Kirby Page Quotes

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“Shall we use the weapons of violence and bloodshed or is there a more effective weapon available?”

“Courageous and sacrificial men may use wrong methods or pursue unworthy ends.”

“In the early days of our Federal Government, skeptics concerning its usefulness were found in high places.”

“War is not high ideals. War is not noble objectives. War is not gallant heroism. War is not sacrificial devotion.”

“Exceptions to the rule do not invalidate the general principle that restraint by capital punishment and warfare is grossly ineffective and highly perilous.”

“Countless numbers of people have justified war on grounds of the end in view and the spirit of the combatants.”

“We gain illumination as to the immensity of Jesus' contribution in setting before us a vision of the new society, and indicating ways and means of bringing it to pass.”

“We would enter the League not because we believe in a perfect instrument—on the contrary, its weakness and grave imperfections are fully recognized—but because the place for a powerful nation like the United States is on the inside, where it may aid in determining the character of its activities and the scope of its jurisdiction, rather than on the outside, indulging in harshest criticism.”

“This race of armaments made Europe an armed camp and laid the foundations for the most colossal slaughter in human history.”

“Mutual aid is the way to prevent the third world war. Mutual aid is also the way to stop the internal growth of Communism by providing our people with plenty, security and freedom.”

“My own conviction is that if the transfer cannot be made without civil war, it cannot be made at all, and that there is a reasonable probability that, if the government is supported by a considerable majority of citizens and if it is re-enforced by a powerful labor movement and cooperative movement, the change may be brought about without armed resistance from the owning class. The program that I have outlined is, of course, that of the Socialist Party of America, although not all Socialists will agree with everything that I have written.”

“We can take Jesus seriously and strive earnestly to follow him, or we can prepare to wage atomic war, but it is utterly impossible to do both at the same time.”

“Even after proper discount is made for false propaganda, the evidence is indisputable that every invading army perpetrates atrocity, so much so that war may correctly be defined as atrocity. Reference to various standard dictionaries reveals the following definition of atrocity: "A deed of violence or savagery; great cruelty or reckless wickedness; extreme cruelty; enormous wickedness."”

“If rugged individualists would throw away the right to fight for special privilege and would cooperate in a collective endeavor to secure plenty for everybody, they would have time, energy, and desire to explore higher pathways of living.”

“There is no inherent irreconcilability between love and coercion, but rather the reverse; under some circumstances love ceases to be love if it fails to use moral means of restraint.”

“When we are reminded that modern men find it difficult to believe in the divinity of Jesus, we urge a search for realities that are far greater than words. If Jesus gives us our clearest vision of the nature of God; if he reveals the godlike qualities in man; if he secures penitence, restitution, joyous allegiance, and heroic sacrifice; if he leads to deliverance for individuals and groups—he becomes a symbol for all that is noblest in the universe, whatever may be the title by which he is characterized.”

“When we are reminded of his apocalyptic concepts and are told that an interim ethic possesses little validity for distant centuries, we are able to make rejoinder that his experience of God, his valuation of man, his call to love, forgiveness, and sacrifice are universal and eternal.”

“There may be occasions when "to do unto others as you would have them do unto you" requires coercion.”

“A deep fog of obscurity is thrown about war by the use of misleading and confusing terms.”

“Faith in armed might paralyzes international action.”

“Religious groups should exert themselves in behalf of the unemployed and should be zealous in defense of civil liberties, but they merely weaken their efforts when they enter into combinations with communists.”

“The way of disarmament and of mutual aid and of international cooperation is a highly dangerous way. It is not safe. But it is safer, safer than the race of armaments and the third world war.”

“If certain types and degrees of compulsion represent true expressions of brotherly affection, coercion may ennoble personality. If the killing of a brother is an act which in its very essence is alien to and destructive of the family bond, then it is ethically unjustifiable.”

“Of all the founders of great religions, Jesus alone proclaimed one God, immanent and powerful, holy and righteous, a loving and seeking Father, concerned about the welfare of each of his children.”

“Feebleness of confidence in the power of international goodwill operating through appropriate agencies of international justice and friendship is at present paralyzing efforts to take the steps which must be taken if war is to be averted.”

“Taxation must be used as an instrument of social policy, but if carried too far under the profit system, it may be an instrument of destruction rather than construction.”

