The key to wisdom is this - constant and frequent questioning, for by doubting we are led to question and by questioning we arrive at the truth.
Peter AbelardRead
We call an intention good which is right in itself, but the action is good, not because it contains within it some good, but because it issues from a good intention.
Interpretation
A good intention is what makes an action morally right, not the action itself.
This quote by Peter Abelard emphasizes the significance of good intentions behind actions. It suggests that the moral value of an action stems from the purity of the intention that inspires it, rather than the action being inherently good in nature. This highlights the importance of motive in ethical considerations.
In practice
During a discussion about ethics in a philosophy class.
The key to wisdom is this - constant and frequent questioning, for by doubting we are led to question and by questioning we arrive at the truth.
By doubting we are led to question, by questioning we arrive at the truth.
And now, my friend, I am going to expose to you all my weaknesses. All men, I believe, are under a necessity of paying tribute at some time or other to Love, and it is vain to strive to avoid it. I was a philosopher, yet this tyrant of the mind triumphed over all my wisdom; his darts were of greater force than all my reasonings, and with a sweet constraint he led me wherever he pleased.
Are you not moved to tears and bitter compassion, when you behold the only Son of God seized by the most impious, dragged away, mocked, scourged, buffeted, spit upon, crowned with thorns, hung upon the infamous cross between two thieves, finally in such a horrible and execrable manner suffering death, for your salvation and that of the world?
Our redemption through the suffering of Christ is that deeper love within us which not only frees us from slavery to sin, but also secures for us the true liberty of the children of God, in order that we might do all things out of love rather than out of fear - love for him that has shown us such grace that no greater can be found.
In doubting we come to inquiry; by inquiry we perceive the truth.
If you don't have the smoking gun, then it's pointless to hector interviewees. Because you just shut people up instead of opening them up.
I have an intellectual inclination for democratic institutions, but I am instinctively an aristocrat, which means that I despise and fear the masses. I passionately love liberty, legality, the respect for rights, but not democracy....liberty is my foremost passion. That is the truth.
Unity consciousness is a state of enlightenment where we pierce the mask of illusion which creates separation and fragmentation. Behind the appearance of separation is one unified field of wholeness. Here the seer and the scenery are one.
Law has become a business. Health care has become a business. Unfortunately, politics has also become a business. That really undermines society.
A man who has no office to go, to I don't care who he is, is a trial of which you can have no conception.
Let me tell you something: for hundreds of thousands of years, this kind of discussion would have been impossible to have, or those like us would have been having it at the risk of our lives. Religion now comes to us in this smiley-face, ingratiating way — because it’s had to give so much more ground and because we know so much more. But you’ve got no right to forget the way it behaved when it was strong, and when it really did believe that it had God on its side.
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