Dafoe and Hazlitt on Why You Must Know What You Believe
Defoe says that there were a hundered thousand country fellows in his time ready to fight to death against popery, without knowing whether popery was a man or a horse.
-William Hazlitt
A quick comment about this quote:
I’m sure the same can be said of communists that were anti-west and anti-capitalist. Here’s the point…know what you believe and why you believe it!
In our youth, between the ages of 12 and 24 it seems, we have exceeding vigor and vitality and desire to show it. We are very idealistic and strongly desire to give our allegiance, our energies and our purpose to something meaningful and strong.
We may give it to sports, arts, military or politics or other fields or systems of belief or groups to which we may belong whether a club or other.
This is how some have even fallen for cults, as strange the cult may have been, or that others may have been duped to waste hours of their time in purposeless, bizarre and silly rituals.
Yet again the key point is the folly of ignorance. How much did they know before they followed what they heard? Were they educated or propagandized? Was what they learned slanted and taken out of context?
If someone is so willing to fight for or against something they barely understand and something they’ve heard of by reputation or through media yet did little to prove and research to themselves first, then this is dangerous.
Can this happen in a democracy? I fear, yes. Cults prove it, terrorists prove it, hate groups prove it and worst of all, the mere accusation and the way something is labeled by the media and reported can do it. This is very dangerous.
What to do with this famous saying:
Do not be ignorant, regardless of what age you are. Before you believe anything or anyone, check out the matter for yourself.
If there is no way of checking it out for yourself, and it seems a bit far fetched or extreme, then maintain a healthy dose of skepticism for the sake of truth. Know what you believe and why you believe it.
The easiest way to do this is to ask yourself, “ What do I believe” and :”Why do I believe that” for each thing and for everything.
If you find yourself giving reasons such as influence of friends or media rather than based on your own research and thinking, then you should do more research and thinking before being convinced…so much so that you’re willing to read the counter views if you feel you are so firm in what you believe.
The arguments for what you believe better be strong and convincing or they should be dropped and changed…you owe that to yourself…to be true to yourself. Otherwise you live a lie and remain ignorant in darkness.
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Tags: Belief, Dafoe, Hazlitt, Know What You Believe, Purpose, Sense of Purpose
