Justice and goodwill will outlast passion.
Interpretation
Justice and goodwill are more enduring than fleeting emotions like passion.
In this quote, Garfield suggests that while passion can be intense and vibrant, it is ultimately the principles of justice and goodwill that persist over time. This implies that actions driven by reason, fairness, and compassion will leave a lasting impact, outliving the temporary nature of emotional fervor.
In practice
In a speech about community values, one could use this quote to emphasize the importance of justice over emotional responses.
Statistical science is indispensable to modern statesmanship. In legislation as in physical science it is beginning to be understood that we can control terrestrial forces only by obeying their laws. The legislator must formulate in his statutes not only the national will, but also those great laws of social life revealed by statistics.
I am trying to do two things: dare to be a radical and not a fool, which is a matter of no small difficulty.
Now more than ever the people are responsible for the character of their Congress. If that body be ignorant, reckless, and corrupt, it is because the people tolerate ignorance, recklessness, and corruption.
If the power to do hard work is not a skill, it's the best possible substitute for it.
Next in importance to freedom and justice is popular education, without which neither freedom nor justice can be permanently maintained.
I never meet a ragged boy in the street without feeling that i may owe him a salute, for I know not what possibilities may be buttoned up under his coat.
Money will determine whether the accused goes to prison or walks out of the courtroom a free man.
Ferguson and St. Louis County are not the first places that we have become engaged to ensure fair and equitable policing, and they will not be the last. The Department of Justice will continue to work tirelessly to ensure that the Constitution has meaning for all communities.
To exclude all jurors who would be in the slightest way effected by the prospect of the death penalty would be to deprive the defendant of the impartial jury to which he or she is entitled under the law.
We are confident. We have ourselves. We know how to sacrifice. We know how to work. We know how to combat the forces that oppose us. But even more than that, we are true believers in the whole idea of justice. Justice is so much on our side, that that is going to see us through.
You white folks have long been eating the white meat of the chicken. We Negroes are now ready for some of the white meat instead of the dark meat.
We ask justice, we ask equality, we ask that all the civil and political rights that belong to citizens of the United States, be guaranteed to us and our daughters forever.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.