Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America
Letter to David Baillie Warden (25 February 1809)
1800s, Second Presidential Administration (1805-1809)
Third Century, sect. 2.
Centuries of Meditations
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America
Letter to David Baillie Warden (25 February 1809)
1800s, Second Presidential Administration (1805-1809)
Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965) French-German physician, theologian, musician and philosopher
Kulturphilosophie (1923), Vol. 2 : Civilization and Ethics
Context: Reverence for life, veneratio vitæ, is the most direct and at the same time the profoundest achievement of my will-to-live.
In reverence for life my knowledge passes into experience. The simple world- and life-affirmation which is within me just because I am will-to-live has, therefore, no need to enter into controversy with itself, if my will-to-live learns to think and yet does not understand the meaning of the world. In spite of the negative results of knowledge, I have to hold fast to world- and life-affirmation and deepen it. My life carries its own meaning in itself. This meaning lies in my living out the highest idea which shows itself in my will-to-live, the idea of reverence for life. With that for a starting-point I give value to my own life and to all the will-to-live which surrounds me, I persevere in activity, and I produce values.
Dante Alighieri book Vita Nuova
Source: La Vita Nuova (1293), Chapter I, opening lines (as reported in The 100 Best Love Poems of All Time by Leslie Pockell)
Lucy Stone (1818–1893) American abolitionist and suffragist
Letter to her mother (14 March 1847)
Context: I know, Mother, you feel badly and that you would prefer to have me take some other course, if I could in conscience. Yet, Mother, I know you too well to suppose that you would wish me to turn away from what I think is my duty. I surely would not be a public speaker if I sought a life of ease, for it will be a most laborious one; nor would I do it for the sake of honor, for I know that I shall be disesteemed, even hated, by some who are now my friends, or who profess to be. Neither would I do it if I sought wealth, because I could secure it with far more ease and worldly honor by being a teacher. If I would be true to myself, true to my Heavenly Father, I must pursue that course of conduct which, to me, appears best calculated to promote the highest good of the world.
Claude Monet (1840–1926) French impressionist painter
in a letter to Frédéric Bazille: as cited by K.E. Sullivan. Monet: Discovering Art, Brockhampton press, London (2004), p. 22
1850 - 1870
Thomas Traherne (1636–1674) English poet
"The Salutation", stanza 7; The Poetical Works of Thomas Traherne, B.D. (London: Bertram Dobell, 1903) p. 3.