Henry David Thoreau Quotes

Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all—the apathy of human beings.

Even in a time of elephantine vanity and greed, one never has to look far to see the campfires of gentle people.

Compassion is not a popular virtue.

Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish.

Kindness is more than a virtue. It is a source of strength.

He was a patient man, a kind man, a man who cared about animals and human beings, all qualities not to be devalued, but James Herriot was not a saint. I tried so hard to play against some of the scripts that implied that he was a saint, but I don't think I was always altogether successful.

The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice,' but integrity.

Of all the virtues necessary to the completion of the perfect man, there is none to be more delicately implied and less ostentatiously vaunted than that of exquisite feeling or universal benevolence.

Charity and good-nature give a sanction to the most common actions; and pride and ill-nature make our best virtues despicable.

There can be no Good Will. Will is always Evil; it is persecution to others or selfishness.

Good-nature is that benevolent and amiable temper of mind which disposes us to feel the misfortunes and enjoy the happiness of others, and, consequently, pushes us on to promote the latter and prevent the former; and that without any abstract contemplation on the beauty of virtue, and without the allurements or terrors of religion.

Deliberately seek opportunities for kindness, sympathy, and patience.

To bear with patience wrongs done to oneself is a mark of perfection, but to bear with patience wrongs done to someone else is a mark of imperfection and even of actual sin.

Human kindness is like a defective tap, the first gush may be impressive but the stream soon dries up.

Men are only as great as they are kind.

It's not our job to play judge and jury, to determine who is worthy of our kindness and who is not. We just need to be kind, unconditionally and without ulterior motive, even - or rather, especially - when we'd prefer not to be.

I believe that every human mind feels pleasure in doing good to another.

Humanity is the virtue of a woman, generosity that of a man.

General benevolence, but not general friendship, made a man what he ought to be.

I pride myself on being kind.

Compassion is so pure, I don't think there is any way to taint it.

Hell is paved with good samaritans.

How can you regret helping a suffering patient?

I only wish that ordinary people had an unlimited capacity for doing harm; then they might have an unlimited power for doing good.

The man of sensibility is too busy talking about his feelings to have time for good deeds.