Unless you have found something in life to live for that is more important to you than your own life, you will always be a slave. For all another man needs to do is threaten to take your life to get you to do his bidding.
Interpretation
True freedom comes from having a purpose greater than oneself.
This quote emphasizes the importance of having a deep-seated purpose or cause that transcends individual existence. Martin Luther King, Jr. suggests that without such a purpose, individuals may find themselves subservient to others, easily manipulated by fears for their own survival. In essence, to truly live freely, one must prioritize ideals that surpass mere self-interest.
In practice
This quote could be used in a motivational speech about finding one's purpose in life.
This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.
Music is the best consolation for a despaired man
We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love.
We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
Israel... is one of the great outpost of democracy in the world
One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.
The logic of the world is prior to all truth and falsehood.
When we are thirsty, we drink the white waters of the pool, the sweetness of our mournful childhood.
Faith is a kind of knowing; it is different from hope. My faith is that life is purposeful; of that I'm sure. There is a God, there is intelligence, there is consciousness. And behind all of this, there is incredible compassion.
It is said that those whom the gods wish to destroy they first make mad. It may well be that a war neurosis stirred up by propaganda of fear and hatred is the prelude to destruction.
The release of atomic power has changed everything except our way of thinking ... the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker. (1945)
God's goodness is the root of all goodness; and our goodness, if we have any, springs out of His goodness.
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