What is worse than having no sight is being able to see but having no vision.
Helen KellerRead
The test of all beliefs is their practical effect in life. If it be true that optimism compels the world forward, and pessimism retards it, then it is dangerous to propagate a pessimistic philosophy.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The impact of our beliefs shapes our reality, with optimism driving progress and pessimism slowing it down.
Helen Keller emphasizes the importance of beliefs and their consequences on life. She argues that while optimism serves to propel the world forward, pessimism can hinder progress, suggesting that spreading pessimistic views can be harmful. Therefore, it is crucial to understand and promote optimistic beliefs to foster a better and more progressive world.
Themes
BeliefsOptimismPessimismProgressPhilosophy
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared to inspire students during a motivational seminar.
More from Helen Keller
All quotes →What could be worse than being born without sight? Being born with sight and no vision.
Helen KellerRead
Knowledge is power." Rather, knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge - broad, deep knowledge - is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from low. To know the thoughts and deeds that have marked man's progress is to feel the great heart-throbs of humanity through the centuries; and if one does not feel in these pulsations a heavenward striving, one must indeed be deaf to the harmonies of life.
Helen KellerRead
Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction. Be heroes in an army of construction.
Helen KellerRead
Our beloved ones have not 'gone to a far country.' It is only the veil of sense that separates them from us, and even that veil grows thin when our thoughts reach out to them.
Helen KellerRead
It's wonderful to climb the liquid mountains of the sky. Behind me and before me is God and I have no fears.
Helen KellerRead
Similar quotes
If Liberia has failed, then, it is no evidence of the failure of the Negro in government. It is merely evidence of the failure of slavery.
Carter G. WoodsonRead
Taking somebody's money without permission is stealing, unless you work for the IRS; then it's taxation. Killing people en masse is homicidal mania, unless you work for the Army; then it's National Defense. Spying on your neighbors is invasion of privacy, unless you work for the FBI; then it's National Security. Running a whorehouse makes you a pimp and poisoning people makes you a murderer, unless you work for the CIA; then it's counter-intelligence.
Robert Anton WilsonRead
Modern totalitarianism can be defined as the establishment, by means of the state of exception, of a legal civil war that allows for the physical elimination not only of political adversaries but of entire categories of citizens who for some reason cannot be integrated into the political system
Giorgio AgambenRead
At the time I did not know that stories of life are often more like rivers than books.
Norman MacleanRead
There is no conversation more boring than the one where everybody agrees.
Michel De MontaigneRead
Modern war appears as a struggle led by all the State apparatuses and their general staffs against all men old enough to bear arms.
Simone WeilRead