What am I pondering, you ask? So help me God, immortality.
Interpretation
The quote reflects a deep contemplation on the concept of immortality and the significance it holds in human thought.
In this quote by John Milton, the speaker reveals that they are engaged in a profound thought about immortality, suggesting that the concept is of great importance to them. The invocation of divine help emphasizes the weightiness of the idea, as pondering immortality often leads to existential questions about life, purpose, and what lies beyond death.
In practice
During a lecture on philosophy, one might use this quote to initiate a discussion on the implications of immortality.
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld Of Paradise, so late their happy seat, Waved over by that flaming brand, the gate With dreadful faces thronged and fiery arms: Some natural tears they dropped, but wiped them soon; The world was all before them, where to choose Their place of rest, and Providence their guide; They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and slow, Through Eden took their solitary way.
The stars, that nature hung in heaven, and filled their lamps with everlasting oil, give due light to the misled and lonely traveller.
Ev'n them who kept thy truth so pure of old, When all our fathers worshipp'd stocks and stones.
Abashed the devil stood and felt how awful goodness is and saw Virtue in her shape how lovely: and pined his loss
The end of all learning is to know God, and out of that knowledge to love and imitate Him.
Apt words have power to suage the tumors of a troubled mind.
When you have a global mush, people lose their identity, they become pseudonyms, they have no investment and no consequence in what they do.
blindness is a private matter between a person and the eyes with which he or she was born.
In whatever guise - our own daily nightmares of war, intolerance, inhumanity or the struggles of an Assistant Pig-Keeper against the Lord of Death - the problems are agonizingly familiar. And an openness to compassion, love, and mercy is as essential to us here and now as it is to any inhabitant of an imaginary kingdom.
Slavery it is that makes slavery; freedom, freedom. The slavery of women happened when the men were slaves of kings.
We live in an almost perfect stillness and work with incredible urgency.
People have to be atomized and segregated and alone. They're not supposed to organize, because then they might be something beyond spectators of action. They might actually be participants if many people with limited resources could get together to enter the political arena. That's really threatening.
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