A Quote by Baruch Spinoza

Ceremonies are no aid to blessedness. — © Baruch Spinoza
Ceremonies are no aid to blessedness.
Like Adam, we have all lost Paradise; and yet we carry Paradise around inside of us in the form of a longing for, almost a memory of, a blessedness that is no more, or the dream of a blessedness that may someday be again.
I have taken part in ceremonies with North American and Mexican shamans, as well as Brazilian ceremonies.
Aid leads to more aid and more aid and more aid and less independence of the people that are receiving aid.
Aid makes itself superfluous if it is working well. Good aid takes care to provide functioning structures and good training that enables the recipient country to later get by without foreign aid. Otherwise, it is bad aid.
Countries which receive aid do graduate. Within a generation, Korea went from being a big recipient to being a big aid donor. China used to get quite a bit of aid; now it's aid-neutral.
Ceremonies are important. But our gratitude has to be more than visits to the troops, and once-a-year Memorial Day ceremonies. We honor the dead best by treating the living well.
The foundation of a nation is self-aid, mutual aid and public aid.
Ceremony assists people to adjust to change (a marriage ceremony does this for families), to recognize achievement (a classic example is a graduation ceremony), to relate, to express love, and/or to establish a relationship. Ceremonies are the human way we have to signpost a deal such as a business merger, to trigger off a healthy grief process (such as in divorce or funeral ceremonies), to welcome another human being into the family. So Ceremonies have these excellent effects - they can be used further to announce intentions, to express loyalty and to reinforce a sense of identity.
I don't want to participate in traditional Indian religious ceremonies - dance in a sun dance or pray in a sweat lodge or go on a vision quest with the help of a medicine man. The power of these ceremonies has an appeal, but I'm content with what little religion I already have.
The notion that aid can alleviate systemic poverty, and has done so, is a myth. Millions in Africa are poorer today because of aid; misery and poverty have not ended but increased. Aid has been, and continues to be, an unmitigated political, economic, and humanitarian disaster for most parts of the developing world.
Almsgiving tends to perpetuate poverty; aid does away with it once and for all. Almsgiving leaves a man just where he was before. Aid restores him to society as an individual worthy of all respect and not as a man with a grievance. Almsgiving is the generosity of the rich; social aid levels up social inequalities. Charity separates the rich from the poor; aid raises the needy and sets him on the same level with the rich.
We have to do that. We have to be thankful. That's what we said. Two things were told to us: To be thankful, so those are our ceremonies, ceremonies of thanksgiving. We built nations around it, and you can do that, too. And the other thing they said was enjoy life. That's a rule, a law- enjoy life- you're supposed to.
The temple is a sacred edifice, a holy place, where essential saving ceremonies and ordinances are performed to prepare us for exaltation. It is important that we gain a sure knowledge that our preparation to enter the holy house and that our participation in these ceremonies and covenants are some of the most significant events we will experience in our mortal lives.
Rwanda is not over needing aid, but we can survive with less aid than before.
Aid the dawning, tongue and pen; Aid it, hopes of honest men!
This is, I say, the time for all good men not to go to the aid of their party, but to come to the aid of their country.
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