License they mean when they cry Liberty; For who loves that, must first be wise and good.
Interpretation
True liberty requires wisdom and goodness.
In this quote, John Milton emphasizes that the essence of liberty is deeply rooted in wisdom and moral virtue. Without the qualities of understanding and goodness, the concept of freedom can be superficial or misused, suggesting that those who value true liberty must possess a strong moral and intellectual foundation to appreciate and uphold it.
In practice
At a graduation ceremony to inspire students to lead with integrity.
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.
We should also leave behind discrimination, because it is narrow-minded and ignorant, denies contact and warmth; and corrodes mankind's belief that we can better ourselves. The only way to avoid misunderstanding, war and bloodshed is to defend freedom of expression and to communicate with sincerity, concern and good intentions.
A thought that sometimes makes me hazy: Am I - or are the others crazy?
But as the scissors snip-snapped through her hair and the razor shaved the rest, she realized with a sudden awful panic that she could no longer recall anything from the past. I cannot remember, she whispered to herself. I cannot remember. She's been shorn of memory as brutally as she'd been shorn of her hair, without permission, without reason... Gone, all gone, she thought again wildly, no longer even sure what was gone, what she was mourning.
In thy face I see the map of honour, truth and loyalty.
The expression to write something down suggests a descent of thought to the fingers whose movements immediately falsify it.
More than its utilitarian and technocratic transparency, it is the opaque ambivalence of its oddities that makes the city livable.
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