As a nation, we may take pride in the fact that we are softhearted; but we cannot afford to be soft-headed.
Interpretation
We should balance compassion with rational thinking as a society.
Franklin D. Roosevelt's quote emphasizes the importance of combining empathy with sound judgment in national decision-making. While it's commendable to be compassionate and caring, it is crucial that these qualities do not lead to folly or ineffective policies. Roosevelt urges that a nation must maintain its rationality while being softhearted to thrive.
In practice
Discussing the balance of empathy and rational policy in a community meeting.
There has been one persistent theme through all Axis propaganda. This theme has been that Americans are admittedly rich, that Americans have considerable industrial power - but that Americans are soft and decadent, that they cannot and will not unite and work and fight. ... Let them tell that to the Marines!
The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.
A war of ideas can no more be won without books than a naval war can be won without ships. Books, like ships, have the toughest armor, the longest cruising range, and mount the most powerful guns.
Better the occasional faults of a government that lives in a spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a government frozen in the ice of its own indifference.
Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.
A world turned into a stereotype, a society converted into a regiment, a life translated into a routine, make it difficult for either art or artists to survive. Crush individuality in society and you crush art as well. Nourish the conditions of a free life and you nourish the arts, too.
Religion is a feature of cultural evolution that, among other things, addresses anxieties created by cultural evolution; it helps keep social change safe from itself.
Life is the dancer and you are the dance.
Generally the officers of the army were indifferent whether the annexation [of Texas] was consummated or not; but not so all of them. For myself, I was bitterly opposed to the measure, and to this day regard the war, which resulted, as one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation. It was an instance of a republic following the bad example of European monarchies, in not considering justice in their desire to acquire additional territory.
It is the resurrection that makes Good Friday good.
The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man; and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one's gloves.
If you're going to be unreligious, it's likely going to be due to reflecting on it and finding some things that are hard to believe.
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