Peaceful quotes
page 2
“Nature does not hurry yet it accomplishes everything.”
“Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love.”
“The least movement is of importance to all nature. The entire ocean is affected by a pebble.”
“True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is the presence of justice.”
In a 1955 response to an accusation that he was "disturbing the peace" by his activism during the Montgomery Bus Boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, as quoted in Let the Trumpet Sound : A Life of Martin Luther King, Jr (1982) by Stephen B. Oates
1950s
“I believe in the religion of Islam. I believe in Allah and peace.”
"Presidential Candidates Proposing to Ban Muslim Immigration to the United States" http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/muhammad-ali-hits-trump-misguided-murderers-sabotaging-islam-n477351 (9 December 2015).
Context: I am a Muslim and there is nothing Islamic about killing innocent people in Paris, San Bernardino, or anywhere else in the world... True Muslims know that the ruthless violence of so called Islamic Jihadists goes against the very tenets of our religion... We as Muslims have to stand up to those who use Islam to advance their own personal agenda... They have alienated many from learning about Islam. True Muslims know or should know that it goes against our religion to try and force Islam on anybody.
“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.”
The Cruise of the Corwin http://www.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/writings/cruise_of_the_corwin/default.aspx (1917), chapter 3: Siberian Adventures <!-- Terry Gifford, LLO, page 738 -->
(Echoing William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida, iii, 3: "One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.")
1910s
Variant: One touch of nature makes all the world kin.
Source: Our National Parks
1960s, I Have A Dream (1963)
Context: Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
Context: The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges. But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
“Many eyes go through the meadow, but few see the flowers in it”
This passage contains some phrases King later used in "Where Do We Go From Here?" (1967) which has a section below.
1950s, Loving Your Enemies (Christmas 1957)
Variant: Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.
Source: Mentioned in "Out of Osama's Death, a Fake Quotation Is Born" by Megan McArdle, The Atlantic (May 2011) http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/05/out-of-osamas-death-a-fake-quotation-is-born/238220/, and widely distributed on twitter http://twitter.com/#!/jmadly/status/65314784136011776 as a quote of King, after the death of Osama bin Laden, the first sentence is one written by Jessica Dovey http://i.imgur.com/cqtjw.jpg on her Facebook page, which became improperly combined by others with genuine statements of King, whom she quoted, and which occur in Strength to Love (1963), Ch. 5 : Loving your enemies, and in Where Do We Go from Here : Chaos or Community? (1967), p. 62.
For the full story see "Anatomy of a Fake Quotation" by Megan McArdle, The Atlantic (May 3, 2011) http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/05/anatomy-of-a-fake-quotation/238257/ and for the Facebook version of the quote see Did Martin Luther King, Jr. say that “I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy”? at skeptics.stackexchange.com http://skeptics.stackexchange.com.
Context: Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.
Context: Let us move now from the practical how to the theoretical why: Why should we love our enemies? The first reason is fairly obvious. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction. So when Jesus says "love your enemies," he is setting forth a profound and ultimately inescapable admonition. Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies-or else? The chain reaction of evil-Hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars-must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
Context: I mourn the loss of thousands of precious lives, but I will not rejoice in the death of one, not even an enemy. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
“Let the peace of this day be here tomorrow when I wake up.”
Source: Gravity's Rainbow
“Defeat is not the worst of failures. Not to have tried is the true failure.”
“My father considered a walk among the mountains as the equivalent of churchgoing.”
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
1960s, The Rising Tide of Racial Consciousnes (1960)
Context: Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Therefore, no American can afford to be apathetic about the problem of racial justice. It is a problem that meets every man at his front door.
“Letting go gives us freedom and freedom is the only condition for happiness”
1960s, Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community? (1967)
Context: Power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political and economic change. … Now a lot of us are preachers, and all of us have our moral convictions and concerns, and so often have problems with power. There is nothing wrong with power if power is used correctly. You see, what happened is that some of our philosophers got off base. And one of the great problems of history is that the concepts of love and power have usually been contrasted as opposites — polar opposites — so that love is identified with a resignation of power, and power with a denial of love.
It was this misinterpretation that caused Nietzsche, who was a philosopher of the will to power, to reject the Christian concept of love. It was this same misinterpretation which induced Christian theologians to reject the Nietzschean philosophy of the will to power in the name of the Christian idea of love. Now, we've got to get this thing right. What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love. And this is what we must see as we move on. What has happened is that we have had it wrong and confused in our own country, and this has led Negro Americans in the past to seek their goals through power devoid of love and conscience.
