Animal Suffering Quotes

• The awful wrongs and sufferings forced upon the innocent, helpless, faithful animal race form the blackest chapter in the whole world's history.

  R. Edward Freeman

  Animal, Race, Faithful

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  We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace.

  Albert Schweitzer

  Fighting, Compassion, Animal

  186 Copy quote

• Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.

  Albert Schweitzer

  Philosophical, Animal, Thinking

  40 Copy quote

• Could you look an animal in the eyes and say to it, 'My appetite is more important than your suffering'?

  Moby

  Eye, Animal, Suffering

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• What is it that should trace the insuperable line? ...The question is not, Can they reason? nor Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?

  Jeremy Bentham

  Love, Yoga, Compassion

  Jeremy Bentham (1876). “An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation”, p.311

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• Mankind's true moral test, its fundamental test (which lies deeply buried from view), consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals. And in this respect mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.

  Milan Kundera

  Love, Peace, Nature

  "The Unbearable Lightness of Being". Book by Milan Kundera, 1984.

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• May all that have life be delivered from suffering.

  Gautama Buddha

  Buddhist, Animal, Suffering

  45 Copy quote

• The brute animals have all the same sensations of pain as human beings, and consequently endure as much pain when their body is hurt; but in their case the cruelty of torment is greater, because they have no mind to bear them up against their sufferings, and no hope to look forward to when enduring the last extreme pain.

  Thomas Chalmers

  Hurt, Pain, Animal

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• It is more important to prevent animal suffering, rather than sit to contemplate the evils of the universe praying in the company of priests.

  Gautama Buddha

  Animal, Evil, Suffering

  29 Copy quote

• As custodians of the planet it is our responsibility to deal with all species with kindness, love, and compassion. That these animals suffer through human cruelty is beyond understanding. Please help to stop this madness.

  Richard Gere

  Kindness, Responsibility, Compassion

  96 Copy quote

• I wish no living thing to suffer pain.

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Life, Pain, Compassion

  1820 Prometheus Unbound, act 1, l.303-5.

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• Once admit that we have the right to inflict unnecessary suffering and you destroy the very basis of human society.

  John Galsworthy

  Animal, Compassion, Suffering

  John Galsworthy (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of John Galsworthy (Illustrated)”, p.7260, Delphi Classics

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• The indifference, callousness and contempt that so many people exhibit toward animals is evil first because it results in great suffering in animals, and second because it results in an incalculably great impoverishment of the human spirit.

  Albert Einstein

  Compassion, Animal, Vegetarianism

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• What else is it that should trace the insuperable line? Is it the faculty of reason or perhaps the faculty of discourse? But a full-grown horse or dog is beyond comparison a more rational, as well as more conversable animal, than an infant of a day or a week or even a month old. But suppose they were otherwise, what would it avail? The question is not, Can they reason?, nor Can they talk? but, Can they suffer? Why should the law refuse its protection to any sensitive being? The time will come when humanity will extend its mantle over everything which breathes.

  Jeremy Bentham

  Dog, Horse, Animal

  Jeremy Bentham (2012). “An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation”, p.311, Courier Corporation

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• To a man whose mind is free there is something even more intolerable in the sufferings of animals than in the sufferings of man. For with the latter it is at least admitted that suffering is evil and that the man who causes it is a criminal. But thousands of animals are uselessly butchered every day without a shadow of remorse. If any man were to refer to it, he would be thought ridiculous. And that is the unpardonable crime.

  Romain Rolland

  Animal, Men, Vegetarianism

  Romain Rolland (1913). “Jean-Christophe: The market-place”

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  Ever occur to you why some of us can be this much concerned with animals' suffering? Because government is not. Why not? Animals don't vote.

  Paul Harvey

  Animal, Equality, Government

  94 Copy quote

• People must have renounced, it seems to me, all natural intelligence to dare to advance that animals are but animated machines.... It appears to me, besides, that such people can never have observed with attention the character of animals, not to have distinguished among them the different voices of need, of suffering, of joy, of pain, of love, of anger, and of all their affections. It would be very strange that they should express so well what they could not feel.

  Voltaire

  Pain, Philosophical, Character

  26 Copy quote

• Humans — who enslave, castrate, experiment on, and fillet other animals — have had an understandable penchant for pretending animals do not feel pain. A sharp distinction between humans and 'animals' is essential if we are to bend them to our will, make them work for us, wear them, eat them — without any disquieting tinges of guilt or regret. It is unseemly of us, who often behave so unfeelingly toward other animals, to contend that only humans can suffer. The behavior of other animals renders such pretensions specious. They are just too much like us.

  Carl Sagan

  Pain, Regret, Compassion

  "Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors". Book by Ann Druyan and Carl Sagan, 1992.

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• At the moment our human world is based on the suffering and destruction of millions of non-humans. To perceive this and to do something to change it in personal and public ways is to undergo a change of perception akin to a religious conversion. Nothing can ever be seen in quite the same way again because once you have admitted the terror and pain of other species you will, unless you resist conversion, be always aware of the endless permutations of suffering that support our society.

  Arthur Conan Doyle

  Religious, Pain, Support

  Attributed to Arthur Conan Doyle in "The Face on Your Plate: The Truth About Food" by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, 2009.

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• The indifference, callousness and contempt that so many people exhibit toward animals is evil first because it results in great suffering in animals, and second because it results in an incalculably great impoverishment of the human spirit. All education should be directed toward the refinement of the individual's sensibilities in relation not only to one's fellow humans everywhere, but to all things whatsoever.

  Ashley Montagu

  Animal, People, Evil

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• It seems to me of great importance to teach children respect for life. Towards this end, experiments on living animals in classrooms should be stopped. To encourage cruelty in the name of science can only destroy the finer emotions of affection and sympathy, and breed an unfeeling callousness in the young towards suffering in all living creatures.

  Eleanor Roosevelt

  Respect, Nature, Children

  50 Copy quote

• So in 1987 I gave up all animal products and became a vegan. Simply so that I could eat and live in accordance with my beliefs that animals have their own lives, that they're entitled to their own lives and that contributing to animal suffering is something that I don't want to be a part of.

  Moby

  Animal, Suffering, Want

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• Let's just call things what they are. When a man's love of finery clouds his moral judgment, that is vanity. When he lets a demanding palate make his moral choices, that is gluttony. When he ascribes the divine will to his own whims, that is pride. And when he gets angry at being reminded of animal suffering that his own daily choices might help avoid, that is moral cowardice.

  Matthew Scully

  Pride, Animal, Men

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• Being vegan truly is the secret to my life's joy and peace. I feel physically and spiritually better than I could have ever imagined knowing that I am doing everything I can to reduce animal suffering with simple lifestyle choices like being vegan, never wearing any products made from animals (like wool and leather), and buying only from companies that NEVER test their products or ingredients on animals.

  Alicia Silverstone

  Simple, Animal, Lifestyle Choices

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• I turned to human suffering because - this may sound odd - animal suffering is more difficult for me to deal with.

  Rigoberto Gonzalez

  Animal, Suffering, Sound

  Source: therumpus.net

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