The whole life lies in the verb seeing.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
Morality arose largely as an empirical defence of the individual and society. Ever since intelligent beings began to be in contact, and consequently in friction, they have felt the need to guard themselves against each other's encroachments.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Morality is a way for individuals and societies to protect themselves from harm caused by others.
In this quote, Pierre Teilhard De Chardin expresses that morality emerged as a practical means for individuals and societies to defend themselves against the potential threats posed by human interactions. He suggests that the need for ethical guidelines arises from the friction that occurs when intelligent beings interact, indicating that morality is fundamentally tied to the dynamics of human relationships and the safeguarding of both personal and communal well-being.
Themes
MoralitySocietyDefenseIndividualInteractions
In practice
Example use cases
In a conversation about ethics in business, one might say, 'Morality arose largely as an empirical defence of the individual and society,' to emphasize the importance of ethical practices.
More from Pierre Teilhard De Chardin
All quotes →Religion and science are the two conjugated faces or phases of one and the same complete act of knowledge - the only one which can embrace the past and future of evolution and so contemplate, measure and fulfil them.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
The mineral world is a much more supple and mobile world than could be imagined by the science of the ancients. Vaguely analogous to the metamorphoses of living creatures, there occurs in the most solid rocks, as we now know, perpetual transformation of a mineral species.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
We may, perhaps, imagine that the creation was finished long ago. But that would be quite wrong. It continues still more magnificently, and at the highest levels of the world.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
Love alone is capable of uniting living beings in such a way as to complete and fulfill them, for it alone takes them and joins them by what is deepest in themselves. All we need is to imagine our ability to love developing until it embraces the totality of men and the earth.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
If there is one thing I fear less than everything else, it is, I believe, persecution for my opinions. There are a good many points about which I may be diffident, but when it comes to questions of Truth and intellectual independence, there is no holding me - I can envisage no finer end than to sacrifice oneself for a conviction.
Pierre Teilhard De ChardinRead
Similar quotes
I think 'The Act of Killing' forced people to look at the problem, but the problem is actually a state run by thugs, or a shadow state, a part of the state that's run by thugs, and a military that enjoys complete legal - not just impunity, but immunity.
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He was the average mortal. It troubled him to get used to the world one way and then suddenly have it turn different.
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What could ever be a sufficient reason for excusing in any way the direct murder of the innocent? This is precisely what we are dealing with here. Whether inflicted upon the mother or upon the child, it is against the precept of God and the law of nature: 'Thou shalt not kill.'
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The custom of speaking to God Almighty as freely as with a slave - caring nothing whether the words are suitable or not, but simply saying the first thing that comes to mind from being learnt by rote by frequent repetition - cannot be called prayer: God grant that no Christian may address Him in this manner.
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For while this year it may be a Catholic against whom the finger of suspicion is pointed, in other years it has been, and may someday be again, a Jew— or a Quaker or a Unitarian or a Baptist. It was Virginia's harassment of Baptist preachers, for example, that helped lead to Jefferson's statute of religious freedom. Today I may be the victim, but tomorrow it may be you — until the whole fabric of our harmonious society is ripped at a time of great national peril.
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One of the most important and rewarding ways in which we can serve our fellowmen is by living and sharing the principles of the gospel. We need to help those whom we seek to serve to know for themselves that God not only loves them but he is ever mindful of them and their needs. To teach our neighbors of the divinity of the gospel is a command reiterated by the Lord: 'It becometh every man who hath been warned to warn his neighbor' (D&C 88:81).
Spencer W. KimballRead