Little boldness is needed to assail the opinions and practices of notoriously wicked men; but to rebuke great and good men for their conduct, and to impeach their discernment, is the highest effort of moral courage.
Interpretation
It takes more courage to challenge the actions of good people than to criticize the wicked.
In this quote, William Lloyd Garrison emphasizes the significance of moral courage, particularly in the context of confronting individuals who are generally regarded as virtuous or good. While it may be easy to criticize those who are morally reprehensible, true bravery lies in the ability to question and challenge the decisions or actions of those who are well-respected, highlighting the complexity of moral judgment and the difficulty of navigating ethical dilemmas.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of standing up for one's beliefs even when it's difficult.
Our country is the world, our countrymen are all mankind. We love the land of our nativity, only as we love all other lands. The interests, rights, and liberties of American citizens are no more dear to us than are those of the whole human race. Hence we can allow no appeal to patriotism, to revenge any national insult or injury.
Surely, nothing can be more dangerous than the doctrine that the moral obligations of men change with the latitude and longitude of a place.
I do not believe that God has created us under this dire necessity to toil, like beasts, to sustain life. I believe it is his will that we should hold absolute mastery over time, so as to devote it mainly to intellectual and moral improvement, domestic enjoyment, and social intercourse.
If the State cannot survive the anti-slavery agitation, then let the State perish. If the Church must be cast down by the strugglings of Humanity to be free, then let the Church fall and its fragments be scattered to the four winds of Heaven, never more to curse the earth.
Has not the experience of two centuries shown that gradualism in theory is perpetuity in practice? Is there an instance, in the history of the world, where slaves have been educated for freedom by their task-masters?
The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead.
Unarmed hand-to-hand fighting does not change through the ages; only the name changes, and it has only one rule: do it first, do it fast, do it dirtiest.
Bring on your tear gas, bring on your grenades, your new supplies of Mace, your state troopers and even your national guards. But let the record show we ain't going to be turned around.
The test of a people is what they can do when they're tired.
To have faith requires courage, the ability to take a risk, the readiness even to accept pain and disappointment. Whoever insists on safety and security as primary conditions of life cannot have faith; whoever shuts himself off in a system of defense, where distance and possession are his means of security, makes himself a prisoner. To be loved, and to love, need courage, the courage to judge certain values as of ultimate concern – and to take the jump and to stake everything on these values.
From the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire, let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York, let freedom ring. From the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania, let freedom ring. But not only that: Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
I have hurt my community. I have to look myself in the mirror and know that, and I have to own that in order to grow past that.
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