A Thesis

Modesty is the virtue of limitation which influences all actions. Often we understand modesty to be the wearing of sufficient clothing, but modesty really goes much farther. Mark Twain said “modesty died when clothes were born”. Twain identified an acutely American problem; not the immodesty resulting from too little, but the immodesty of too much. American today suffers under the weight of too much. Austerity (modesty applied to personal possessions), humility (modesty applied to actions) and self-awareness (the modest understanding of one’s self) are all lacking in American society. These lack of these three interconnected virtues is a contributing factor to growing personal debt, increasing health care needs, the widening wealth gap, increasingly centralized power, and a pervasive entitlement mentality. These problems are both problems themselves, and the causes of further problems, most concerning among them the problems we begin to face as the people’s understanding of government’s role becomes more socialistic in nature.