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Quote by Charles Horton Cooley

“So far as discipline is concerned, freedom means not its absence but the use of higher and more rational forms as contrasted with those that are lower or less rational. A free discipline controls the individual by appealing to his reason and conscience, and therefore to his self-respect; while an unfree control works upon some lower phase of the mind, and so tends to degrade him. It is freedom to be disciplined in as rational a manner as you are fit for.”

Quote by Charles Horton Cooley

Book:Human Nature and the Social Order
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Work

Human Nature and the Social Order

This book delves into the intricate connections between individual psychology and the organization of human societies, analyzing how human nature shapes social systems and institutions. more

Author

Charles Horton Cooley
Charles Horton Cooley

Charles Horton Cooley was an American sociologist born on August 17, 1864, and died on May 7, 1929. His research focused on social interaction and the relationship between individuals and society, particularly through his symbolic interaction theory to explore this field. Cooley's work had a profound impact on the development of sociological theory. more

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Book:Two Major Works: Social Organization. Human Nature and the Social Order
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“If the man succeeds in becoming indifferent to the opinions of his neighbors he runs into another danger, that of a distorted and extravagant self of the pride sort, since by the very process of gaining independence and immunity from the stings of depreciation and misunderstanding, he has perhaps lost that wholesome deference to some social tribunal that a man cannot dispense with and remain quite sane.”

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Book:Human Nature and the Social Order
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“There is perhaps no sort of self more subject to dangerous egotism than that which deludes itself with the notion that it is not a self at all, but something else. It is well to beware of persons who believe that the cause, the mission, the philanthropy, the hero, or whatever it may be that they strive for, is outside of themselves, so that they feel a certain irresponsibility, and are likely to do things which they would recognize as wrong if done in behalf of an acknowledged self.”

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Author:Charles Horton Cooley
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“It happens from time to time in every complex and active society, that certain persons feel the complexity and insistence as a tangle, and seek freedom in retirement, as Thoreau sought at Walden Pond. They do not, however, in this manner escape from the social institutions of their time, nor do they really mean to do so; what they gain, if they are successful, is a saner relation to them.”

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Book:Human Nature and the Social Order
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“In the days of witchcraft it used to be believed that if one person secretly made a waxen image of another and stuck pins into the image, its counterpart would suffer tortures, and that if the image was melted the person would die. This superstition is almost realized in the relation between the private self and its social reflection. They seem to separate but are darkly united, and what is done to the one is done to the other.”

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Book:Human Nature and the Social Order
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