Quote:
|
Quote by: fedfem Like Prohibition?
As far as the past....I will let Thomas Jefferson answer.
"The Gothic idea that we were to look backwards instead of forwards for the improvement of the human mind, and to recur to the annals of our ancestors for what is most perfect in government, in religion and in learning, is worthy of those bigots in religion and government by whom it has been recommended, and whose purposes it would answer. But it is not an idea which this country will endure." --Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Priestley, 1800. ME 10:148
"I am for encouraging the progress of science in all its branches, and not for raising a hue and cry against the sacred name of philosophy; for awing the human mind by stories of raw-head and bloody bones to a distrust of its own vision, and to repose implicitly on that of others; to go backwards instead of forwards to look for improvement; to believe that government, religion, morality and every other science were in the highest perfection in the ages of the darkest ignorance, and that nothing can ever be decided more perfect than what was established by our forefathers." --Thomas Jefferson to Elbridge Gerry, 1799. ME 10:78 |
Okay, I've read your quote. But it does not say that people should throw out the established rules of society and adapt ones that apply to a specific individual. It seems that you support people making rules for themselves, and screw everyone else.
What Jefferson is saying is that rules should and can be changed to meet new conditions of society. This is true.
Nor does the Jefferson quote disspell what I said earlier, which is: don't change rules unless you can prove that the old ones are false and that new ones are better. I doubt that Jefferson would argue with me.