A SHAKESPEARE PASSAGE THAT I HAD TO MEMORIZE IN HIGH SCHOOL SEEMS MORE APPROPRIATE FOR OBAMA THAN ANTONY’S ORATION:

But ’tis a common proof
that lowliness is young ambition’s ladder
whereto the climber upward turns his face

But when he once attains the utmost round,
he then unto the ladder turns his back
looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
by which he did ascend. So Caesar may.