Use - Quotes
One of the big reliefs for the atheist is not having to worry about what to hope, wish, and pray for. Did I want to pray for my mother`s suffering to end? Did I want to hope for her death? I didn`t have to worry about that. I could hope one day that she`d live longer so I could talk to her, and wish the next day that she would die and not have to suffer her paralysis and physical loss any longer. My wishing and hoping were inert; I could let them run wild. I could use them as pure solace.
Most of the biggest catastrophes that we've witnessed rarely come from information that is secret or hidden. It comes from information that is freely available and out there, but that we are willfully blind to, because we can't handle, don't want to handle, the conflict that it provokes. But when we dare to break that silence, or when we dare to see, and we create conflict, we enable ourselves and the people around us to do our very best thinking.
Open information is fantastic, open networks are essential. But the truth won't set us free until we develop the skills and the habit and the talent and the moral courage to use it. Openness isn't the end. It's the beginning.
If one cannot enjoy reading a book over and over again, there is no use in reading it at all.
Conceiving God to be the fountain of wisdom, I thought it right and necessary to solicit his assistance for obtaining it; to this end I formed the following little prayer, which was prefix`d to my tables of examination, for daily use: "O powerful Goodness! bountiful Father! merciful Guide! Increase in me that wisdom which discovers my truest interest. Strengthen my resolutions to perform what that wisdom dictates. Accept my kind offices to thy other children as the only return in my power for thy continual favours to me."
You can`t take credit for your talents, but it matters that you use them. You can`t really be blamed for your weaknesses, but it matters that you correct them. So pride and shame don`t make a lot of sense, in the final analysis, but they weren`t much fun anyway.
To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason [...] is like giving medicine to the dead.