Few men survey themselves with so much severity as not to admit prejudices in their own favor.
Interpretation
Men often fail to critically examine their own biases, especially those that benefit them.
This quote by Samuel Johnson highlights the tendency of individuals to overlook their own prejudices, particularly when these biases work in their favor. It suggests that self-reflection and honest assessment of oneβs beliefs and biases is a difficult yet necessary task in the pursuit of personal growth and understanding. By acknowledging our prejudices, we can cultivate a more genuine perspective and foster greater empathy toward others.
In practice
In a discussion about social justice, one might use this quote to highlight the importance of recognizing personal biases.
To be of no church is dangerous. Religion, of which the rewards are distant, and which is animated only by faith and hope, will glide by degrees out of the mind unless it be invigorated and reimpressed by external ordinances, by stated calls to worship, and the salutary influence of example.
He that reads and grows no wiser seldom suspects his own deficiency, but complains of hard words and obscure sentences, and asks why books are written which cannot be understood.
To let friendship die away by negligence and silence is certainly not wise. It is voluntarily to throw away one of the greatest comforts of the weary pilgrimage.
Fly-fishing may be a very pleasant amusement; but angling or float fishing I can only compare to a stick and a string, with a worm at one end and a fool at the other.
When any anxiety or gloom of the mind takes hold of you, make it a rule not to publish it by complaining; but exert yourselves to hide it, and by endeavoring to hide it you drive it away.
A fishing rod is a stick with a hook at one end and a fool at the other.
Surely you're not saying that God had to choose between long life and intelligence for human beings! It's there in your own Bible, Carlotta. Two trees - knowledge and life. You eat of the tree of knowledge and you will surely die. You eat of the tree of life and you remain a child in the garden forever, undying.
It is a hard matter, my fellow citizens, to argue with the belly, since it has no ears.
The ideal of the supreme being is nothing but a regulative principle of reason which directs us to look upon all connection in the world as if it originated from an all-sufficient necessary cause.
The Work always leaves you with less of a story. _x000D_ Who would you be without your story? _x000D_ You never know until you inquire. _x000D_ There is no story that is you or that leads to you. _x000D_ Every story leads away from you. _x000D_ Turn it around; undo it. _x000D_ You are what exists before all stories. _x000D_ You are what remains when the story is understood.
It's a curious thing in American life that the most abject nonsense will be excused if the utterer can claim the sanction of religion. A country which forbids an established church by law is prey to any denomination. The best that can be said is that this is pluralism of a kind.
Thats how we survive infinity - we kill it by breaking it up into small bits.
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