To denounce does not free the self from what it hates, any more than ignoring the past shuts off its influence.
Interpretation
Rejecting something does not release a person from its negative impact, just as ignoring the past does not erase its effects.
This quote emphasizes that merely denouncing or rejecting something a person dislikes does not alleviate the internal struggle associated with that sentiment. It suggests that one must confront and acknowledge their feelings and past influences rather than attempt to escape them through denial or condemnation. Ignoring these aspects does not diminish their power over one's life; instead, they require thoughtful consideration and resolution for true liberation.
In practice
In a discussion about how to cope with trauma, one might use this quote to highlight the importance of facing one's past.
Let us face a pluralistic world in which there are no universal churches, no single remedy for all diseases, no one way to teach or write or sing, no magic diet, no world poets, and no chosen races, but only the wretched and wonderfully diversified human race.
Machines are admirable and tyrannize only with the user's consent. Where, then, is the enemy? Not where the machine gives relief from drudgery but where human judgment abdicates. The smoothest machine-made product of the age is the organization man, for even the best organizing principle tends to corrupt, and the mechanical principle corrupts absolutely.
In teaching you cannot see the fruit of a day's work. It is invisible and remains so, maybe for twenty years.
I can only think that the book is read because it deals with the difficulties of schooling, which do not change. Please note: the difficulties, not the problems. Problems are solved or disappear with the revolving times. Difficulities remain. It will always be difficult to teach well, to learn accurately; to read, write, and count readily and competently; to acquire a sense of history and start one's education or anothers.
Convince yourself that you are working in clay, not marble, on paper not eternal bronze: Let that first sentence be as stupid as it wishes.
The world has long observed that small acts of immorality, if repeated, will destroy character. It is equally manifest, though never said, that uttering nonsense and half-truth without cease ends by destroying Intellect
Men lose all the material things they leave behind them in this world, but they carry with them the reward of their charity and the alms they give. For these, they will receive from the Lord the reward and recompense they deserve.
Life and death live and die in exactly the same spot, the body. It is from there that both babies and cancers are born.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that from puberty onwards, the female body is disgusting and unruly and must be tamed, trimmed and tinted to within an inch of its life before it can be allowed to roam freely in the public eye.
The last thing to collapse is the surface.
I shall be as secret as the grave.
In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.
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