Speak, speak, speak, & remember that whenever anyone's liberty to speak is denied, your liberty is denied also, & your place is where the attack is.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
The question of souls is old—we demand our bodies, now. We are tired of promises, god is deaf, and his church is our worst enemy.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects a demand for present reality over abstract beliefs and highlights disillusionment with religious institutions.
Voltairine De Cleyre's quote emphasizes a deep-seated frustration with spiritual promises and the perceived failures of religious systems to address the immediate concerns of human beings. It suggests a desire for tangible experiences and realities over the pursuit of metaphysical or spiritual assurances that have proved to be unfulfilling, and it critiques the institutional church as an impediment rather than a source of support.
Themes
SoulsBodiesPromisesDisillusionmentReligionCritique
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a debate about the role of religion in modern society.
More from Voltairine De Cleyre
All quotes →Anarchism, to me, means not only the denial of authority, not only a new economy, but a revision of the principles of morality. It means the development of the individual as well as the assertion of the individual. It means self-responsibility, and not leader worship.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Make no laws whatever concerning speech, and speech will be free; so soon as you make a declaration on paper that speech shall be free, you will have a hundred lawyers proving that "freedom does not mean abuse, nor liberty license," and they will define freedom out of existence.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
I think it can be shown that the law makes ten criminals where it restrains one.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Is it not enough that 'things are cruel and blind'? Must we also be cruel and blind?
Voltairine De CleyreRead
Government is as unreal, as intangible, as unapproachable as God. Try it, if you don't believe it. Seek through the legislative halls of America and find, if you can, the Government. In the end you will be doomed to confer with the agent, as before.
Voltairine De CleyreRead
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