
“It's the hardest thing in the world to go on being aware of someone else's pain.”
Vol. 1, p. 92; "Soliloquy: or Advice to an Author".
Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times (1711)
“It's the hardest thing in the world to go on being aware of someone else's pain.”
Source: Memorandum to Robert T. Hartmann https://www.fordlibrarymuseum.gov/library/document/0204/1511691.pdf (1976)
“Communication, hardest thing in the world.”
Jim Carrey's Unnatural Act (1991)
Context: Communication, hardest thing in the world. Y'know, I can look at you guys, I can communicate to you all night, but, one-on-one, I'm terrible. It's just, there's certain things about communicating that really bother me. Like whenever I meet somebody new I say, "Hi! How are you!" Most of the time when people hear that they'll say, "Good! And yourself?", or "Fine! Thank you very much!" But sometimes they like to surprise you, "I've got no dream, man! I'm all dead inside!"
On David Letterman — interview in Joanne Weintraub (November 21, 2000) "Mr. Midwest - Jim Gaffigan tries to hold his own", Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, p. 1.
“The hardest thing in the world to understand is income taxes.”
Attributed by his friend Leo Mattersdorf, who also said that "From the time Professor Einstein came to this country until his death, I prepared his income tax returns and advised him on his tax problems." In a letter to Time magazine, 22 February 1963. See this post from The Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2011/03/07/einstein-income-taxes/#more-2031 for more background.
Attributed in posthumous publications
“To experience the loneliness of soul is the hardest thing in the world.”
Unsourced
Sam Harris, Interview with The Minimalists (19 August 2014) http://www.theminimalists.com/sam/
2010s
Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew, on 25 February 2006, in his eulogy to Rajaratnam.
“In life, all good things come hard, but wisdom is the hardest to come by.”