You can't make people happy by law. If you said to a bunch of average people two hundred years ago 'Would you be happy in a world where medical care is widely available, houses are clean, the world's music and sights and foods can be brought into your home at small cost, travelling even 100 miles is easy, childbirth is generally not fatal to mother or child, you don't have to die of dental abcesses and you don't have to do what the squire tells you' they'd think you were talking about the New Jerusalem and say 'yes'.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Progress in health and freedom would have seemed miraculous to people in the past.
- In plain terms
- Modern comforts would have seemed like heaven to ancestors.
- What can you take from it?
- Recognize current progress as extraordinary compared to the past.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- What do you take for granted?
- How has life changed for you?
Another view
Past generations faced different values and constraints not easily compared.
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