African Spir - People Quotes

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The peculiar value that such and such activity can have for a man rather really depends on the spirit in which it was deployed than its importance or its scope. Thus the most humble work can be accomplished by a great genius, whereas the highest functions, such as to rule over a whole people, can be practiced in a petty spirit of personal glorification, as it is frequently seen.

African Spir
Education has a tremendous power on man. Can't we see to which astonishing disciple the people of Sparta have submitted for centuries, and this with a view to very petty purposes: purely outer greatness, the military predominance of Sparta. This example proves that man can everything on themselves when they want it; therefore it would only be a question of making them will the good.

African Spir
Up to here, in general, we have mainly stuffed the brain of the young people with a indigestible multitude of various notions, without thinking about enough of the prime necessity to form their character.

African Spir
Injustice having always hold sway on earth, there are some who imagine that the existing social order may subsist forever. Whether this order could last until now, this was mainly due to the conviction of people, that it was of divine institution. But this belief is vanishing, and with it the only moral support of the actual order will collapse, leaving only brutal forces opposed to each others clashing, with no peaceful way out.

African Spir
It is erroneous to consider the multiplication of needs as a sign of progress, to think that it is necessary to arouse in the people still unpolished, new needs to bring them to a more civilized life. Similarly it is erroneous to expect to measure the degree of culture of a man to the degree of refinement he make in his methods of pleasure.

African Spir
In life we only try to produce, to win, and enjoy the more we can; in science, to discover and invent the more we can; in religion, to dominate on the greatest number of people we can; whereas the forming of the character, the further development of the faculties of the intelligence, the refinement of the consciousness and of the heart, are considered incidental things.

African Spir
In ancient times, any man rising up above the common people tried to shape his life according to his principles; it is no longer like than now; it is (because) for the ancients, moral was a principle of inner life, whereas in our days, most of the time one is content to adhere to an official moral, that we recognize in theory, but that one does not care to put into practice.

African Spir
The first principle from which stems the moral of about all people at all time; it is summarized in this precept: Love thy neighbor as thyself, and: do as you would be done by.

African Spir