Few people can be happy unless they hate some other person, nation, or creed.
Interpretation
Happiness is often tied to conflict with others, suggesting a darker side to human satisfaction.
In this quote, Bertrand Russell reflects on the complicated nature of happiness, implying that many individuals find joy through the presence of negativity towards others. This suggests that some people derive a sense of well-being from feeling superior or more fortunate than others, highlighting a potentially toxic aspect of human happiness that thrives on division and animosity.
In practice
This quote can be used during a discussion on human behavior in psychology lectures.
St. Paul introduced an entirely novel view of marriage, that it existed primarily to prevent the sin of fornication. It is just as if one were to maintain that the sole reason for baking bread is to prevent people from stealing cake.
Freedom comes only to those who no longer ask of life that it shall yield them any of those personal goods that are subject to the mutations of time.
Of these austerer virtues the love of truth is the chief, and in mathematics, more than elsewhere, the love of truth may find encouragement for waning faith. Every great study is not only an end in itself, but also a means of creating and sustaining a lofty habit of mind; and this purpose should be kept always in view throughout the teaching and learning of mathematics.
At all times, except when a monarch could enforce his will, war has been facilitated by the fact that vigorous males, confident of victory, enjoyed it, while their females admired them for their prowess.
Moreover, the attitude that one ought to believe such and such a proposition, independently of the question whether there is evidence in its favor, is an attitude which produces hostility to evidence and causes us to close our minds to every fact that does not suit our prejudices.
Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.
You always admire what you really don't understand. - Eleanor Roosevelt
Abhor all idea of being saved by good works, but O, be as full of good works as if you were to be saved by them!
The state has not only the obligation to stay neutral in matters of religion but also to ensure that freedom of thought and conscience of all individuals is protected.
They that will not be counseled, cannot be helped. If you do not hear reason she will rap you on the knuckles.
There needs to be understanding that anger never helps to solve a problem. It destroys our peace of mind and blinds our ability to think clearly. Anger and attachment are emotions that distort our view of reality.
The only true retirement is that of the heart; the only true leisure is the repose of the passions. To such persons it makes little difference whether they are young or old; and they die as they have lived, with graceful resignation.
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