You hold freedom like a prize, and it's in your power to help others be free, but you're too selfish to reach out and give them freedom, too. Keep your freedom, keep your immortality, but somewhere along the line I hope you figure out what you're living forever for. What noble purpose you mean to achieve. Because you're no good to anyone here, not even yourselves
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Criticism of those who hoard freedom and immortality without helping others.
- In plain terms
- You keep freedom and life but do not help others be free.
- What can you take from it?
- Power should be used to free others, not just for self.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What do you live for?
- Are you using your freedom to help?
Another view
Some believe personal liberty is paramount over service.
More from Orson Scott Card
I know what warfare is and I reject it Of course you reject it. Who can kill you? You'll never die. But out there are millions of people who can die
Permalink to quote #886 I hadn't know that. I hadn't known what price they would pay 'I'll do my best without your help'
Permalink to quote #888 For once, I could look forward to the relief of talking to someone to whom I didn't have to lie, someone who might be able to understand what I had done, who m…
Permalink to quote #885
Related quotes
That state is a state of Slavery in which a man does what he likes to do in his spare time and in his working time that which is required of him. This state ca…
Eric GillEric Gill quote #1 I lost part of myself to him then, and a soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become a part of Phineas.
John KnowlesJohn Knowles quote #3 Were the talents and virtues which heaven has bestowed on men given merely to make them more obedient drudges, to be sacrificed to the follies and ambition of …
Samuel AdamsSamuel Adams quote #16