An Observant Outlook

"Jean Nicolet, the Frenchman who cruised the straits from Lake Huron and who donned the mandarin's robes when he went ashore at Green Bay, in the belief that the fresh-water seas had led him to the Orient, was the first in a long procession.  He did not find what he expected to find, but he at least learned that the world was a great deal bigger than he had thought it was." (Catton, Bruce. Michigan: A Bicentennial History. 1976.)

This quote came my way in a book of Michigan history.  It struck me as a bit funny.  This poor guy travels halfway around the world and gets all dressed up to meet the Chinese, and all he encounters is a plant-filled wilderness full of Native Americans, not Chinese; yet the best thing the commentator can say for him is that he learned how big the world is!  I suppose he did learn that, but was that truly the lesson he learned, or the only one he learned?  What about preparation and research, new experiences, paradigms, etc.  However, I do believe that the quotation does have a moot point.
.

One of the great banes of life is the inability to change and, conjunctively, the inability to learn.  If, however, I can examine each situation in life, especially those considered failures, and learn form them even a trite lesson, I can continue to learn and will never become stagnant.
.

Even though the author's comment seems a bit understated, at least he learned from this situation a small lesson.  At least he was not oblivious.
.

The lesson I learned from the author was this: always look for a lesson to be learned.

They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. B. Franklin

Recently, I had the privilege of attending a prestigious leadership conference in which we had a mock-Congressional session in which we practiced revising an act.  One of the sections in this act was about screening news published in a foreign language that deals with military matters.  As winners of the Veterans of Foreign Wars speech competition, we had people on both sides of the issue: those who wanted to protect our soldiers and those who were adamantly for free speech.  It was certainly eyeopening.

I found myself on both sides of the issue, wanting to protect men who die for our freedoms, but unwilling to give up those freedoms that they give us.  We ruled to abolish the section altogether because we felt that there were already many measures in place to protect our soldiers and that it would be a blatant violation of the First Amendment.

How to protect both liberty and human life when they seem to be in opposition?