The entire world is my temple, and a very fine one too, if I'm not mistaken, and I'll never lack priests to serve it as long as there are men.
Desiderius ErasmusRead
Man is to man either a god or a wolf.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that humans can exhibit both divine qualities and brutal instincts toward one another.
Desiderius Erasmus's quote delves into the dual nature of humanity, implying that we have the capacity for both benevolence and cruelty. Just as a god symbolizes the highest ideals of kindness, compassion, and support, a wolf represents instinctual savagery and self-serving behavior. This dichotomy suggests that our treatment of each other oscillates between these two extremes, reflecting the complexities of human relationships and morality.
In practice
In a discussion on ethics, one might cite this quote to illustrate the complexities of human interactions.
The entire world is my temple, and a very fine one too, if I'm not mistaken, and I'll never lack priests to serve it as long as there are men.
When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes.
You'll see certain Pythagorean whose belief in communism of property goes to such lengths that they pick up anything lying about unguarded, and make off with it without a qualm of conscience as if it had come to them by law.
[N]o party is any fun unless seasoned with folly.
If you look at history you'll find that no state has been so plagued by its rulers as when power has fallen into the hands of some dabbler in philosophy or literary addict.
Fortune favours the audacious.
My mouth is full of decayed teeth and my soul of decayed ambitions.
I do not know if there is a more dreadful word in the English language than that word "lost."
For as men in battle are continually in the way of shot, so we, in this world, are ever within the reach of Temptation.
Lord, give me firmness without hardness, steadfastness without dogmatism, love without weakness.
The constant assertion of belief is an indication of fear.
A hostility to modernity is shared by ideologies that have nothing else in common - a nostalgia for moral clarity, small-town intimacy, family values, primitive communism, ecological sustainability, communitarian solidarity, or harmonies with the rhythms of nature.
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