“Jesus was face to face with a concrete situation similar in principle to that of Belgium in 1914…. The issues at stake… were similar in principle, namely freedom versus bondage…. Why not follow the warlike example of Joshua and David and Judas Maccabeus? Does not the end justify the means? These are questions that Jesus faced.”

“To the degree that a man possesses a vivid ideal of the good life, submerges himself in the sea of human misery and endeavors to alleviate suffering, kindles imagination in hours of silence and by visions of beauty, and follows the noblest personality into the presence of a loving, suffering Father—to the extent that he lives meaningfully, he will be convinced of sin and cry aloud for deliverance.”

“If various races and nationalities can live together peaceably in the United States, why is it not within the bounds of possibility that they can learn to live this way throughout the earth?”

“The supreme need of the world today is for a true conception and a deeper knowledge of God. The Hindu mother tosses her baby to the crocodiles, the devout pilgrim mutilates his body, the pious monk retires to the wilderness, the martial Moslem massacres the unbelieving, the consecrated missionary lays down his life for his enemy—all of these deeds are founded on varying conceptions of God.”

“Preparedness to use the weapons of war creates the tempers, the quarrels and the crises which lead to the outbreak of war.”

“The war method includes falsehood as an integral part. Truth is indeed a casualty of war.”

“As long as ministers and laymen labor under the delusion that contemporary Christianity is the same religion that Jesus practiced they will remain immunized against his way of life and will lack the vision.”

“By what name shall we call this animating principle of the universe, this source of all phenomana? Some call it Force or Energy or Mind, others call it God. Some call this idea a working hypothesis, others call it Faith.”

“Plenty for everyone can be provided in the United States if the anarchistic economic freedom of the frontier is renounced and replaced by the higher freedom of collectivism, through the socialization of the basic industries and the approximate equalization of economic privilege.”

“The profit motive and the competitive struggle are more productive and less destructive on the frontier than in the city. Maldistribution of income becomes more devastating with increasing complexity and interdependence.”

“If the moral approval of religious people were withdrawn from the system of individualism, it could be quickly transformed. Just as the churches belatedly called slavery a sin, and later religious institutions pronounced war to be the world's colossal sin, religious institutions should now declare that sanctioning and supporting the profit system is sin.”

“These mighty weapons of explosion and fire are already obsolete, and the improved weapons of today will be dwarfed by the monstrous weapons of tomorrow.”

“To increase the number of men and women in all lands who will refuse absolutely to sanction the use of any unchristian weapon, who will follow without compromise the teaching and example of Jesus Christ, and who will seek diligently by every possible means to spread abroad in the lives of individuals and of nations the spirit of Jesus, this is the only sure way to abolish war.”

“Dwight L. Moody was changed from a shoe salesman into an evangelist whose influence has reached around the world. In all parts of the earth are men and women whose characters were transformed as a direct result of contact with the changed Moody.”

“The very name of Jesus means, "He shall save his people from their sins." He came to seek and save the lost, those who are enslaved by sin.”

“Plato and Aristotle were both convinced that democratic government could not function successfully in an area larger than a city-state.”

“The supreme task before the people of the United States today is the Americanizing and, above all, the Christianizing of the great cities of the country. …It calls for consecrated leadership and prayer of the intensest sort.”

“War is method. War is atrocity. War is wholesale falsehood. War is the practice of military necessity. War is the utter denial of the spirit and example of Jesus.”

“Imperialist war arises not merely because of bitter economic competition among industrialists and financiers of various nations, but because of the dominance of government by powerful vested interests who use the armed forces of the nation to increase their private gains in other lands. To the degree that the power of these groups is broken by socialization and equalization of economic privilege, the likelihood of war is thereby reduced.”

“The consolidation of financial and industrial power in the hands of a small section of the people leads inevitably to more and more intense congestion of money.”

“Before a just society can be established the property system and the penal code of such a social order must be radically transformed.”

“Our difficulty comes, of course, in deciding where ethical coercion ends and unethical violence begins. The only person who is able to escape from this dilemma is the complete anarchist who repudiates every form of restraint and compassion—and such a man has no solution to offer for the imminently menacing problems of the hour. All other persons are obliged to draw the line somewhere, and orderly progress depends upon intellectual keenness and ethical sensitiveness with which the situation is confronted.”

“The truth of the matter is that, even under individualism, only a small fraction of the population is impelled chiefly by the profit motive, and that vast multitudes of men and women are motivated by other incentives than by the desire for profit. …nevertheless, they are strategic individuals whose activities are essential to efficiency in industry.”