“We came from many roots, and we have many branches.”
Gerald Ford (1913–2006) American politician, 38th President of the United States (in office from 1974 to 1977)
1970s, State of the Union Address (1975)
Source: Striking Thoughts (2000), p. 11
Context: What we are after is the ROOT and not the branches. The root is the real knowledge; the branches are surface knowledge. Real knowledge breeds "body feel" and personal expression; surface knowledge breeds mechanical conditioning and imposing limitation and squelches creativity.
“We came from many roots, and we have many branches.”
Gerald Ford (1913–2006) American politician, 38th President of the United States (in office from 1974 to 1977)
1970s, State of the Union Address (1975)
Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher
Source: The Great Learning
“The roots below the earth claim no rewards for making the branches fruitful.”
Rabindranath Tagore Stray Birds
134
Source: Stray Birds (1916)
“There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root”
Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist
Walden (1854)
Source: Walden, or Life in the Woods
Context: There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root, and it may be that he who bestows the largest amount of time and money on the needy is doing the most by his mode of life to produce that misery which he strives in vain to relieve.<!--p.87
“Try to solve the issues from their root. Leaves and branches are not as necessary and important.”
Elia M. Ramollah (1973) founder and leader of the El Yasin Community
The Great Master of Thought (Amen- Vol.3), Observing management
“The Labour Party should oppose the Government arms plan root and branch.”
Aneurin Bevan (1897–1960) Welsh politician
Tribune, 19 February 1937.
1930s
“They more adeptly bend the willow's branches
who have experience of the willow's roots.”
Rainer Maria Rilke book Sonnets to Orpheus
Sonnet 6 (as translated by Edward Snow)
Sonnets to Orpheus (1922)
James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) Missionary in China
(J. Hudson Taylor. Dwelling in Him. Robesonia: Overseas Missionary Fellowship).