quote · Legacy record
So let me just say this. There are ways. You already know that because, in your life, there have been High Kindness periods and Low Kindness periods, and you know what inclined you toward the former and away from the latter. Education is good; immersing ourselves in a work of art: good; prayer is good; meditation’s good; a frank talk with a dear friend; establishing ourselves in some kind of spiritual tradition — recognizing that there have been countless really smart people before us who have asked these same questions and left behind answers for us. It would be strange and self-defeating to fail to seek out these wise voices from the past--as self-defeating as it would be to attempt to rediscover the principles of physics from scratch or invent a new method of brain surgery without having learned the ones that already exist.
So let me just say this. There are ways. You already know that because, in your life, there have been High Kindness periods and Low Kindness periods, and you know what inclined you toward the former and away from the latter. Education is good; immersing ourselves in a work of art: good; prayer is good; meditation’s good; a frank talk with a dear friend; establishing ourselves in some kind of spiritual tradition — recognizing that there have been countless really smart people before us who have asked these same questions and left behind answers for us. It would be strange and self-defeating to fail to seek out these wise voices from the past--as self-defeating as it would be to attempt to rediscover the principles of physics from scratch or invent a new method of brain surgery without having learned the ones that already exist.
Approximate author period: c. 1958 AD · modern
Meaning not yet available
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- Author or tradition
- George Saunders
Attribution: attributed - Country attributed
- Not established
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- Approximate author period: c. 1958 AD · modern
Approximate author-period anchor from documented birth year 1958; activity date not established; Wikidata Q1251926, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q1251926 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
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Supplied reference C; CSV row 391451; supplied attribution, independently unverified
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