Time and memory are true artists; they remould reality nearer to the heart's desire.
Interpretation
Time and memory shape our perceptions of reality and allow us to adjust them to align with our desires.
This quote by John Dewey suggests that our understanding of reality is not fixed; rather, it is continuously influenced by the passage of time and the memories we hold. As we reflect on our experiences, memories can reshape our perceptions to better align with our innermost wishes and sentiments, highlighting the subjective nature of our reality and the power of our emotions in interpreting our lives.
In practice
During a graduation speech, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of memories in shaping future aspirations.
Every teacher should realize he is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of the proper social order and the securing of the right social growth. In this way, the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer-in of the true Kingdom of God.
Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife.
It science involves an intelligent and persistent endeavor to revise current beliefs so as to weed out what is erroneous, to add to their accuracy, and, above all, to give them such shape that the dependencies of the various facts upon one another may be as obvious as possible.
For in spite of itself any movement that thinks and acts in terms of an ‘ism becomes so involved in reaction against other ‘isms that it is unwittingly controlled by them. For it then forms its principles by reaction against them instead of by a comprehensive, constructive survey of actual needs, problems, and possibilities.
Any genuine teaching will result, if successful, in someone's knowing how to bring about a better condition of things than existed earlier.
The reactionaries are in possession of force, in not only the army and police, but in the press and the schools
We all know people who have been made much meaner and more irritable and more intolerable to live with by suffering: it is not right to say that all suffering perfects. It only perfects one type of person ...... the one who accepts the call of God in Christ Jesus.
I believe in an India of pluralism and diversity, not of religious bigotry and caste politics. I believe in an India that is secure in itself and confident of its place in the world, an India that is a proud example of tolerance, freedom and hope for the downtrodden.
Perfection has one grave defect: it is apt to be dull.
Science cannot destroy the consciousness of freedom, without which there is no morality and no art, but it can refute it.
I'm not personally obsessed with death. At a certain age, the light that you live in is inhabited by the shades - it 'tis.
If my activism, however well-motivated, drives out love, then I have misunderstood Jesus’ gospel. I am stuck with law, not the gospel of grace.
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