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Literary notes about Reflect (AI summary)

In literature, the term "reflect" is employed with versatile nuance—sometimes urging a moment of careful, internal consideration and at other times evoking the physical phenomenon of mirroring. Authors use it as an invitation to ponder deeper themes or moral complexities, as when a character is advised to consider consequences before acting [1] or to muse upon abstract notions like justice or happiness [2][3]. At the same time, "reflect" can denote a literal mirroring process, creating images that symbolize truths about the self or the environment, such as when a mirror is playfully invoked to demonstrate that two arrangements are essentially the same [4]. This multiplicity of senses imbues the word with a rich flexibility that spans philosophical introspection and vivid, tangible imagery.
  1. “I will give you the address of one of the best; but reflect before you do anything.
    — from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova
  2. [205] [265] Perhaps the first point that strikes us when we reflect upon our notion of Justice is its connexion with Law.
    — from The Methods of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick
  3. But why do I reflect on happy situations only to aggravate my own misery?
    — from History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding
  4. If you reflect in a mirror you get another arrangement, which also is not considered different.
    — from Amusements in Mathematics by Henry Ernest Dudeney

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