This is leading a few extremists today to advocate for Negroes the same destructive and conscienceless power that they have justly abhorred in whites. It is precisely this collision of immoral power with powerless morality which constitutes the major crisis of our times.
“There are two ways of spreading light.. to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.”
“Nature always wears the colors of the spirit.”
“Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only be attained through understanding.”
“I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order.”
“It is my conviction that there is no way to peace - peace is the way.”
Source: The Art of Power
“When there is no enemy within, the enemies outside cannot hurt you.”
“Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.”
“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong.”
“Everything in nature invites us constantly to be what we are.”
“Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.”
1840s, Essays: First Series (1841), Self-Reliance
Source: Ralph Waldo Emerson on Self Reliance
As quoted in The Canine Hiker's Bible (2000) by Doug Gelbert, p. 8
“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.”
“You have peace," the old woman said, "when you make it with yourself.”
Source: The Five People You Meet in Heaven
“Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations… entangling alliances with none”
1800s, First Inaugural Address (1801)
Context: Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people -- a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles
Context: About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people -- a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety.
“The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.”
“Fighting for peace is like screwing for virginity.”
Last paragraph of section III of Antidotes for fear, page 122 (see link at top of the section)
1960s, Strength to Love (1963)
Source: A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches
“Those who love peace must learn to organize as effectively as those who love war.”
“If you can win over your mind, you can win over the whole world.”
Interview with Alfred Werner, Liberal Judaism 16 (April-May 1949), Einstein Archive 30-1104, as sourced in The New Quotable Einstein by Alice Calaprice (2005), p. 173
Differing versions of such a statement are attributed to conversations as early as 1948 (e.g. The Rotarian, 72 (6), June 1948, p. 9 http://books.google.com/books?id=0UMEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA9: "I don't know. But I can tell you what they'll use in the fourth. They'll use rocks!"). Another variant ("I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones") is attributed to an unidentified letter to Harry S. Truman in "The culture of Einstein" by Alex Johnson http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7406337/, MSNBC, (18 April 2005). However, prior to 1948 very similar quotes were attributed in various articles to an unnamed army lieutenant, as discussed at Quote Investigator : "The Futuristic Weapons of WW3 Are Unknown, But WW4 Will Be Fought With Stones and Spears" http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/06/16/future-weapons/#more-679. The earliest found was from “Quote and Unquote: Raising ‘Alarmist’ Cry Brings a Winchell Reply” by Walter Winchell, in the Wisconsin State Journal (23 September 1946), p. 6, Col. 3. In this article Winchell wrote: <blockquote> Joe Laitin reports that reporters at Bikini were questioning an army lieutenant about what weapons would be used in the next war. “I dunno,” he said, “but in the war after the next war, sure as Hell, they’ll be using spears!” </blockquote>
: It seems plausible, therefore, that Einstein may have been quoting or paraphrasing an expression which he had heard or read elsewhere.
1940s
Variant: I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.
“If there are no books. There is no civilization.”
“Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence.”
“Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it.”
Knox College commencement address http://www.knox.edu/colbert.xml (3 June 2006)
Context: Don’t be afraid to be a fool. Remember, you cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying yes begins things. Saying yes is how things grow. Saying yes leads to knowledge. "Yes" is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say yes.
“The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home.”
“A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.”
“There are two ways of spreading light: to be
The candle or the mirror that reflects it.”
"Vesalius in Zante (1564)", in North American Review (November 1902), p. 631
Variant: There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that receives it.
“Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.”
Variant: Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding.
“Always do what you are afraid to do.”
“Maybe that's the best part of going away for a vacation-coming home again.”
Source: Meet the Austins
“Nothing external to you has any power over you.”
Source: Letter to My Daughter
Source: The 48 Laws of Power
“There is no escape if love is not there”
Source: The Witch of Blackbird Pond
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”
Address to Latin American diplomats at the White House (13 March 1962) http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=9100&st=&st1=
1962
“To sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure is the most perfect refreshment.”
Mansfield Park (1814)
Works, Mansfiled Park
Context: "I shall soon be rested," said Fanny; "to sit in the shade on a fine day, and look upon verdure, is the most perfect refreshment."
“Deep in their roots all flowers keep the light.”
Source: Letters of Thomas Jefferson
“Dad, how do soldiers killing each other solve the world's problems?”
Source: Calvin and Hobbes: Sunday Pages 1985-1995: An Exhibition Catalogue
“I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace.”
