Well the themes for me were and remain sex and love and grief and death - the things that make us and undo us, create and destroy, how we breed and disappear and the emotional context that surrounds these events.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the profound impact of fundamental human experiences on our existence.
In this quote, Thomas Lynch reflects on the central themes of life that shape our identities and experiences—sex, love, grief, and death. He suggests that these elements are intertwined, influencing how we live and ultimately how we meet our end, serving as both creators and destroyers of our emotional realities.
In practice
In a eulogy reflecting on a loved one's life.
Whatever's there to feel, feel it—the riddance, the relief, the fright and freedom, the fear of forgetting, the dull ache of your own mortality. Get with someone you can trust with tears, with anger, and wonderment and utter silence.
But which is the State's essential function, aggression or defence, few seem to know or care.
The foundation of reverence is this perception, that the present holds within itself the complete sum of existence, backwards and forwards, that whole amplitude of time, which is eternity.
The effect of liberty to individuals is that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.
To be content with death may be better than to desire it.
Government is an evil; it is only the thoughtlessness and vices of men that make it a necessary evil. When all men are good and wise, government will of itself decay.
Wealth should come like manna from heaven, unearned and uncalled for. Money should be like grace -- a gift. It is not worth sweating and scheming for.
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