underscored

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It is not the magnitude of our actions but the place they hold in our lives that gives them their character. Thus the smallest good act today is the conquest of the whole future.

Georges Bernanos, The Diary of a Country Priest (1936)
1w ago

It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well. And the greatest souls are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues.

2w ago

We are double-edged blades, and every time we whet our virtue the return stroke straps our vice.

2w ago

It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well. And the greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as the greatest virtues.

1mo ago

We are faces of the same humanity, and what injures one of us injures all of us; accordingly, let us stretch out our hands to those who have fallen. Above all, let us stretch them out as widely as possible, for those who have fallen farthest.

1mo ago

You don't pursue them to pass tests or drop names at a cocktail party—but to live a wise life, a mindful life, a good life. There are people everywhere who are doing just that. Their stories aren't told in the media or made into motion pictures, but they are far better role models than movie stars or pop singers.

2mo ago

It is not enough to have a good mind; the main thing is to use it well. And the greatest souls are capable of the greatest vices as well as the greatest virtues.

2mo ago

Characters formed within one society and living in circumstances where their dispositions are no longer needed — characters in time of great social change — are likely to be tragic. Their virtues lie useless or even foiled; they are no longer recognized for what they are; their motives and actions are misunderstood. The magnanimous man in a petty bourgeois society is seen as a vain fool; the energetic and industrious man in a society that prizes elegance above energy is seen as a bustling boor; the meditative person in an expansive society is seen as melancholic.

2mo ago

If we abandon introspection and critical thinking, we descend to an animal life—and that is unworthy of us as human beings.

4mo ago

Hope and trust must not be confused. They are different things, as the expectation of fortune here on earth is different from the second theological virtue. He who blindly, obstinately repeats "let us hope" does not trust; he is really only hoping for a lucky break in the momentarily propitious game governed by the law of necessity. Those who trust, on the other hand, do not count on particular events, for they are sure there is an economy that encompasses all events and surpasses their meaning the way a tapestry, a symbolic carpet, surpasses the flowers and animals that compose it.

4mo ago

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