Quoted in Henry More: The Rational Theology of a Cambridge Plattonist (1962) by Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein, page 100.
“Every great dream begins with a dreamer.”
Source: The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson
Source: Miller, H. (1969). “Creation,” The Henry Miller Reader. New York: New Directions Publishing Corporation. p.33.
Context: Through art then, one finally establishes contact with reality: that is the great discovery. Here all is play and invention; there is no solid foothold from which to launch the projectiles which will pierce the miasma of folly, ignorance and greed. The world has not to be put in order: the world is order incarnate. It is for us to put ourselves in unison with this order, to know what is the world order in contradistinction to the wishful-thinking orders which we seek to impose on one another. The power which we long to possess, in order to establish the good, the true and the beautiful, would prove to be, if we could have it, but the means of destroying one another. It is fortunate that we are powerless.
“Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.”
“Learning to ignore things is one of the great paths to inner peace.”
Source: Calculating God (2000), Chapter 14 (p. 137)
“We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.”
“Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal.”
“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.”
Source: Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life
Attributed in The National elementary principal https://books.google.com/books?id=T8YVAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Then+will+our+world+know+the+blessings+of+peace.%22&dq=%22Then+will+our+world+know+the+blessings+of+peace.%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj1iNCMvcHLAhUMcz4KHXvcCt84MhDoAQgfMAE (1948) - Volume 28 - Page 34; a similar statement has also become attributed to Jimi Hendrix: "When the power of love overcomes love of power the world will know peace." A similar quotation is found in My Heart Shall Give A Oneness-Feast (1993) by Sri Chinmoy: "My books, they all have only one message: the heart's Power Of Love must replace the mind's Love Of Power. If I have the Power Of Love, then I shall claim the whole World as my own … World Peace can be achieved when the Power Of Love replaces the Love Of Power." An even earlier statement of Chinmoy is found in Meditations: Food For The Soul (1970): "When the power of love replaces the love of power, man will have a new name: God."
Disputed
Variant: We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessings of peace.
Peace Is Every Step : The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life (1992) Bantam reissue
Source: Being Peace
Context: If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. If we really know how to live, what better way to start the day than with a smile? Our smile affirms our awareness and determination to live in peace and joy. The source of a true smile is an awakened mind.
“To love and to be loved is the greatest happiness.”
Quotations from Gurudev’s teachings, Chinmya Mission Chicago
“An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.”
1914: "If…we were to go back to…'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,' there would be very few [Honourable] Gentlemen in this House who would not…be blind and toothless." — George Perry Graham, during a debate on capital punishment before the Canadian House of Commons. Official Report of the Debates of the House of Commons of the Dominion of Canada, Third Session-Twelfth Parliament, Vol CXIII, p. 496, February 5, 1914. http://parl.canadiana.ca/view/oop.debates_HOC1203_01/508
1950: "An-eye-for-an-eye-for-an-eye-for-an-eye … ends in making everybody blind" in The Life of Mahatma Gandhi by Louis Fischer (1950), though Fischer did not attribute it to Gandhi and seemed to be giving his own description of Gandhi's philosophy.
1958: "The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everybody blind" in Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story by Martin Luther King, Jr., 1958.
1982: "An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind" in the 1982 film, Gandhi. In a 1993 biographical article about screenwriter John Briley, Jon Krampner wrote, "…Gandhi never said it. Michigan graduate John Briley put those pithy words in his mouth." From "John Briley '51 - Epic Screenwriter", Michigan Today, March 1993, p. 12. http://michigantoday.umich.edu/93/Mar_and_Oct_93/Mar_93/briley.html
2006: There is a quaternary source in Yale Book of Quotations http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=w5-GR-qtgXsC&pg=PA269&dq=whole-world-blind+ (2006), in which editor Fred R. Shapiro states that the Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence stated that Gandhi's family believes it authentic, but did not provide any further reference and provided no year, place or body of work.
2006: Discussed in The Quote Verifier: Who Said What, Where, and When, by Ralph Keyes (2006), 1st ed., p. 74.
2010: Research detailed by Garson O'Toole in "An Eye for an Eye Will Make the Whole World Blind" http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/12/27/eye-for-eye-blind/ in Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/.
Misattributed
1990s, Long Walk to Freedom (1995)
Source Commencement Address at Dartmouth College June 9th, 2002 http://www.dartmouth.edu/~news/releases/2002/june/060902c.html
There is something wrong with that press.
1960s, Why I Am Opposed to the War in Vietnam (1967)