Pacifism Quotes

• There are causes worth dying for, but none worth killing for.

  Albert Camus

  Life, Dying, Causes

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• Nothing will end war unless the peoples themselves refuse to go to war.

  Albert Einstein

  War, People, Ends

  "Einstein on Peace".

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• My study of Gandhi convinced me that true pacifism is not nonresistance to evil, but nonviolent resistance to evil. Between the two positions, there is a world of difference. Gandhi resisted evil with as much vigor and power as the violent resister, but True pacifism is not unrealistic submission to evil power. It is rather a courageous confrontation of evil by the power of love. . . .

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love, Courage, Two

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “"In a Single Garment of Destiny": A Global Vision of Justice”, p.99, Beacon Press

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• We must begin to inculcate our children against militarism by educating them in the spirit of pacifism. Our schoolbooks glorify war and conceal it's horror. I would teach peace rather than war.

  Albert Einstein

  Education, Peace, Children

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• One ought not to return injustice, nor do evil to anybody in the world, no matter what one may have suffered from them.

  Socrates

  Evil, World, May

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• Pacifism is a shifty doctrine under which a man accepts the benefits of the social group
  without being willing to pay; and claims a halo for his dishonesty.

  Robert A. Heinlein

  Men, Groups, Halos

  Robert A. Heinlein (2013). “Double Star”, p.100, Hachette UK

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• Pacifism in the face of war is not only irresponsible - it is immoral. Refusing to meet force with force in the name of peace will beget not peace, but further death and destruction, the very violence the pacifists seek to avoid.

  David Limbaugh

  Peace, War, Names

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• I am not only a pacifist but a militant pacifist. I am willing to fight for peace. Nothing will end war unless the people themselves refuse to go to war.

  Albert Einstein

  Inspirational, Peace, War

  Albert Einstein (2017). “Einstein on Peace”, p.184, Pickle Partners Publishing

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• My pacifism is not based on any intellectual theory but on a deep antipathy to every form of cruelty and hatred.

  Albert Einstein

  War, Hatred, Intellectual

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• Pacifism is objectively pro-Fascist

  George Orwell

  Inspirational, Fascists

  George Orwell (1998). “The complete works of George Orwell”

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• If peace can only come through killing someone, then I don't want it.

  Hiro Mashima

  Peace, Killing Someone, Want

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• A pacifism which can see the cruelties only of occasional military warfare and is blind to the continuous cruelties of our social system is worthless.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Military, Warfare, Poverty

  Mahatma Gandhi (2012). “The Essential Gandhi: An Anthology of His Writings on His Life, Work, and Ideas”, p.285, Vintage

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• The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders...tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger.

  Hermann Goring

  Country, Peace, Freedom

  Quoted in Gustave M. Gilbert, Nuremberg Diary (1947).

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• Pacifism is simply undisguised cowardice.

  Adolf Hitler

  Cowardice

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• Being a pacifist to save your own life is normal, being a pacifist for the lives of others is true pacifism.

  Ammon Hennacy

  Normal, Life Is, Pacifist

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• Naturally, the common people don't want war ... but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.

  Hermann Goring

  Country, Peace, Military

  Interview in Göring's jail cell, April 18, 1946. "Nuremberg Diary". Book by Gustave Gilbert, 1947.

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• Pacifism is objectively pro-fascist. This is elementary common sense. If you hamper the war effort of one side, you automatically help out that of the other. Nor is there any real way of remaining outside such a war as the present one. In practice, 'he that is not with me is against me'.

  George Orwell

  Real, War, Practice

  George Orwell (1998). “The complete works of George Orwell”

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• The absolute pacifist is a bad citizen; times come when force must be used to uphold right, justice and ideals.

  Alfred North Whitehead

  Justice, Citizens, Force

  Alfred North Whitehead, Lucien Price (2001). “Dialogues of Alfred North Whitehead”, p.93, David R. Godine Publisher

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• If peace is equated simply with the absence of war, it can become abject pacifism that turns the world over to the most ruthless.

  Henry A. Kissinger

  Peace, War, Patriotic

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• The goal of pacifism is possible only though a supranational organization. To stand unconditionally for this cause is the criterion of true pacifism.

  Albert Einstein

  Organization, Goal, Causes

  Albert Einstein (2010). “The Ultimate Quotable Einstein”, p.258, Princeton University Press

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• The pacifist's task today is to find a method of helping and healing which provides a revolutionary constructive substitute for war.

  Vera Brittain

  Peace, War, Healing

  Vera Brittain (1964). “The Rebel Passion: A Short History of Some Pioneer Peacemakers”, London : G. Allen & Unwin

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• The peace of the man who has forsworn the use of the bullet seems to me not quite peace, but a canting impotence.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Men, Use, Bullets

  Ralph Waldo Emerson, Joel Porte (1982). “Emerson in His Journals”, p.224, Harvard University Press

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• The pacifist is as surely a traitor to his country and to humanity as is the most brutal wrongdoer.

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Country, Peace, Humanity

  Theodore Roosevelt (2015). “Theodore Roosevelt on Bravery: Lessons from the Most Courageous Leader of the Twentieth Century”, p.79, Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

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• Principles-and I have in mind such principles as states' rights or national sovereignty or the free market or pacifism-have a way of drying up while the sap of life goes flowing in another direction.

  Max Lerner

  Rights, Mind, Principles

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• Pacifism, the preaching of peace in the abstract, is one of the means of duping the working class.

  Vladimir Lenin

  Mean, Class, Abstract

  "The Conference of the R.S.D.L.P. Groups Abroad". Sotsial-Demokrat, No. 40, March 29, 1915. Collected Works, Volume 21, pp. 158 - 164,

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