Peace has to be created, in order to be maintained. It is the product of Faith, Strength, Energy, Will, Sympathy, Justice, Imagination, and the triumph of principle. It will never be achieved by passivity and quietism.
Interpretation
Peace must be actively pursued and nurtured through strong values and actions.
This quote emphasizes that peace is not a passive state that can be obtained without effort; it requires active engagement and the cultivation of various virtues such as faith, strength, and justice. Dorothy Thompson suggests that achieving a lasting peace relies on a proactive approach, involving imagination and steadfast principles, rather than simply waiting for peace to occur or accepting the status quo.
In practice
In a speech on international relations, one might use this quote to highlight the importance of active diplomacy.
Courage, it would seem, is nothing less than the power to overcome danger, misfortune, fear, injustice, while continuing to affirm inwardly that life with all its sorrows is good; that everything is meaningful even if in a sense beyond our understanding; and that there is always tomorrow.
When liberty is taken away by force it can be restored by force. When it is relinquished voluntarily by default it can never be recovered.
It is not the fact of liberty but the way in which liberty is exercised that ultimately determines whether liberty itself survives.
Age is not measured by years. Nature does not equally distribute energy. Some people are born old and tired while others are going strong at seventy.
Only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live.
If we are to have peace on earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation; and this means we must develop a world perspective.
The more peace there is in us, the more peace there will be in our troubled world.
Peace is a day-to-day problem, the product of a multitude of events and judgments. Peace is not an 'is,' it is a 'becoming.'
We must be prepared to see an Association of Nations in conference growing into an organic system of world controls for world affairs and the keeping of the world’s peace, or we must be prepared for – a continuation of war.
Here's a notion: Peace in the Middle East would come about more easily if the region were governed by women.
I truly believe there is a field of peace within and that it can be enlivened and brought to the surface to be enjoyed by all.
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