in 1884 for a few years. Most of it was excellent craftsmanship. Some ... not so much. Previous owners had been lucky the dining room floor had never been stressed too much.)

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