They that approve a private opinion, call it opinion; but they that dislike it, heresy; and yet heresy signifies no more than private opinion.
Interpretation
The quote discusses the subjective nature of opinions and how they are judged differently based on acceptance or rejection.
In this quote, Thomas Hobbes highlights the duality of opinions and the tendency of people to label prevailing beliefs as 'opinions' while rejecting opposing views as 'heresy'. This reflects the subjective nature of belief systems, suggesting that what is deemed a valid perspective by some can be dismissed as heretical by others, despite both being merely private opinions.
In practice
During a debate about free speech, this quote can illustrate how people respond differently to controversial opinions.
Baptism is the sacrament of allegiance of them that are to be received into the Kingdom of God, that is to say, into Eternal life, that is to say, to Remission of Sin. For as Eternal life was lost by the committing, so it is recovered by the remitting of men's sins.
Force and fraud are in war the two cardinal virtues.
For it is not the shape, but their use, that makes them angels.
For to accuse requires less eloquence, such is man's nature, than to excuse; and condemnation, than absolution, more resembles justice.
Scientia potentia est, sed parva; quia scientia egregia rara est, nec proinde apparens nisi paucissimis, et in paucis rebus. Scientiae enim ea natura est, ut esse intelligi non possit, nisi ab illis qui sunt scientia praediti.
The end of knowledge is power ... the scope of all speculation is the performing of some action or thing to be done.
One impossible day, of an impossible month, of an impossible year.
The discovery of personal whiteness among the world's peoples is a very modern thing - a nineteenth and twentieth century matter, indeed. The ancient world would have laughed at such a distinction.
To say that 'prayer changes things' is not as close to the truth as saying, 'prayer changes me and then I change things.' God has established things so that prayer, on the basis of redemption, changes the way a person looks at things.
As a man, casting off worn out garments taketh new ones, so the dweller in the body, entereth into ones that are new.
We live in a world of communication - everyone gets information about everyone else. There is universal comparison and you don't just compare yourself with the people next door, you compare yourself to people all over the world and with what is being presented as the decent, proper and dignified life. It's the crime of humiliation.
No system of regulation can safely be substituted for the operation of individual liberty as expressed in competition.
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