A good government may, indeed, redress the grievances of an injured people; but a strong people can alone build up a great nation.
Thomas Francis MeagherRead
I now bid farewell to the country of my birth - of my passions - of my death; a country whose misfortunes have invoked my sympathies - whose factions I sought to quell - whose intelligence I prompted to a lofty aim - whose freedom has been my fatal dream.
Interpretation
This quote reflects a deep emotional connection to one's homeland, intertwined with themes of struggle, aspiration, and loss.
In this poignant farewell, Thomas Francis Meagher expresses his profound attachment to his homeland, marked by a mix of passion and sorrow. He acknowledges the misfortunes that drew his sympathies and the struggles for freedom that inspired his aspirations, recognizing that his dreams for the country ultimately led to personal sacrifice and heartbreak.
In practice
During a memorial for a national hero, this quote can be used to reflect on the sacrifices made for freedom.
A good government may, indeed, redress the grievances of an injured people; but a strong people can alone build up a great nation.
Solomon, who was one of the Deity's favorites, had a copulation cabinet composed of seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. To save his life he could not have kept two of these young creatures satisfactorily refreshed, even if he had fifteen experts to help him. Necessarily almost the entire thousand had to go hungry for years and years on a stretch. Conceive of a man hardhearted enough to look daily upon all that suffering and not be moved to mitigate it.
I believe there is something going on in a conscious being, which includes many animals, as well as ourselves, that is not a computational activity. And to be conscious at all is not a quality that a computer as such will ever possess - no matter how complicated, no matter how well it plays chess or any of these things.
There is something almost cruel about the Christian's being placed in a world which in every way wants to pressure him to do the opposite of what God bids him to do.
When people get taken over by the ego to such an extent, there is nothing else in their mind except the ego. They can no longer feel or sense their humanity - what they share with other human beings, or even with other life forms on the planet. They are so identified with concepts in their minds that other human beings become concepts as well.
THE FATHER: But don't you see that the whole trouble lies here? In words, words. Each one of us has within him a whole world of things, each man of us his own special world. And how can we ever come to an understanding if I put in the words I utter the sense and value of things as I see them; while you who listen to me must inevitably translate them according to the conception of things each one of you has within himself. We think we understand each other, but we never really do.
His lifetime was less than a fraction of a second in infinity. Or maybe he did not even exist; maybe human beings, the planets, everything in Creation were a dream...an illusion. He smiled with humility when he remembered.
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