Human Nature Quotes - Page 21

• ... it is a commonplace that men like war. For peace, in our society, with the feeling we have then that it is feeble-minded to strive except for one's own private profit, is a lonely thing and a hazardous business. Over and over men have proved that they prefer the hazards of war with all its suffering. It has its compensations.

  Ruth Benedict

  Lonely, Peace, War

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• Physical nature lies at our feet shackled with a hundred chains. What of the control of human nature? Do not point to the triumphsof psychiatry, social services or the war against crime. Domination of human nature can only mean the domination of every man by himself.

  Johan Huizinga

  War, Lying, Mean

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• Nothing spoils human nature more than false zeal. The good nature of a heathen is more God-like than the furious zeal of a Christian.

  Benjamin Whichcote

  Christian, Good Nature, Zeal

  Benjamin Whichcote, Anthony Tuckney (1753). “Moral and religious aphorisms [collected by J. Jeffery from the papers of B. Whichcote]. Now re-publ., with additions, by S. Salter. To which are added, Eight letters: which passed between dr. Whichcote, and dr. Tuckney”, p.52

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• ... the space left to freedom is very small.ends are inherent in human nature and the same for all.

  Hannah Arendt

  Freedom, Space, Ends

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• What a world is this! What is there in it desirable? The good we hope for so strangely mixed, that one knows not what to wish for!And one half of mankind tormenting the other, and being tormented themselves in tormenting!

  Samuel Richardson

  Life, Wish, Half

  Samuel Richardson (2014). “Clarissa Harlowe, or The History of a Young Lady - Complete”, p.288, Simon and Schuster

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• When we reflect upon the cruelties daily practised upon such of the animal creation as are given us for food, or which we ensnarefor our diversion, we shall be obliged to own that there is more of the savage in human nature than we are aware of.

  Samuel Richardson

  Animal, Savages, Creation

  Samuel Richardson (1755). “A collection of the moral and instructive sentiments, maxims, cautions, and reflexions, contained in the histories of Pamela, Clarissa, and Sir Charles Grandison: Digested under proper heads, with references to the volume, ...”, p.109

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• Cardinal Dolan, of course, has a very, very hard job: trying to hold up Catholic family values in sexually liberal New York City. I'm not saying New York is the Gay Mecca. But it's at least Gay-rusalem.

  Stephen Colbert

  Family, Leadership, Jobs

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• If the world is a precipitation of human nature, so to speak, then the divine world is a sublimation of the same. Both occur in one act. No precipitation without sublimation. What goes lost there in agility, is won here.

  Novalis

  World, Agility, Speak

  "Pollen and Fragments". Book by Novalis. Fragment No. 96, 1798.

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• You never know what's actually going on in a person's life. You don't know what happened to them before you met them...and that's why they are the way they are. But I do think about it whenever I get in contact with my fans. I know this may be the only time they'll ever meet me. I try to take advantage of that moment and be kind and grateful.

  Katy Perry

  Wisdom, Grateful, Reality

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• ... the man in the violent situation reveals those qualities least dispensable in his personality, those qualities which are all he will have to take into eternity with him.

  Flannery O'Connor

  Men, Afterlife, Personality

  Flannery O'Connor (1993). “"A Good Man is Hard to Find"”, p.59, Rutgers University Press

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• Obviously [my daughters] - and Michelle - have made a lot of sacrifices on behalf of my cockamamie ideas, the running for office and things.

  Barack Obama

  Family, Running, Daughter

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• But the question is, do we care enough? Do we care enough to keep standing up for the country that we know is possible, even if it's hard, and even if it's politically uncomfortable? Do we care enough to sustain the passion and the pressure to make our communities safer and our country safer? Do we care enough to do everything we can to spare other families the pain that is felt here today?

  Barack Obama

  Leadership, Country, Pain

  "CNN Newsroom" with Rosa Flores, www.cnn.com. September 22, 2013.

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• We Americans are not an inherently more violent people than folks in other countries. We're not inherently more prone to mental health problems. The main difference that sets our nation apart is what makes us so susceptible to so many mass shootings is that we don't do enough, we don't take the basic commonsense actions to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and dangerous people. What's different in America is it's easy to get your hands on a gun.

  Barack Obama

  Country, Gun, Mass Shootings

  "CNN Newsroom" with Rosa Flores, www.cnn.com. September 22, 2013.

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• Politics, differences of religion or race, all that fades away when we are confronted with the awesome power of nature, and we're reminded that all we have is each other.

  Barack Obama

  Differences, Race, Power Of Nature

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• Human life is so strangely constituted that even perfected intellectual understanding combined with the richest experience is incapable of conquering innate weaknesses. Even if it thoroughly analyzes itself, psychology (and this is one of the dubious aspects of psychoanalysis) can, to be sure, recognize its flawed native characteristics, but it cannot eliminate them. Understanding (them) is not the same as overcoming (them) and, again and again, we see the wisest of human beings helpless in the fact of their small follies which everyone else observes with a smile.

  Stefan Zweig

  Psychology, Understanding, Intellectual

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• It is a law of life that human beings, even the geniuses among them, do not pride themselves on their actual achievements but thatthey want to impress others, want to be admired and respected because of things of much lower import and value.

  Stefan Zweig

  Pride, Law, Achievement

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• One never gets to know a person's character better than by watching his behavior during decisive moments.... It is always only danger which forces the most deeply hidden strengths and abilities of a human being to come forth.

  Stefan Zweig

  Strength, Character, Moments

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• Work is the only meanin' I've ever known. Like the man in the song says, I just gotta keep on keepin' on.

  Joe Frazier

  Song, Work, Men

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• Finding God in all things is not an 'empirical eureka.' When we desire to encounter God, we would like to verify him immediately by an empirical method. But you cannot meet God this way...A contemplative attitude is necessary: it is the feeling that you are moving along the good path of understanding and affection toward things and situations. Profound peace, spiritual consolation, love of God, and love of all things in God-this is the sign that you are on this right path.

  Pope Francis

  Spiritual, Wisdom, Attitude

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• I'm tired of the naked, raped, beaten black woman body. I want to see an image of black femaleness that alters our universe in some way.

  Bell Hooks

  Leadership, Wisdom, Tired

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• It's the one thing we can all relate to no matter what religion, what color, what nationality: we can all relate to sex and love.

  Enrique Iglesias

  Family, Sex, Color

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• I can't play the game of basketball and live my life on what other people expect me to do or what they think I should do. That doesn't make me happy. What makes me happy is being able to make plays for my teammates, to be able to represent the name on the back of my jersey.

  LeBron James

  Family, Basketball, Thinking

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• [Hillary Clinton] and I are fine. Are we going to be besties for the rest of our lives? No.

  Claire McCaskill

  Reality, Comedy, Civility

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• In the 2012 election, Obamacare, as it's called, and I'll be more polite - the ACA ...was a major issue in the campaign. I campaigned all over America for two months, everywhere I could. And in every single campaign rally I said, 'We have to repeal and replace Obamacare.' Well, the people spoke. They spoke, much to my dismay, but they spoke. And they reelected the President of the United States.

  John McCain

  Leadership, Party, Health

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• Speak out, educate, do not be intimidated by the apologists, and do not let extreme racism be mainstreamed. Hopefully there will come a time when we don't need to tell our kids that Halloween is no excuse for hate, and that blackface has no place in a civilized society.

  Christine Pelosi

  Leadership, Halloween, Hate

  "Halloween Is No Excuse for Hate: Blackface Has No Place" by Christine Pelosi, www.huffingtonpost.com. October 27, 2013.

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