“Education is largely the acquisition of the accumulated prejudices of…” — Max Ehrmann | V2Melody

“Education is largely the acquisition of the accumulated prejudices of man’s past—often a serious handicap for the influencing of man’s future.”

Warns that schooling can freeze old biases instead of freeing thought · Journal, 10 March 1933

About Max Ehrmann

Max Ehrmann

26 September 1872–9 September 1945

Max Ehrmann was born on 26 September 1872 in Terre Haute, Indiana, and died there on 9 September 1945, seventeen days before his seventy-third birthday. He is remembered almost everywhere as the author of “Desiderata,” the compact prose poem beginning, “Go placidly amid the noise and haste,” but that single work…

More by Max Ehrmann

Poems by Max Ehrmann

More remarks by Max Ehrmann

“Let me drive out of myself the universal madness to be elsewhere in search of the joy of life, for the joy of life resides within oneself.”

Argues that contentment is an inner discipline, not a change of scene · Journal, on remaining in Terre Haute

“I am not making a book that will live or a book that will die. I have no thought whether it will live or die. I am for my own sake manifesting myself, looking at myself, encouraging and criticising myself.”

Writing treated as self-examination rather than a bid for immortality · Prelude to Confessional, The Poems of Max Ehrmann

“Religion is the bread of the soul. The best Christianity of today has abandoned the metaphysics of the Bible, but clings to the ethical teachings of Jesus—love, brotherhood, and service—which are the hope of the world.”

Separates ethical religion from disputed doctrine · Journal