The most important lesson in the writing trade is that any manuscript is improved if you cut away the fat.
Robert A. HeinleinRead
Men rarely if ever dream up a god superior to themselves. Most gods have the manners and morals of a spoiled child.
Interpretation
People often create gods in their own image, reflecting human flaws and immaturities.
This quote suggests that humans tend to envision gods that mirror their own traits, particularly the less admirable aspects of human nature. It implies that the attributes assigned to deities are often reflections of our own weaknesses and failings, rather than ideals of wisdom and virtue.
In practice
Use this quote in a discussion about the nature of religion and its impact on human behavior.
The most important lesson in the writing trade is that any manuscript is improved if you cut away the fat.
An armed society is a polite society.
Democracy is a poor system of government at best; the only thing that can honestly be said in its favor is that it is eight times as good as any other method the human race has ever tried.
Long human words (the longer the better) were easy, unmistakable, and rarely changed their meanings . . . but short words were slippery, unpredictable, changing their meanings without any pattern.
Progress is made by lazy men looking for easier ways to do things.
When a place gets crowded enough to require ID's, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.
A distracted existence leads us to no goal
The unbeliever imagines that religion pretends to offer answers, while the believer knows that the only promise it makes is to multiply questions.
History is not Time; nor is evolution. They are both consequences. Time is a state: the flame in which there lives the salamander of the human soul.
There is a daily discussion with our servants about the price of food and the number of loaves: a conference with our presbyters to consider the sins of our people is a very rare occurrence.
But most it is presumption in us when the help of heaven we count the act of men.
Do you see O my brothers and sisters? It is not chaos or death, it is form, union, plan, it is eternal life, it is happiness.
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