Quote #6

Man is the 'ethical animal' -ethical in potentiality even if, unfortunately, not in actuality. His capacity for ethical judgment-like freedom, reason and the other unique characteristics of the human being-is based upon his consciousness of himself.

More from Rollo May

  1. Freedom is man's capacity to take a hand in his own development. It is our capacity to mold ourselves.
  2. In any discussion of religion and personality integration the question is not whether religion itself makes for health or neurosis, but wha…
  3. Along with the loss of the sense of self has gone a loss of our language for communicating deeply personal meanings to each other. This is …
  4. We define religion as the assumption that life has meaning. Religion, or lack of it, is shown not in some intellectual or verbal formulatio…
  5. The upshot is that the values and goals which provided a unifying center for previous centuries in the modern period no longer are cogent. …
  6. In any age courage is the simple virtue needed for a human being to traverse the rocky road from infancy to maturity of personality. But in…
  7. The human being cannot live in a condition of emptiness for very long: if he is not growing toward something, he does not merely stagnate; …
  8. Courage is the capacity to meet the anxiety which arises as one achieves freedom. It is the willingness to differentiate, to move from the …

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