To examine the causes of life, we must first have recourse to death.
Interpretation
Understanding life requires an awareness of death.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's quote suggests that to truly comprehend the essence and causes of life, one must consider the inevitability of death. This perspective emphasizes the interconnectedness of existence and mortality, pointing out that the meaning of life can be illuminated by acknowledging its transience and the finite nature of our experiences.
In practice
A speaker at a graduation ceremony might use this quote to remind students to value their lives in the face of life's impermanence.
Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of a void, but out of chaos; the materials must in the first place be afforded; it can give form to dark, shapeless substances, but cannot bring into being the substance itself.
The instructor can scarcely give sensibility where it is essentially wanting, nor talent to the unpercipient block. But he can cultivate and direct the affections of the pupil, who puts forth, as a parasite, tendrils by which to cling, not knowing to what - to a supporter or a destroyer.
What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow.
I shall commit my thoughts to paper, it is true; but that is a poor medium for the communication of feeling. I desire the company of a man who could sympathize with me, whose eyes would reply to mine.
Heavy misfortunes have befallen us, but let us only cling closer to what remains, and transfer our love for those whom we have lost to those who yet live. Our circle will be small, but bound close by the ties of affection and mutual misfortune. And when time shall have softened your despair, new and dear objects of care will be born to replace those of whom we have been so cruelly deprived.
Hateful day when I received life!' I exclaimed in agony. 'Accursed creator! Why did you form a monster so hideous that even you turned from me in disgust? God, in pity, made man beautiful and alluring, after his own image; but my form is a filthy type of yours, more horrid even from the very resemlance. Satan had his companions, fellow-devils, to admire and encourage him; but I am solitary and abhorred.' - Frankenstein
Nada is found within. It is a music without strings which plays in the body. It penetrates the inner and outer and leads you away from illusion.
To live for a principle, for the triumph of some reform by which all mankind are to be lifted up to be wedded to an idea may be, after all, the holiest and happiest of marriages.
Being a giver is not good for a 100-yard dash, but itβs valuable in a marathon.
What to the Slave is the 4th of July.
Hatred obscures all distinctions.
They watch on, evil, incredibly stupid, enjoying my destruction. 'Poor Grendel's had an accident,' I whisper. 'So may you all.
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