I suppose the thing I most would have liked to have known or been reassured about is that in the world, what counts more than talent, what counts more than energy or concentration or commitment, or anything else - is kindness. And the more in the world that you encounter kindness and cheerfulness - which is its kind of amiable uncle or aunt - the better the world always is. And all the big words: virtue, justice, truth - are dwarfed by the greatness of kindness.
Interpretation
Kindness is more important than talent or hard work in making the world a better place.
In this quote, Stephen Fry emphasizes that kindness surpasses other admirable qualities such as talent and dedication. He suggests that the presence of kindness and cheerfulness in the world can enhance life's experience, making virtues like justice and truth seem small in comparison to the profound impact of being kind to others.
In practice
During a speech about community service at a local charity event.
I used many times to touch my own chest and feel, under its asthmatic quiver, the engine of the heart and lungs and blood and feel amazed at what I sensed was the enormity of the power I possessed. Not magical power, but real power. The power simply to go on, the power to endure, that is power enough, but I felt I had also the power to create, to add, to delight, to amaze and to transform.
To be human and to be adult means constantly to be in the grip of opposing emotions, to have daily to reconcile apparently conflicting tensions. I want this, but need that. I cherish this, but I adore its opposite too.
There comes a time when the blankness of the future is just so extreme, it's like such a black wall of nothingness. Not of bad things like a cave full of monsters and so, you're afraid of entering it. It's just nothingness, the void, emptiness and it is just horrible. It's like contemplating a future-less future and so you just want to step out of it. The monstrosity of being alive overwhelms you.
As someone who worked hard for a Labour victory in the 90s, do I regret it? Not really. It was bound to happen. And it'll happen with the next government, and the one after it. Because all governments serve us. They serve the filth.
It's now very common to hear people say 'I'm rather offended by that'.
You can't just say there is a God because well, the world is beautiful. You have to account for bone cancer in children. You have to account for the fact that almost all animals in the wild live under stress with not enough to eat and will die violent and bloody deaths. There is not any way that you can just choose the nice bits and say that means there is a God and ignore the true fact of what nature is.
For what can be more noble than to slay oneself? Not literally. Not with a blade in the guts. But to extinguish the selfish self within, that part which looks only to its own preservation, to save its own skin. That, I saw, was the victory you Spartans had gained over yourselves. That was the glue. It was what you had learned and it made me stay, to learn it too.
I know who I am. And after all these years, there's a victory in that.
There is nothing so stupid as the educated man if you get him off the thing he was educated in.
We can easily become as much slaves to precaution as we can to fear. Although we can never rivet our fortune so tight as to make it impregnable, we may by our excessive prudence squeeze out of the life that we are guarding so anxiously all the adventurous quality that makes it worth living.
Self confidence is the ability to exercise restraint in the face of disrespect and still show respect in response.
You're worth something because God says you're worth something-not because of what people think or say about you.
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