Nothing is more incumbent on the old than to know when they should get out of the way and relinquish to younger successors the honors they can no longer earn, and the duties they can no longer perform.
Interpretation
Older individuals should recognize when it's time to step aside and allow younger generations to lead.
This quote emphasizes the importance of wisdom and humility among the older generation. Thomas Jefferson suggests that with age comes the responsibility to acknowledge one's limitations and to make way for the youth who have the energy, ability, and potential to take on roles that the older generation can no longer fulfill effectively. It is a call for older individuals to pass on the torch to ensure progress continues in society.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech at a retirement party to highlight the importance of passing on responsibilities.
The firmness with which the (American) people have withstood the... abuses of the press, the discernment they have manifested between truth and falsehood, show that they may safely be trusted to hear everything true and false and to form a correct judgment between them.
I, place economy among the first & most important republican virtues, & public debt as the greatest of the dangers to be feared
We must make our choice between economy and liberty or confusion and servitude...If we run into such debts, we must be taxed in our meat and drink, in our necessities and comforts, in our labor and in our amusements...if we can prevent the government from wasting the labor of the people, under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.
Very many and very meritorious were the worthy patriots who assisted in bringing back our government to its republican tack. To preserve it in that, will require unremitting vigilance.
A nation, as a society, forms a moral person, and every member of it is personally responsible for his society.
Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
You cannot force ideas. Successful ideas are the result of slow growth. Ideas do not reach perfection in a day, no matter how much study is put upon them.
You cannot go around and keep score. If you keep score on the good things and the bad things, you'll find out that you're a very miserable person. God gave man the ability to forget, which is one of the greatest attributes you have. Because if you remember everything that's happened to you, you generally remember that which is the most unfortunate.
In this world of numbness and information overload, the ability to feel, my boy, is a rare gift indeed.
The wise ones fashioned speech with their thought, sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve.
Turn off your radio. Put away your daily paper. Read one review of events a week and spend some time reading good books. They tell too of days of striving and of strife. They are of other centuries and also of our own. They make us realize that all times are perilous, that men live in a dangerous world, in peril constantly of losing or maiming soul and body. We get some sense of perspective reading such books. Renewed courage and faith and even joy to live.
Egolessness is contentment. Egoless, you don't expect anything, and just a small child smiles at you, but it is so beautiful. What else could you need? Suddenly you see a flower and the flower sends its perfume to you. What else could you need? What more could you want? The whole sky goes on filling with stars, the whole life becomes a celebration because now everything is beautiful. Without expectation everything fulfills - just to breathe is enough, just to breathe is such a bliss.
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