Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
Interpretation
People often accept suffering rather than make the effort to change their situation.
This quote by Thomas Jefferson reflects on the human tendency to endure hardship and suffering when faced with familiar problems, rather than taking the difficult steps necessary to change their circumstances. It suggests that comfort in the known, even if painful, often outweighs the fear of the unknown that comes with attempting to correct a situation.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion about social change and activism.
The firmness with which the (American) people have withstood the... abuses of the press, the discernment they have manifested between truth and falsehood, show that they may safely be trusted to hear everything true and false and to form a correct judgment between them.
I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared
βWe must make our choice between economy and liberty or confusion and servitude...If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labor and in our amusements...if we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.
Very many and very meritorious were the worthy patriots who assisted in bringing back our government to its republican tack. To preserve it in that, will require unremitting vigilance.
A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
Perhaps my whisper was already born before my lips.
The greatest pride, or the greatest despondency, is the greatest ignorance of one's self.
The bud disappears when the blossom breaks through, and we might say that the former is refuted by the latter; in the same way when the fruit comes, the blossom may be explained to be a false form of the plant's existence, for the fruit appears as its true nature in place of the blossom.
Men are generally more careful of the breed of their horses and dogs than of their children.
I was a westerner in Iran, an Iranian in the West. I had no identity. I didn't even know anymore why I was living.
To deal with the true causes of war one must begin by recognizing as of prime relevancy to the solution of the problem the familiar fact that civilization is a partial, incomplete, and, to a great extent, superficial modification of barbarism.
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