“We only become beasts—we become worse than beasts—when we torment others.”
Source: Culture series, Inversions (1998), Chapter 11 (p. 197)
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Iain Banks139
Scottish writer 1954–2013Related quotes
Margrethe II of Denmark (1940) Queen of Denmark
New Year's Address 2010/2011 http://kongehuset.dk/english/Menu/news/her-majesty-the-queens-new-year-address-2010 (01 January 2011). <br class="br">Society
Simone Weil (1909–1943) French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist
Source: Simone Weil : An Anthology (1986), The Great Beast (1947), p. 123; it should be noted that in this comment she is referring to the intolerant traditions of ancient Rome and ancient Isreal, and not the modern entities, one of which did not yet exist at the time of her writing.
Joseph Addison (1672–1719) politician, writer and playwright
François Fénelon, in Selections from the Writings of Fenelon: With an appendix, containing a Memoir of his Life (1829) as translated by A Lady (Eliza Lee Cabot Follen) http://books.google.com/books?id=qJ4rAAAAYAAJ, Letter 37, p. 189. <br class="br">Misattributed
“Through others, we become ourselves.”
Lev Vygotsky (1896–1934) Soviet psychologist
Vygotskij, L. S. (1987). The genesis of higher mental functions. In R. Reiber (Ed.), The history of the development of higher mental functions (Vol. 4, pp. 97-120). New York: Plennum.
“The less we depend on each other, the less connected we become.”
Teal Swan (1984) American spiritual teacher
“How many a thing which we cast to the ground,
When others pick it up, becomes a gem!”
George Meredith (1828–1909) British novelist and poet of the Victorian era
St. 41. <br class="br">Compare: "Once in a golden hour / I cast to earth a seed. Up there came a flower, The people said, a weed", Alfred Tennyson, The Flower. <br class="br"> Modern Love http://www.ev90481.dial.pipex.com/Meredith/modern_love.htm (1862)
Jun Hong Lu (1959) Australian Buddhist leader
Quotes from Words of Wisdoms Vol.2
