“The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation's greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable”

— John F. Kennedy

1963, Speech at Amherst College
Context: The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation's greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable, especially when that questioning is disinterested, for they determine whether we use power or power uses us.

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John F. Kennedy 469

35th president of the United States of America 1917–1963

Ysabella Brave (1979) American singer

"Hecklers are Garbage" (20 September 2008) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nYlRFGL8UQ
Context: First I'd like to address the hecklers (cause I know you're out there!)... There are people who contribute, people who create, and people who destroy.... Nobody likes hecklers — nobody likes heckling — it's not interesting, it's not funny, it's certainly not appreciated, and it's of no use and no good. And it just hurts people. And I'm not sure if the intention is to hurt people, in which case you are evil — and if not, that's what you are doing, so it is not constructive, at all. The whole idea of 'I must be honest, so here is what I think' is complete baloney. If there is information you must transmit to another, you must do it empathically, or it is worthless....
Essentially, what I have for you heckler victims is this: If you do what you must, and you do what is right, you are bulletproof! Don't bother changing — don't listen to any of that garbage — because it's garbage!

“Some people are constructive, if you like. Others are destructive. It's this diversity in humankind that results in some making positive contributions and some negative contributions. It's necessary to have enough who make positive contributions to overcome the problems of each age.”

Jonas Salk (1914–1995) Inventor of polio vaccine

Academy of Achievement interview (1991)

“To spread healthy ideas among even the lowest classes of people, to remove men from the influence of prejudice and passion, to make reason the arbiter and supreme guide of public opinion; that is the essential goal of the sciences; that is how science will contribute to the advancement of civilization, and that is what deserves protection of governments who want to insure the stability of their power.”

Georges Cuvier (1769–1832) French naturalist, zoologist and paleontologist (1769–1832)

Rapport historique sur les progrès des sciences naturelles http://books.google.com/books?id=ajsyAQAAMAAJ (1810) as quoted in Clifford D. Conner, A People's History of Science (2005)

“I do not believe that the real life of this nation is to be found either in great luxury hotels and the petty gossip of so-called fashionable suburbs, or in the officialdom of the organised masses. It is to be found in the homes of people who are nameless and unadvertised, and who, whatever their individual religious conviction or dogma, see in their children their greatest contribution to the immortality of their race. The home is the foundation of sanity and sobriety; it is the indispensable condition of continuity; its health determines the health of society as a whole.”

Robert Menzies (1894–1978) Australian politician, 12th Prime Minister of Australia

Radio talk, 22 May, 1942
Wilderness Years (1941-1949)

“The worst of men is he who stops his contributions to charity, eats by himself, and whips his slave.”

Ali al-Rida (770–818) eighth of the Twelve Imams

Majlisi, Bihārul Anwār, vol.78, p. 335.
Religious Wisdom

“The power of patriarchy has been to make maleness feared and to make men feel that it is better to be feared that to be loved. Whether they can confess this or not, men know that just is not true.”

Bell Hooks (1952) American author, feminist, and social activist

“Finding the center of strength within ourselves is in the long run the best contribution we can make to our fellow men.”

Rollo May (1909–1994) US psychiatrist

Man’s Search for Himself (1953)
Context: Finding the center of strength within ourselves is in the long run the best contribution we can make to our fellow men. … One person with indigenous inner strength exercises a great calming effect on panic among people around him. This is what our society needs — not new ideas and inventions; important as these are, and not geniuses and supermen, but persons who can be, that is, persons who have a center of strength within themselves.

“Men of God, before anything else, are indispensable to the furtherance of the kingdom of God on earth.”

Edward McKendree Bounds (1835–1913) clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal Church South

The Weapon of Prayer.

“Men of power have not time to read; yet men who do not read are unfit for power”

Michael Foot (1913–2010) British politician

On Benjamin Disraeli, in his own book, 'Debts of Honour
1980s

“She was of the stuff of which great men's mothers are made. She was indispensable to high generation, feared at tea-parties, hated in shops, and loved at crises.”

Thomas Hardy book Far from the Madding Crowd

Source: Far from the Madding Crowd

“The men who create power make an indispensable contribution to the Nation's greatness, but the men who question power make a contribution just as indispensable”

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John F. Kennedy 469

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