If it be true that democracy is based upon the assumption that every man shall serve his fellow man, the organization of democracy should be gradually adapted to that assumption.
Interpretation
Democracy relies on the idea of serving one another, and its structure should reflect this belief.
Herbert Croly's quote highlights the fundamental principle of democracy, which is the collaborative service to fellow citizens. He emphasizes that the very organization of democratic systems should evolve to support and facilitate this principle, suggesting that true democracy is not just a political structure but a commitment to mutual support and service among individuals.
In practice
During a community meeting, to emphasize the importance of serving one another in our democracy.
Democracy must stand or fall on a platform of possible human perfectibility. If human nature cannot be improved by institutions, democracy is at best a more than usually safe form of political organization . . . . But if it is to work better as well as merely longer, it must have some leavening effect on human nature; and the sincere democrat is obliged to assume the power of the leaven. [Progressive]
Ever since the days of Adam, man has been hiding from God and saying, 'God is hard to find.
Africa is less a wilderness than a repository of primary and fundamental values, and less a barbaric land than an unfamiliar voice
Basically we could not have peace, or an atmosphere in which peace could grow, unless we recognized the rights of individual human beings... their importance, their dignity... and agreed that was the basic thing that had to be accepted throughout the world.
A myth is a fantasy, a preferred lie, a foundational story, a hypnotic trance, an identity game, a virtual reality, one that can be either inspirational or despairing. It is a story in which I cast myself; it is my inner cinema, the motion picture of my inner reality - one that moves all the time. No diagnosis can fix the myth, no cure can settle it, because our inner life is precisely what, in us, will not lie still.
When we die, as when the scenes have been fixed on to celluloid and the scenery is pulled down and burnt β we are phantoms in the memories of our descendants. Then we are ghosts, my dear, then we are myths. But still we are together. We are the past together, we are a distant past. Beneath the dome of the mysterious stars, I still hear your voice.
In my own case, the most inflammatory statements I have ever made are ones that I have written and remain willing to defend.
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