There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County. But it was a time of vague optimism for some of the people: Maycomb County had recently been told that it had nothing to fear but fear itself.
– Harper Lee
To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 1. Scout speaks of the “vague optimism”, a kind of hope, that was spreading throughout Maycomb. The quote about fear references the hope offerd by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his first inaugural address on March 4, 1933. He encourages people to look past their fears during the Great Depression.