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“They must only bow to the authority of reason, instead of being the modest slaves of opinion.”
Respectability is grounded in independent reasoning rather than deference to social opinion, making judgment more important than approval.
Source note: A Vindication of the Rights of Woman; Wollstonecraft explicitly connects independence of character with the exercise of understanding.
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“a man may have a great mass of knowledge, but if he has not worked it up by thinking it over for himself, it has much less value than a far smaller amount which he has thoroughly pondered.”
Accumulated information is distinguished from understanding: Schopenhauer values knowledge that has been actively compared, connected and reconsidered over a larger but unprocessed store.
Source note: The Art of Literature, section “On Thinking for Oneself,” T. Bailey Saunders translation; Project Gutenberg #10714. The library analogy immediately precedes the sentence.
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“It is not selfish to think for oneself.”
Independent thought is distinguished from selfishness: forming one’s own judgment can protect individuality without requiring indifference to other people.
Source note: The Soul of Man under Socialism; Wilde defends individual thought while criticizing social pressure that mistakes conformity for moral virtue.
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“You shall listen to all sides and filter them from yourself.”
Whitman urges the reader not to borrow even his own viewpoint wholesale: other voices can be heard, but judgment still has to be worked through personally rather than accepted second-hand.
Source note: Leaves of Grass (1855), the untitled poem later known as “Song of Myself,” in the early passage telling readers not to take things at second or third hand or look through another person’s eyes. Wikisource’s 1855 scan places the sentence on printed page 14.
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“But why, my dear Crito, should we care about the opinion of the many?”
Voice: Dialogue speaker · Socrates
Socrates challenges the idea that widespread approval should decide a moral question, directing attention toward informed judgment rather than numerical popularity.
Source note: Crito, Benjamin Jowett translation; Socrates responds to Crito’s concern about public opinion while awaiting execution.
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“He who lets the world, or his own portion of it, choose his plan of life for him, has no need of any other faculty than the ape-like one of imitation.”
A life copied from convention leaves important human faculties unused; choosing deliberately requires observation, judgment and firmness.
Source note: On Liberty, Chapter III; Mill contrasts imitation with actively choosing one’s own plan of life.