Reverence for Life by Albert Schweitzer was an essay about, as the title says, finding respect for life. He says we are all the same. ‘We’ being the animals, the plants, the bugs, the humans, etc. When you find a dead beetle in your path, you will recognize yourself in it, in everything. Schweitzer makes the excellent point that the human and the beetle both fulfill the sense of the word life. Meaning that they both are born; they both know pain; they both know fear; they both will soon know death. Yet, we would not kill a human being, but we would mindlessly kill a beetle or pick a flower. We have lost all true principles, and the current ones we own are superficial and ignorant. We talk about teaching the next generation a genuine set of values, when we have no set of values ourselves. He ends by once again stating the need for respect for life, of all forms.
2006-12-19
08:55:40
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4 answers
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asked by
Jordan
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Philosophy