On rare occasions one does hear of a miraculous case of a married couple falling in love after marriage, but on close examination it will be found that it is a mere adjustment to the inevitable.
Emma GoldmanRead
No real social change has ever been brought about without a revolution... revolution is but thought carried into action.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Social change requires active engagement and revolutionary thought.
Emma Goldman's quote emphasizes the idea that for any significant social change to occur, it must be driven by revolutionary ideas that motivate people to take action. It suggests that change does not happen simply through passive thought or discussion; instead, it requires people to translate their revolutionary ideas into concrete actions that can lead to transformation in society.
Themes
Social ChangeRevolutionActionThoughtActivism
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about social justice, a speaker may use this quote to inspire the audience to take action.
More from Emma Goldman
All quotes βNo one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy, the kindness and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure.
Emma GoldmanRead
To the indefinite, uncertain mind of the American radical the most contradictory ideas and methods are possible. The result is a sad chaos in the radical movement, a sort of intellectual hash, which has neither taste nor character.
Emma GoldmanRead
John Burroughs has stated that experimental study of animals in captivity is absolutely useless. Their character, their habits, their appetites undergo a complete transformation when torn from their soil in field and forest. With human nature caged in a narrow space, whipped daily into submission, how can we speak of its potentialities?
Emma GoldmanRead
Anarchism is the only philosophy which brings to man the consciousness of himself; which maintains that God, the State, and society are non-existent, that their promises are null and void, since they can be fulfilled only through man's subordination.
Emma GoldmanRead
If love does not know how to give and take without restrictions, it is not love, but a transaction that never fails to lay stress on a plus and a minus.
Emma GoldmanRead
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I find no change of consequence in grown people, I do not miss the dead. It does not surprise me to hear that this friend or that friend died at such and such a time, because I fully expected that sort of news. But somehow I had made no calculation on the infants. It never occurred to me that infants grow up...These unexpected changes, from infancy to youth, and from youth to maturity, are by far the most startling things I meet with.
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We are tapping into what the world wants: to be a part of change.
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