Thursday, October 06, 2005

A Few Thought Provokers...

So here are a few snippets I have read lately that stuck in my mind and have rolled around in my brain. And yes, one is about Africa...

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.
-Edmund Burke

In twenty years every aspect that defines Africa today will have undergone an alteration that cannot be foretold by our present means of analysis. The pessimism undeniably called for in the short term, then, cannot be validly extended to the longer term.
-Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, author

The eight blunders that lead to violence in society:
• Wealth without work
• Pleasure without conscience
• Knowledge without character
• Commerce without morality
• Science without humanity
• Worship without sacrifice
• Politics without principles
• Rights without responsibilities

- Gandhi

I want the freedom of my country so that other countries may learn something from my free country, so that the resources of my country might be utilized for the benefit of mankind. Just as the call of patriotism teaches us today that the individual has to die for the family, the family has to die for the village, the village for the district, the district for the province, the province for the country, even so a country has to be free in order that it may die if necessary for the benefit of the world. My love, therefore, of nationalism or my idea of nationalism, is that my country may become free, that if need be the whole country may die, so that the human race may live.
-Gandhi

1 comment:

(jim) Bo Ba Log said...

First I thought, "How does Gandhi make it to the list of 8 blunders."

Then I thought, "Wait, that's 9 blunders."

Then I thought, "Idiot!"