The essence of immorality is the tendency to make an exception of myself.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that immorality arises when individuals prioritize their own needs and desires above moral standards.
Jane Addams highlights a critical aspect of immorality: the hypocrisy often displayed by individuals who believe that the rules that apply to everyone else do not apply to them. This mindset creates a double standard where personal interests override ethical considerations, leading to selfishness and a breakdown of social morals.
In practice
In a discussion on ethical leadership, one might quote Addams to emphasize the importance of accountability.
I might believe I had unusual talent if I did not know what good music was; I might enjoy half an hour's practice a day if I were busy and happy the rest of the time. You do not know what life means when all the difficulties are removed! I am simply smothered and sickened with advantages. It is like eating a sweet dessert the first thing in the morning.
America's future will be determined by the home and the school. The child becomes largely what he is taught; hence we must watch what we teach, and how we live.
Action indeed is the sole medium of expression for ethics.
I am not one of those who believe - broadly speaking - that women are better than men. We have not wrecked railroads, nor corrupted legislatures, nor done many unholy things that men have done; but then we must remember that we have not had the chance.
Nothing could be worse than the fear that one had given up too soon, and left one unexpended effort that might have saved the world.
National events determine our ideals, as much as our ideals determine national events.
A faith without some doubts is like a human body with no antobodies in it. People who blithely go through life too busy or indifferent to ask the hard questions about why they believe as they do will find themselves defenseless against either the experience of tragedy or the probing questions of a smart skeptic. A person's faith can collapse almost overnight if she failed over the years to listen patiently to her own doubts, which should only be discarded after long reflection.
I don't believe in God but I'm very interested in her.
To practice Zen or the Martial Arts, you must live intensely, wholeheartedly, without reserve - as if you might die in the next instant
The descent to the infernal regions is easy enough, but to retrace one's steps, and reach the air above, there's the rub.
Even Castles made of sand, fall into the sea, eventually.
The blessed spirits must be sought within the self which is common to all
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