Obedience

Famous quotes containing the word obedience:

    The momentary charge at Balaklava, in obedience to a blundering command, proving what a perfect machine the soldier is, has, properly enough, been celebrated by a poet laureate; but the steady, and for the most part successful, charge of this man, for some years, against the legions of Slavery, in obedience to an infinitely higher command, is as much more memorable than that as an intelligent and conscientious man is superior to a machine. Do you think that that will go unsung?
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    Ye know why the forms are fair, ye hear how the tale is told:
    It is all triumphant art, but art in obedience to laws,
    Robert Browning (1812–1889)

    In schools all over the world, little boys learn that their country is the greatest in the world, and the highest honor that could befall them would be to defend it heroically someday. The fact that empathy has traditionally been conditioned out of boys facilitates their obedience to leaders who order them to kill strangers.
    Myriam Miedzian, U.S. author. Boys Will Be Boys, ch. 3 (1991)