Quotes About Compassion

Give to every other human being every right that you claim for yourself.

He stands erect by bending over the fallen. He rises by lifting others.

Justice should remove the bandage from her eyes long enough to distinguish between the vicious and the unfortunate.

This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right you claim for yourself.

If abuses are destroyed, man must destroy them. If slaves are freed, man must free them. If new truths are discovered, man must discover them. If the naked are clothed; if the hungry are fed; if justice is done; if labor is rewarded; if superstition is driven from the mind; if the defenseless are protected and if the right finally triumphs, all must be the work of man. The grand victories of the future must be won by man, and by man alone.

Call me infidel, call me atheist, call me what you will, I intend so to treat my children, that they can come to my grave and truthfully say: 'He who sleeps here never gave us a moment of pain. From his lips, now dust, never came to us an unkind word.

Suppose it should turn out that no such person as Christ ever lived. What harm would that do justice or mercy? Wouldn't the tear of pity be as pure as now, and wouldn't justice, holding aloft her scales, from which she blows even the dust of prejudice, be as noble, as admirable as now? Is it not better to love justice and mercy than to love a name, and when you put a name above justice, above mercy, are you sure that you are benefiting your fellowmen?

Is it a small thing to quench the flames of hell with the holy tears of pity -- to unbind the martyr from the stake -- break all the chains -- put out the fires of civil war -- stay the sword of the fanatic, and tear the bloody hands of the Church from the white throat of Science? Is it a small thing to make men truly free -- to destroy the dogmas of ignorance, prejudice and power -- the poisoned fables of superstition, and drive from the beautiful face of the earth the fiend of fear?

When all men give to all others all the rights they claim for themselves, this world will be civilized.

Suppose God should damn to everlasting fire a man so great and good, that he, looking from the abyss of hell, would forgive God,—how would a god feel then?

I want to see a good miracle. I want to see a man with one leg, and then I want to see the other leg grow out.

But I will tell you what I say to my children: 'Go where you will; commit what crime you may; fall to what depth of degradation you may; you can never commit any crime that will shut my door, my arms, or my heart to you. As long as I live you shall have one sincere friend.

What pleasure can it give God to see a man devoured by a cancer; to see the quivering flesh slowly eaten; to see the nerves throbbing with pain? Is this a festival for God?

but if there is the smallest seed of good in any human heart, let kindness fall upon it until it grows, and in that way I know, and so do you, that the world will get better and better day by day.

For my part, I am willing to give up heaven to get rid of hell. I had rather there should be no heaven than that any solitary soul should be condemned to suffer for ever and ever.

man has the right to stop the pulse of pain and woo the sleep that has no dream.

I believe that all actions that tend to the well-being of sentient beings are virtuous and moral.

In the name of universal benevolence Christians have hated their fellow-men.

Whoever imagines himself a favorite with God, holds other people in contempt.

We cannot assist the Infinite, but we can assist our fellow-men.

What is morality? It is the best thing to do under the circumstances. What is the best thing to do under the circumstances? That which will increase the sum of human happiness—or lessen it the least. Happiness in its highest, noblest form, is the only good; that which increases or preserves or creates happiness is moral—that which decreases it, or puts it in peril, is immoral.

How could the death of someone you had never met affect you so?

People do kill themselves, you know, Miranda, when they think their whole reason for living is being taken away from them. Even the fact that other people think their suffering is a joke isn't enough to shake them out of it.

All love, ultimately, is self-love.