Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[gloria_taipei]

Hi to all!

Please help me with this sentence. I don't quite understand it.

"If you were busy being right,
You'd find yourself too busy quite
To criticize your neighbor long
Because he's busy being wrong."

Q1: Does "being right" mean "doing the right things"?
Q2: I'd find myself having no time to criticize my neighbor?
Q3: Does "long" here mean "all day long"?
Q4: How could someone be busy being wrong?

Thank you in advance.

[CP]

"If you were busy being right,
You'd find yourself too busy quite
To criticize your neighbor long
Because he's busy being wrong."

Q1: Does "being right" mean "doing the right things"?
--Yes.
Q2: I'd find myself having no time to criticize my neighbor?
--Right.
Q3: Does "long" here mean "all day long"?
--Not necessarily. It means you'd find yourself way too busy to have much time to criticize your neighbor; you wouldn't have long to criticize your neighbor.
Q4: How could someone be busy being wrong?
--It's parallel to being busy being right. If your neighbor is spending all his time doing the wrong things (from your point of view) he's busy being wrong in the same way as you should be busy being right.

The moral of the poem: Mind your own business. Often very good advice.
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You live a new life for every new language you speak. -Czech proverb