An innocent man is a sin before God. Inhuman and therefore untrustworthy. No man should live without absorbing the sins of his kind, the foul air of his innocence, even if it did wilt rows of angel trumpets and cause them to fall from their vines.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that innocence is a flaw that disconnects a person from the shared human experience of sin and moral complexity.
Toni Morrison's quote expresses the idea that true humanity encompasses the understanding and absorption of the suffering and sins of others. It argues that an innocent person, removed from the moral dilemmas faced by humanity, may be seen as untrustworthy because they lack the empathy and awareness that comes from sharing in the collective struggles and experiences of people. The imagery of wilting angel trumpets symbolizes the consequences of maintaining a state of innocence that ultimately distances one from the realities of life.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about moral philosophy in a classroom setting.
There is a certain kind of peace that is not merely the absence of war. It is larger than that. The peace I am thinking of is not at the mercy of history's rule, nor is it a passive surrender to the status quo. The peace I am thinking of is the dance of an open mind when it engages another equally open one -- an activity that occurs most naturally, most often in the reading/writing world we live in. Accessible as it is, this particular kind of peace warrants vigilance.
You looking good." "Devil's confusion. He lets me look good long as I feel bad.
What do you say? There really are no words for that. There really aren't. Somebody tries to say, 'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.' People say that to me. There's no language for it. Sorry doesn't do it. I think you should just hug people and mop their floor or something.
Like friendship, hatred needed more than physical intimacy; it wanted creativity and hard work to sustain itself
One of my kids was born in 1968. There were going to be political difficulties, but they were never going to have that level of hatred and contempt that my brothers and my sister and myself were exposed to.
In a way, her strangeness, her naiveté, her craving for the other half of her equation was the consequence of an idle imagination. Had she paints, or clay, or knew the discipline of the dance, or strings, had she anything to engage her tremendous curiosity and her gift for metaphor, she might have exchanged the restlessness and preoccupation with whim for an activity that provided her with all she yearned for. And like an artist with no art form, she became dangerous.
Pre-emptive war might fall within the framework of international law.
South Africa belongs to all who live in it, black and white.
That world is ended, as if it had never been. Let the race of Adam and Eve take warning.
Europe today is the most secular region in the world. Europe is the only region in the world experiencing population decline. Wherever you turn today the more religious the community, the larger on average are their families.
Memory is a strange Bell—Jubilee, and Knell.
For sin is just this, what man cannot by its very nature do with his whole being; it is possible to silence the conflict in the soul, but it is not possible to uproot it
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