The man that brings ant-infested faggots into his hut should not grumble when lizards begin to pay him a visit.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that individuals should not complain about the consequences of actions they initiated themselves.
Chinua Achebe's quote emphasizes the importance of personal responsibility and awareness of the repercussions that accompany our choices. By bringing trouble or undesirable elements into our lives, we must accept the challenges and issues that arise from our decisions, much like drawing pests to one's home and then being surprised by their presence.
In practice
A teacher might use this quote to illustrate the importance of accountability in a classroom discussion.
In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to feel that the story that I was told about this religion wasn't perhaps completely whole, that something was left out.
Writers don't give prescriptions. They give headaches!
Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.
It is the storyteller who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have - otherwise their surviving would have no meaning.
Writing has always been a serious business for me. I felt it was a moral obligation. A major concern of the time was the absence of the African voice. Being part of that dialogue meant not only sitting at the table but effectively telling the African story from an African perspective - in full earshot of the world.
An angry man is always a stupid man.
Faith is a most precious commodity, without which we should be very badly off.
It is easy to be swept away by some overwhelming feeling, so it's helpful to remember that any stressful feeling is like a compassionate alarm clock that says, "You're caught in the dream."
With reference to the younger generation..."If the experience of their exhausted, insomniac, dispirited elders makes them decide they'd prefer not to go straight from the classroom to the cubicle to the coffin, it doesn't mean they're lazy. It means they're sane."
There's nothing you can do to see β it is a gift.
Look closely at those who patronize you. Half are unfeeling, half untaught.
It took me forty years of dealing with buddhism to finally realize that actually Buddha's discovery was happiness and bliss.
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