Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me. It is an uncomfortable doctrine which the true ethics whisper into my ear. You are happy, they say; therefore you are called upon to give much.

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me. It is an uncomfortable doctrine which the true ethics whisper into my ear. You are happy, they say; therefore you are called upon to give much." in the context of "Albert Schweitzer, Civilization and Ethics, chapter 26.—The Philosophy of Civilization, trans. C. T. Campion, part 2, p. 321 (1949, reissued 1981)." to mean that wisdom is timeless.