I would go to the deeps a hundred times to cheer a downcast spirit. It is good for me to have been afflicted, that I might know how to speak a word in season to one that is weary.

You must reward the kind of behavior that you want.

It is very important to generate a good attitude, a good heart, as much as possible. From this, happiness in both the short term and the long term for both yourself and others will come.

Anybody who has been discriminated against, who comes from a group that’s been discriminated against, knows what it’s like.

As a musician and a songwriter, it is an act of the ego to believe that other people might be interested in your point of view. But it is usually an empathetic nature that gets you going in the first place. Music keeps the heart porous in many ways.

Be nice to the whites, they need you to rediscover their humanity.

We pity in others only the those evils which we ourselves have experienced.

It is too late to be studying Hebrew; it is more important to understand even the slang of today.

I go to cancer wards, and I tell them guys, ‚I’ve beaten it. You can, too.‘

I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are your greatest treasures.

For the people who ostensibly wish me well or are worried about my immortal soul, I say I take it kindly.

Aptitude found in the understanding and is often inherited. Genius coming from reason and imagination, rarely.

Wherever the invitation of men or your own occasions lead you, speak the very truth, as your life and conscience teach it, and cheer the waiting, fainting hearts of men with new hope and new revelation.

I think of a hero as someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom.

Do not be afraid to ask for help. Nobody gets through college on their own.

A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.

No better way is there to learn to love Nature than to understand Art. It dignifies every flower of the field. And, the boy who sees the thing of beauty which a bird on the wing becomes when transferred to wood or canvas will probably not throw the customary stone.

I want to represent… to the kids to draw strength from me. So they can see that everybody goes through something, but you can rise up and do your best. Just try.

Friendship is but another name for an alliance with the follies and the misfortunes of others. Our own share of miseries is sufficient: why enter then as volunteers into those of another?

What do you regard as most humane? To spare someone shame.

We have a tendency to condemn people who are different from us, to define their sins as paramount and our own sinfulness as being insignificant.

I mean, if you didn’t get it or if you didn’t feel like you enjoyed it, sometimes that experience can change.

He that has done you a kindness will be more ready to do you another, than he whom you yourself have obliged.

What I remember as a child is that other kids didn’t care about suffering. I always did.

Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.

To attain any assured knowledge about the soul is one of the most difficult things in the world.

You give before you get.

I think we all have empathy. We may not have enough courage to display it.

No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he’d only had good intentions; he had money as well.

I always ask God to work through me and let me be a light of some kind and help in this world, so I always pray for that, and I always want to do good.

Kindnesses are easily forgotten; but injuries! what worthy man does not keep those in mind?

Listen, I think that people want a president who is going to be interested in the things that keep them up at night, the things that are weighing on them, the things that are debilitating and can be addressed.

He who does not prevent a crime when he can, encourages it.

Tonight – to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans – I ask for your support.

I often advocate that we look at many sides of an issue, walk in someone else’s shoes, and identify and reject false choices.

When we are well, we all have good advice for those who are ill.

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.

What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.

With compassion you can die for other people, like the mother who can die for her child. You have the courage to say it because you are not afraid of losing anything, because you know that understanding and love is the foundation of happiness. But if you have fear of losing your status, your position, you will not have the courage to do it.

Our human compassion binds us the one to the other – not in pity or patronizingly, but as human beings who have learnt how to turn our common suffering into hope for the future.

I’m so tough and so bad, I can be humble and lift another guy up.

When I talk to kids, I’m really listening. When I do that, we have a little bit of a bigger connection than me being Kendrick Lamar and you being a student. It’s almost like we’re friends. Because a friend listens.

My dear sisters, whatever your calling, whatever your circumstances, we need your impressions, your insights, and your inspiration. We need you to speak up and speak out in ward and stake councils.

‚Suffering should not make us bitter people,‘ my mother once said, ‚it should make us better comforters.‘ Young people need to hear this from those who have walked before them, because someday they’ll be walking those same steps, but there may not be anyone following behind.

People gonna be they own individuals and have they own worlds and I can’t knock it.

Sadly, of course, there is real evil in the world. You watch the news, and you see all of the people suffering and so much cruelty.

It’s a tragedy, in a way, that Americans are brought up to think that they cannot feel for other people and other beings just because they are different. They think they’re different. It’s very limiting.

While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered animals, how can we expect any ideal living conditions on this earth?

To realize that you do not understand is a virtue; Not to realize that you do not understand is a defect.

The hardest thing to understand in the world is the income tax.

Change happens by listening and then starting a dialogue with the people who are doing something you don’t believe is right.

An enemy generally says and believes what he wishes.

A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: ‚Tell me: when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person?‘ We must always consider the person.

You must live for another if you wish to live for yourself.

A good thing to remember is somebody’s got it a lot worse than we do.

What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness?

We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.

When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?

Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he works for the welfare of his fellow-men.

When we value correct principles, we have truth – a knowledge of things as they are.

When you really listen to another person from their point of view, and reflect back to them that understanding, it’s like giving them emotional oxygen.