Quotes About Empathy

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Father forgive them, for they know not what they do

But to live,—to wear on, day after day, of mean, bitter, low, harassing servitude, every nerve dampened and depressed, every power of feeling gradually smothered,—this long and wasting heart-martyrdom, this slow, daily bleeding away of the inward life, drop by drop, hour after hour,—this is the true searching test of what there may be in man or woman.

No, no, no!" said Tom, holding her small hands, which were clenched with spasmodic violence. "No, ye poor, lost soul, that ye mustn't do. The dear, blessed Lord never shed no blood but his own, and that he poured out for us when we was enemies. Lord, help us

Ah, brave, manly heart,—smothering thine own sorrow, to comfort thy beloved ones!

The woman did not sob nor weep. She had gone to a place where tears are dry; but every one around her was, in some way characteristic of themselves, showing signs of hearty sympathy.

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Ah, good brother! is it fair for you to expect of us services which your own brave, honorable heart would not allow you to render, were you in our place?

or I'll take ye down a

And, woman, though dressed in silk and jewels, you are but a woman, and, in life's great straits and mighty griefs, ye feel but one sorrow!

do ye know that everything your money can buy, given with a cold, averted face, is not worth one honest tear shed in real sympathy?

He had never thought that a fugitive might be a hapless mother, a defenceless child,—like

Now, John, I don't know anything about politics, but I can read my Bible; and there I see that I must feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and comfort the desolate; and that Bible I mean to follow.

He invented mother's hearts--& he certainly has the pattern in his own.

Any mind that is capable of a real sorrow is capable of good.

Scenes of blood and cruelty are shocking to our ear and heart. What man has nerve to do, man has not nerve to hear.

It's a matter of taking the side of the weak against the strong, something the best people have always done.

I am one of the sort that lives by throwing stones at other people's glass houses, but I never mean to put up one for them to stone.

She knew him so well, the amused, detached tone of his voice, the scroll of his ear, his eyes, his bony frame. Someone whom she always wanted in the room, someone who saw the world the same way, and it had always been like that.

We had loads in common but we just didn't see the world in the same way.

People's sense of self worth is pivotal to their ability to look clearly at the hurt they've caused. The more solid one's sense of self regard, the more likely that that person can feel empathy and compassion for the hurt party, and apologize from an authentic center.

When we do not put our primary emotional energy into solving our own problems, we take on other people's problems as our own.

To listen with an open heart and ask questions to better help us understand the other person is a spiritual exercise, in the truest sense of the word.

If only our passion to understand others were as great as our passion to be understood. Were this so, all our apologies would be truly meaningful and healing.