Love, whether newly born, or aroused from a deathlike slumber, must always create sunshine, filling the heart so full of radiance, this it overflows upon the outward world.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
What we call real estate - the solid ground to build a house on - is the broad foundation on which nearly all the guilt of this world rests.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Real estate represents the material world, which is often the basis of human guilt and moral dilemmas.
In this quote, Nathaniel Hawthorne suggests that the foundation of real estate symbolizes the physical and societal structures upon which many of humanity's moral failures are built. The 'solid ground' can be interpreted not just as property but as the broader ethical implications of how we interact with the material world and how that can lead to feelings of guilt and burden, either personally or collectively.
Themes
Real EstateGuiltFoundationMoralityMaterialism
In practice
Example use cases
A discussion on the ethical implications of property ownership in a philosophy class.
More from Nathaniel Hawthorne
All quotes βA bodily disease which we look upon as whole and entire within itself, may after all, be but a symptom of some ailment in the spiritual part.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
All merely graceful attributes are usually the most evanescent.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
There is so much wretchedness in the world, that we may safely take the word of any mortal professing to need our assistance; and, even should we be deceived, still the good to ourselves resulting from a kind act is worth more than the trifle by which we purchase it.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
Let men tremble to win the hand of woman, unless they win along with it the utmost passion of her heart! Else it may be their miserable fortune, when some mightier touch than their own may have awakened all her sensibilities, to be reproached even for the calm content, the marble image of happiness, which they will have imposed upon her as the warm reality.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
The thing you set your mind on is the thing you ultimately become.
Nathaniel HawthorneRead
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