In Snaps: 2005–2015, by David Remnick, in the Feb. 23/ Mar, 2 issue of the New Yorker (the President in the following  is Obama):

“I think we are born into this world and inherit all the grudges and rivalries and hatreds and sins of the past,” the President said in a series of interviews for The New Yorker. “But we also inherit the beauty and the joy and goodness of our forebears. And we’re on this planet a pretty short time, so that we cannot remake the world entirely during this little stretch that we have. But I think our decisions matter.” He added, “At the end of the day, we’re part of a long-running story. We just try to get our paragraph right.”