What is worse than having no sight is being able to see but having no vision.
Helen KellerRead
The test of a democracy is not the magnificence of buildings or the speed of automobiles or the efficiency of air transportation, but rather the care given to the welfare of all the people.
Interpretation
What this quote means
A true democracy is measured by how well it looks after its citizens rather than its material achievements.
Helen Keller emphasizes that the essence of a democracy is not defined by its physical infrastructure or technological advancements, but by how genuinely it serves and prioritizes the well-being of its citizens. This quote invites reflection on the core values of a society and challenges the notion that outward growth and efficiency can substitute for the moral duty to care for all individuals, particularly the vulnerable.
Themes
DemocracyWelfareCitizensSocietyValues
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be referenced in a discourse on civic responsibility during a community meeting.
More from Helen Keller
All quotes →What could be worse than being born without sight? Being born with sight and no vision.
Helen KellerRead
Knowledge is power." Rather, knowledge is happiness, because to have knowledge - broad, deep knowledge - is to know true ends from false, and lofty things from low. To know the thoughts and deeds that have marked man's progress is to feel the great heart-throbs of humanity through the centuries; and if one does not feel in these pulsations a heavenward striving, one must indeed be deaf to the harmonies of life.
Helen KellerRead
Be not dumb, obedient slaves in an army of destruction. Be heroes in an army of construction.
Helen KellerRead
Our beloved ones have not 'gone to a far country.' It is only the veil of sense that separates them from us, and even that veil grows thin when our thoughts reach out to them.
Helen KellerRead
It's wonderful to climb the liquid mountains of the sky. Behind me and before me is God and I have no fears.
Helen KellerRead
Similar quotes
I get the urge for going/But I never seem to go.
Joni MitchellRead
Race is a constant factor in American life. Yet reacting to every incident,real or imagined, is crippling, tiring, and ultimately counterproductive.
Condoleezza RiceRead
Not knowing how he lost himself, or how he recovered himself, he may never feel certain of not losing himself again.
Charles DickensRead
All the same, I should like it all plain and clear," said he obstinately, putting on his business manner (usually reserved for people who tried to borrow money off him), and doing his best to appear wise and prudent and professional and live up to Gandalf's recommendation. "Also I should like to know about risks, out-of-pocket expenses, time required and remuneration, and so forth"--by which he meant: "What am I going to get out of it ? and am I going to come back alive?
J. R. R. TolkienRead
The really wonderful thing that happened to me when I was in space was this feeling of belonging to the entire universe.
Mae JemisonRead
That the zeal for God's honor is also a dangerous passion, that the Christian must bring with him the courage to swim against the tide instead of with it... accept a good deal of loneliness, will perhaps be nowhere so clear and palpable as in the church, where he would so much like things to be different. Yet he cannot and he will not refuse to take this risk and pay this price... he belongs where the reformation of the church is underway or will again be underway.
Karl BarthRead