Quotes About Compassion

Remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.

He'd developed a strangely tender feeling towards such words, as if they were children abandoned in the woods and it was his duty to rescue them.

Those in pain have no time for the pain they cause.

He doesn't understand yet that guilt comes to you not from the things you've done, but from the things that others have done to you.

How can I have behaved so badly, so cruelly, so stupidly? you will ask. You yourself would never have done such things! But you yourself will never have had to.

How can I teach her some way of being human that won't destroy her I would like to tell her, Love is enough, I would like to say, Find shelter in another skin. I would like to say, Dance and be happy. Instead I will say in my crone's voice, Be ruthless when you have to, tell the truth when you can, when you can see it.

No mother is ever, completely, a child's idea of what a mother should be, and I suppose it works the other way around as well. But despite everything, we didn't do badly by one another, we did as well as most. I wish she were here, so I could tell her I finally know this.

But if you happen to be a man, sometime in the future, and you've made it this far, please remember: you will never be subject to the temptation or feeling you must forgive, a man, as a woman. It's difficult to resist, believe me. But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.

Of course (said Oryx), having a money value was no substitute for love. Every child should have love, every person should have it. . . . but love was undependable, it came and then it went, so it was good to have a money value, because then at least those who wanted to make a profit from you would make sure you were fed enough and not damaged too much. Also there were many who had neither love nor a money value, and having one of these things was better than having nothing.

Those who have been in trouble themselves are alert to it in others

She did not believe he was a monster. He was not a monster, to her. Probably he had some endearing trait: he whistled, off key, in the shower, he had a yen for truffles, he called his dog Liebchen and made it sit up for pieces of raw steak. How easy it is to invent a humanity, for anyone at all.

Nobody's heart is perfect.

Maybe it's about who can do what to whom and can be forgiven for it. Never tell me it amounts to the same thing.

Every child should have love, every person should have it. She herself would rather have had her mother's love - the love she still continued to believe in, the love that had followed her through the jungle in the form of a bird so she would not be too frightened or lonely.

We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat.

An eye for an eye only leads to more blindness

But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.

But why bother about the end of the world? It's the end of the world every day, for someone. Time rises and rises, and when it reaches the level of your eyes you drown.

It's lack of love we die from.

All of this was understood, and if not condoned, at least pardoned.

Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. I refuse to say this. If it means I will have to forgive Mrs. Smeath or else go to Hell when I die, I'm ready to go. Jesus must have known how hard it is to forgive, that was why he put this in. He was always putting in things that were impossible to do really, such as giving away all your money.

How can I teach her some way of being human that won't destroy her?

Stretch your hand towards those gentle eyes that regard you with such trust

You should not be sad, he said, gazing at me with his melancholy, leathery walrus eyes. It must be the love. But you are young and pretty, you will have time to be sad later. The French are connoisseurs of sadness, they know all the kinds. This is why they have bidets. It is criminal, the love, he said, patting my shoulder. But none is worse.—