Quotes About Compassion

I weep, therefore I love

One's life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, and compassion.

The capacity to pay attention to an afflicted person is something very rare, very difficult; it is nearly a miracle. It is a miracle. Nearly all those who believe they have this capacity do not. Warmth, movements of the heart, and pity are not sufficient.

One cannot imagine St. Francis of Assisi talking about rights.

To die for God is not a proof of faith in God. To die for an unknown and repulsive convict who is a victim of injustice, that is a proof of faith in God.

Among human beings, only the existence of those we love is fully recognized. Belief in the existence of other human beings as such is love.

L'amour n'est pas consolation, il est lumière.

It is impossible to forgive whoever has done us harm if that harm has lowered us. We have to think that it has not lowered us, but has revealed our true level.

There are four evidences of divine mercy here below. The favors of God to beings capable of contemplation (these states exist and form part of their experience as creatures). The radiance of these beings, and their compassion, which is the divine compassion in them. The beauty of the world. The fourth evidence is the complete absence of mercy here below.

We should seek neither to escape suffering nor to suffer less, but to remain untainted by suffering.

God is not present, even if we invoke him, where the afflicted are merely regarded as an occasion for doing good. They may even be loved on this account, but then they are in their natural role, the role of matter and of things. We have to bring to them in their inert, anonymous condition a personal love....In true love it is not we who love the afflicted in God; it is God in us who loves them.

The wish to see others suffer exactly what we are suffering. It is because of this that, except in periods of social instability, the spite of those in misfortune is directed against their fellows. That is a factor making for social stability.

Ori de câte ori m? gândesc la crucificarea lui Hristos, s?vâÅŸesc p?catul invidiei.

With no matter what human being, taken individually, I always find reasons for concluding that sorrow and misfortune do not suit him; either because he seems too mediocre for anything so great, or, on the contrary, too precious to be destroyed.

I have never caused anyone to weep. I have never spoken with a haughty voice. I have never made anyone afraid. I have never been deaf to words of justice and truth.

Love on the part of someone who is happy is the wish to share the suffering of the beloved who is unhappy. Love on the part of someone who is unhappy is to be filled with joy by the mere knowledge that his beloved is happy without sharing in this happiness or even wishing to do so.

Let us love this distance which is thoroughly woven with friendship, since those who do not love each other are not separated

Those who are unhappy have no need for anything in this world but people capable of giving them their attention.

Only he who has measured the dominion of force, and knows how not to respect it, is capable of love and justice.

Arriba se está en mala posición para darse cuenta de las cosas, y abajo para actuar. Creo que ahí radica de manera general una de las causas esenciales de las desgracias humanas. Es por eso que he querido ir yo misma abajo de todo, y por lo que quizá volveré. Simone Weil. Carta a Victor Bernard

It is good to reflect about whatever forces us to come out of ourselves. I have difficulty in imagining how it can be that you really have some friendship for me; but as you apparently have, it may be for this purpose.

The fullness of love for neighbor is simply the capacity to ask the question, 'What is your agony?' It is to know (recognize) that the afflicted exist, not as a unit in a collection, nor as an example of a social category labeled 'the afflicted,' but in all their humanity, exactly like us, who have been stamped and marked by an inimitable mark, by their affliction.

We must not judge. We must be like the Father in heaven who does not judge: by him beings judge themselves.

Il faut éliminer le malheur autant qu'on le peut de la vie sociale, car le malheur ne sert qu'à la grâce et la société n'est pas une société d'élus. Il y aura toujours assez de malheur pour les élus.