Mankind Quotes - Page 30

• The intellectual power, honesty, lucidity, courage, and disinterested love of the truth of the most gifted thinkers of the eighteenth century remain to this day without parallel. Their age is one of the best and most hopeful episodes in the life of mankind.

  Isaiah Berlin

  Honesty, Hopeful, Intellectual

  Isaiah Berlin, Henry Hardy (2001). “The Power of Ideas”, p.52, Princeton University Press

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• Much has seen said of the wisdom of old age. Old age is wise, I grant, for itself, but not wise for the community. It is wise in declining new enterprises, for it has not the power nor the time to execute them; wise in shrinking from difficulty, for it has not the strength to overcome it; wise in avoiding danger, for it lacks the faculty of ready and swift action, by which dangers are parried and converted into advantages. But this is not wisdom for mankind at large, by whom new enterprises must be undertaken, dangers met, and difficulties surmounted.

  William C. Bryant

  Wise, Community, Age

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• Mankind's suffering belongs to all men.

  Bernard Kouchner

  Men, Suffering

  "Once we believed in intervention. Now, to our shame, we turn away" by Nick Cohen, www.theguardian.com. July 22, 2006.

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• Our duty to ourselves, to posterity, and to mankind, call on us
  by every motive which is sacred or honorable, to watch over the safety of our beloved country
  during the troubles which agitate and convulse the residue of the world, and to sacrifice to
  that all personal and local considerations.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Country, Sacrifice, Safety

  Thomas Jefferson, Richard Holland Johnston, Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association of the United States “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson”

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• What mankind needs today is liberation from the rule of nonsensical slogans and a return to sound reasoning.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Sound, Needs, Today

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• The aim of socialism is not only to abolish the present division of mankind into smaller states and all-national isolation, not only to bring the nations closer to each other, but also to merge them.

  Vladimir Lenin

  Division, Isolation, Socialism

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• It may be broadly stated that.....of all animals kept for the recreation of mankind the horse is alone capable of exciting a passion that shall be absolutely hopeless.

  Bret Harte

  Horse, Passion, Animal

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• The crowd neither wants nor seeks knowledge, and the leaders of the crowd, in their own interests, try to strengthen its fear and dislike of everything new and unknown. The slavery in which mankind lives is based upon this fear.

  G. I. Gurdjieff

  Leader, Trying, Slavery

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• As the fisherman depends upon the rivers, lakes and seas and the farmer upon the land for his existence, so does mankind in general depend upon the beauty of the world about him for his spiritual and emotional existence.

  Ansel Adams

  Spiritual, Emotional, Lakes

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• The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion. However valuable-even necessary-that may have been in enforcing good behavior on primitive peoples, their association is now counterproductive. Yet at the very moment when they should be decoupled, sanctimonious nitwits are calling for a return to morals based on superstition.

  Arthur C. Clarke

  Tragedy, Calling, Hijacking

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• Indeed, beauty is one of mankind's greatest needs; it is the root from which the branches of our peace and the fruits of our hope come forth. Beauty also reveals God because, like him, a work of beauty is pure gratuity; it calls us to freedom and draws us away from selfishness.

  Pope Benedict XVI

  Roots, Selfishness, Needs

  Pope Benedict XVI's Holy Mass With Dedication Of The Church Of The Sagrada Familia And Of The Altar, w2.vatican.va. November 7, 2010.

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• By the fall a poison was handed to mankind through a woman [Eve], by the Redemption man was given salvation also through a woman [Mary].

  Saint Augustine

  Fall, Men, Poison

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• Virtue in distress, and vice in triumph make atheists of mankind.

  John Dryden

  Atheist, Vices, Triumph

  John Dryden (1998). “The Works of John Dryden, Volume XVI: Plays: King Arthur, Cleomenes, Love Triumphant, and The Secular Masque and Other Contributions to The Pilgrim”, p.145, Univ of California Press

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• A man deserves credit when he accomplishes something of importance. Something that provides for the betterment of his life and his family's life and, whenever possible, mankind.

  Therese Anne Fowler

  Men, Credit, Importance

  Therese Anne Fowler (2013). “Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald”, p.34, Macmillan

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• Mankind are in the end always governed by superiority of intellectual faculties, and none are more sensible of this than the military profession. When, on my return from Italy, I assumed the dress of the Institute, and associated with men of science, I knew what I was doing: I was sure of not being misunderstood by the lowest drummer boy in the army.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Military, Army, Boys

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• But a somewhat more liberal and sympathetic examination of mankind will convince us that the cross is even older than the gibbet, that voluntary suffering was before and independent of compulsory; and in short that in most important matters a man has always been free to ruin himself if he chose.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Independent, Men, Convince Us

  Gilbert K. Chesterton (2013). “The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton”, p.316, Simon and Schuster

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• Poets, the first instructors of mankind,
  Brought all things to the proper native use.

  Horace

  Use, Firsts, Poet

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• Ingenious philosophers tell you, perhaps, that the great work of the steam-engine is to create leisure for mankind. Do not believe them; it only creates a vacuum for eager thought to rush in.

  George Eliot

  Believe, Leisure, Vacuums

  George Eliot (2016). “Complete Works Of George Eliot”, p.834, ShandonPress

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• Some one called Sir Richard Steele the "vilest of mankind," and he retorted with proud humility, "It would be a glorious world if I were.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Humility, Would Be, World

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• That incessant envy wherewith the common rate of mankind pursues all superior natures to their own.

  Jonathan Swift

  Envy, Common, Incessant

  Jonathan Swift (1861). “The Works of Jonathan Swift ...: With Copious Notes and Additions, and a Memoir of the Author”, p.327

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• No man of honor, as the word is usually understood, did ever pretend that his honor obliged him to be chaste or temperate, to pay his creditors, to be useful to his country, to do good to mankind, to endeavor to be wise or learned, to regard his word, his promise, or his oath.

  Jonathan Swift

  Wise, Country, Men

  Jonathan Swift, Thomas Roscoe (1859). “The works of Jonathan Swift, D.D.: with copious notes and additions and a memoir of the author”, p.149

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• Music is the only sensual gratification which mankind may indulge in to excess without injury to their moral or religious feelings.

  Joseph Addison

  Music, Religious, Indulge In

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• It generally takes its rise either from an ill-will to mankind, a private inclination to make ourselves esteemed, an ostentation of wit, and vanity of being thought in the secrets of the world; or from a desire of gratifying any of these dispositions of mind in those persons with whom we converse.

  Joseph Addison

  Vanity, Ill Will, Mind

  Joseph Addison, Sir Richard Steele (1852). “The Spectator”, p.675

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• In the common run of mankind, for one that is wise and good you find ten of a contrary character.

  Joseph Addison

  Wise, Running, Wisdom

  Joseph Addison (1858). “Works, Including the Whole Contents of Bp. Hurd's Edition: Withletters and Other Pieces Not Found in Any Previous Collection; and Macaulay's Essay on His Life and Works”, p.191

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• Great God, what do I see and hear!
  The end of things created!
  The judge of mankind doth appear
  On clouds of glory seated!
  The trumpet sounds; the graves restore,
  The dead which they contained before;
  Prepare, my soul, to meet Him!

  Martin Luther

  Clouds, Judging, Soul

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