Depend upon it that if a man talks of his misfortunes there is something in them that is not disagreeable to him; for where there is nothing but pure misery there never is any recourse to the mention of it.
Samuel JohnsonThe greatness of man is great in that he knows himself to be wretched. A tree does not know itself to be wretched.
Blaise PascalAt what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
Abraham LincolnI think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We’ve created life in our own image.
Stephen HawkingWhat is government itself but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?
James MadisonI gave ‚em a sword. And they stuck it in, and they twisted it with relish. And I guess if I had been in their position, I’d have done the same thing.
Richard M. NixonProbably the greatest harm done by vast wealth is the harm that we of moderate means do ourselves when we let the vices of envy and hatred enter deep into our own natures.
Theodore RooseveltWe are much beholden to Machiavel and others, that write what men do, and not what they ought to do.
Francis BaconThe deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated.
William JamesRacial prejudice, anti-Semitism, or hatred of anyone with different beliefs has no place in the human mind or heart.
Billy GrahamMan is not a machine that can be remodelled for quite other purposes as occasion demands, in the hope that it will go on functioning as regularly as before but in a quite different way. He carries his whole history with him; in his very structure is written the history of mankind.
Carl JungWar grows out of the desire of the individual to gain advantage at the expense of his fellow man.
Napoleon HillMortals are easily tempted to pinch the life out of their neighbour’s buzzing glory, and think that such killing is no murder.
George EliotWe are born believing. A man bears beliefs as a tree bears apples.
Ralph Waldo EmersonIt is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.
Niccolo MachiavelliThere are times when one would like to hang the whole human race, and finish the farce.
Mark TwainReally I don’t like human nature unless all candied over with art.
Virginia WoolfIt is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts.
Carl JungWhat then in the last resort are the truths of mankind? They are the irrefutable errors of mankind.
Friedrich NietzscheOf the love or hatred God has for the English, I know nothing, but I do know that they will all be thrown out of France, except those who die there.
Joan of ArcPeople have discovered that they can fool the devil; but they can’t fool the neighbors.
Francis BaconIsn’t it amazing that we are all made in God’s image, and yet there is so much diversity among his people?
Desmond TutuTo prefer evil to good is not in human nature; and when a man is compelled to choose one of two evils, no one will choose the greater when he might have the less.
PlatoI don’t think it is so difficult to solve the problems between Cuba and the United States; it all depends on whether there is a dialogue, a discussion, or if the prejudices and hatred of people like the extremists and terrorists from the Cuban community, who try to impose their policies, prevail.
Fidel CastroIt’s human nature to gripe, but I’m going ahead and doing the best I can.
Elvis PresleyMan is fully responsible for his nature and his choices.
Jean-Paul SartreIt is true that we are weak and sick and ugly and quarrelsome but if that is all we ever were, we would millenniums ago have disappeared from the face of the earth.
John SteinbeckWe grow older, but we do not change. We become more sophisticated, but at bottom we continue to resemble our young selves, eager to listen to the next story and the next, and the next.
Paul AusterPolitics, as a practise, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds.
Henry AdamsEvery man casts a shadow; not his body only, but his imperfectly mingled spirit. This is his grief. Let him turn which way he will, it falls opposite to the sun; short at noon, long at eve. Did you never see it?
Henry David ThoreauSubdue your appetites, my dears, and you’ve conquered human nature.
Charles DickensMany people genuinely do not want to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human beings.
George OrwellMen are by nature merely indifferent to one another; but women are by nature enemies.
Arthur SchopenhauerIf there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have a paradise in a few years.
Bertrand RussellLoyalty to petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul.
Mark TwainMan will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on.
Winston ChurchillNo man lives without jostling and being jostled; in all ways he has to elbow himself through the world, giving and receiving offence.
Thomas CarlyleYou should read history and look at ostracism, persecution, martyrdom, and that kind of thing. They always happen to the best men, you know.
George EliotThe human race is governed by its imagination.
Napoleon BonaparteIn the last analysis, even the best man is evil: in the last analysis, even the best woman is bad.
Friedrich NietzscheTo destroy is always the first step in any creation.
E. E. CummingsMan has lost the capacity to foresee and to forestall. He will end by destroying the earth.
Albert SchweitzerWar is a way of shattering to pieces… materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable and… too intelligent.
George OrwellRadical Islamist extremists surely hope that an attack on Iraq will kill many people and destroy much of the country, providing recruits for terrorist actions.
Noam ChomskyPower is the measure of the degree of control you have over circumstances in your life and the actions of the people around you. It is a skill that is developed by a deep understanding of human nature, of what truly motivates people, and of the manipulations necessary for advancement and protection.
Robert GreeneCivilisations have been destroyed many times, and this civilisation is no different. It can be destroyed. We can think of time in terms of millions of years and life will resume little by little. The cosmos operates for us very urgently, but geological time is different.
Thich Nhat HanhSurely God would not have created such a being as man, with an ability to grasp the infinite, to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for immortality.
Abraham LincolnContempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people’s happiness, and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race.
Bertrand RussellNo evil propensity of the human heart is so powerful that it may not be subdued by discipline.
Lucius Annaeus SenecaSo far is it from being true that men are naturally equal, that no two people can be half an hour together, but one shall acquire an evident superiority over the other.
Samuel JohnsonTo assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today.
Albert CamusMan is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.
Jean-Paul SartreThe abdomen is the reason why man does not readily take himself to be a god.
Friedrich NietzscheWhy is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved.
Mark TwainHow could man rejoice in victory and delight in the slaughter of men?
Lao TzuMan is an intelligence in servitude to his organs.
Aldous HuxleyPerhaps people like us cannot love. Ordinary people can – that is their secret.
Hermann HesseIt is natural for the mind to believe and for the will to love; so that, for want of true objects, they must attach themselves to false.
Blaise PascalMost damage that others do us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or racial devotion.
Alice WalkerA tragic situation exists precisely when virtue does not triumph but when it is still felt that man is nobler than the forces which destroy him.
George Orwell