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This time, instead of moving oceans and healing planets, let's get our bills in order and pay down the debt so we control our own future.

We have been maintaining a standard of living by putting things on the debt of the next generation.

We can pay the ecological debt by changing economic models, and by giving up luxury consumption, setting aside selfishness and individualism, and thinking about the people and the planet Earth.

When you've paid your debt to society, you need to be reconnected and re-engaged in society.

Let us not bankrupt our todays by paying interest on the regrets of yesterday and by borrowing in advance the troubles of tomorrow.

The human world is a long way from meeting the needs of the present, and it is borrowing massively from the future - not only by piling up money debt, but also by degrading the resources from which all real wealth ultimately comes.

To suggest that we can't pay our debts - that's absolutely not true.

It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.

Debt is part of the human condition. Civilization is based on exchanges - on gifts, trades, loans - and the revenges and insults that come when they are not paid back.

We have to honor our commitments to today's beneficiaries, but we can't solve the growing deficit and debt problems unless we are smart, courageous, and sensible in planning for future.