Freedom for the wolves has often meant death to the sheep.
Isaiah BerlinRead
Only barbarians are not curious about where they come from, how they came to be where they are, where they appear to be going, whether they wish to go there, and if so, why, and if not, why not.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of self-reflection and curiosity about one's origins and future direction.
Isaiah Berlin suggests that a lack of curiosity about one’s past, present circumstances, and future is a sign of barbarism. He contends that understanding ourselves and our paths is crucial in leading a thoughtful and meaningful life, as it shapes our identity and informs our decisions.
Themes
CuriositySelf-ReflectionIdentityPhilosophySelf-Awareness
In practice
Example use cases
During a seminar on personal development, this quote could be used to prompt discussion about self-awareness.
More from Isaiah Berlin
All quotes →Injustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance - these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible.
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All central beliefs on human matters spring from a personal predicament.
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The underlying assumption that human nature is basically the same at all times, everywhere, and obeys eternal laws beyond human control, is a conception that only a handful of bold thinkers have dared to question.
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The case against the notion of historical objectivity is like the case against international law, or international morality; that it does not exist.
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Utopias have their value -- nothing so wonderfully expands the imaginative horizons of human potentialities -- but as guides to conduct they can prove literally fatal.
Isaiah BerlinRead
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Fantasy is an area where it is possible to talk about right and wrong, good and evil, with a straight face. In mainstream fiction and even in a good deal of mystery, these things are presented as simply two sides of the same coin. Never really more than a matter of where you happen to be standing.
Robert JordanRead
The organization controlling the material equipment of our everyday life is such that what in itself would enable us to construct it richly plunges us instead into a poverty of abundance, making alienation all the more intolerable as each convenience promises liberation and turns out to be only one more burden. We are condemned to slavery to the means of liberation.
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Behavior is the mirror in which everyone shows their image.
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My social philosophy may be said to be enshrined in three words: liberty, equality and fraternity. Let no one, however, say that I have borrowed by philosophy from the French Revolution. I have not. My philosophy has roots in religion and not in political science. I have derived them from the teachings of my Master, the Buddha.
B. R. AmbedkarRead
The more one lives alone on the river or in the open country, the clearer it becomes that nothing is more beautiful or great than to perform the ordinary duties of one's daily life simply and naturally.
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For the current of our spiritual life creeds, rituals and channels that may thwart or help, according to their fixity or openness. When a symbol or spiritual idea becomes rigidly elaborate in its construction, it supplants the idea which it should support.
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