One is a member of a country, a profession, a civilization, a religion. One is not just a man.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the multifaceted identity of a person beyond their individual existence.
Antoine De Saint-Exupery's quote reflects on the idea that a person's identity is shaped by various groups and affiliations they belong to, such as their country, profession, civilization, and religion. It suggests that these collective identities play a crucial role in defining who we are and how we relate to the world, challenging the notion of seeing ourselves simply as individuals.
In practice
In a speech about community involvement, one might say, 'As Antoine De Saint-Exupery noted, one is a member of so many facets of society, which makes our contributions that much more meaningful.'
Grown-ups love figures... When you tell them you've made a new friend they never ask you any questions about essential matters. They never say to you "What does his voice sound like? What games does he love best? Does he collect butterflies? " Instead they demand "How old is he? How much does he weigh? How much money does his father make? " Only from these figures do they think they have learned anything about him.
Attitude is a paintbrush. It colors everything!
Water, thou hast no taste, no color, no odor; canst not be defined, art relished while ever mysterious. Not necessary to life, but rather life itself, thou fillest us with a gratification that exceeds the delight of the senses.
In those days, I didn't understand anything. I should have judged her according to her actions, not her words. She perfumed my planet and lit up my life. I should never have run away! I ought to have realized the tenderness underlying her silly pretensions. Flowers are so contadictory! But I was too young to know how to love her.
When a mystery is too overpowering, one dare not disobey.
When the body sinks into death, the essence of man is revealed. Man is a knot, a web, a mesh into which relationships are tied. Only those relationships matter. The body is an old crock that nobody will miss. I have never known a man to think of himself when dying. Never.
Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to cast a stone.
The willing, destiny guides them; the unwilling, destiny drags them.
Human nature will not change. In any future great national trial, compared with the men of this, we shall have as weak and as strong, as silly and as wise, as bad and as good. Let us therefore study the incidents in this as philosophy to learn wisdom from and none of them as wrongs to be avenged.
Rulers, Statesmen, Nations, are wont to be emphatically commended to the teaching which experience offers in history. But what experience and history teach is this - that people and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it. Each period is involved in such peculiar circumstances, exhibits a condition of things so strictly idiosyncratic, that its conduct must be regulated by considerations connected with itself, and itself alone.
There are no rules, no models; rather, there are no rules other than the general laws of Nature.
I was a personality before I became a person - I am simple, complex, generous, selfish, unattractive, beautiful, lazy and driven.
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