“The suffering of a loved one was in many ways worse than one's one suffering because it left one feeling so very helpless.”

Bk. XIV, ch. 15
War and Peace (1865–1867; 1869)

"The Reasons for My Involvement in the Peace Movement" (1972) http://www.shalomctr.org/node/61; later included in Moral Grandeur and Spiritual Audacity (1996)
Context: There is immense silent agony in the world, and the task of man is to be a voice for the plundered poor, to prevent the desecration of the soul and the violation of our dream of honesty.
The more deeply immersed I became in the thinking of the prophets, the more powerfully it became clear to me what the lives of the Prophets sought to convey: that morally speaking, there is no limit to the concern one must feel for the suffering of human beings, that indifference to evil is worse than evil itself, that in a free society, some are guilty, but all are responsible.

Source: From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain (2007), Chapter 11 “Self-Distraction is Self-Destruction” (p. 325)

Source: Lumina and New Lumina (1969), p. 45

Source: The Quiet American

Source: The Seven Storey Mountain (1948), p. 91

Persuasion (1817)
Works, Persuasion