“Recently, while I was in the street, my eye was caught by a poulterer's shop; I stared unthinkingly at his piled-up wares, neatly and appetizingly laid out, when I became aware of a man at the side busily plucking a hen, while another man was just putting his hand in a cage, where he seized a live hen and tore its head off. The hideous scream of the animal, and the pitiful, weaker sounds of complaint that it made while being overpowered transfixed my soul with horror. Ever since then I have been unable to rid myself of this impression, although I had experienced it often before. It is dreadful to see how our lives—which, on the whole, remain addicted to pleasure—rest upon such a bottomless pit of the cruellest misery! This has been so self-evident to me from the very beginning, and has become even more central to my thinking as my sensibility has increased … I have observed the way in which I am drawn in the [direction of empathy for misery] with a force that inspires me with sympathy, and that everything touches me deeply only insofar as it arouses fellow-feeling in me, i. e. fellow-suffering. I see in this fellow-suffering the most salient feature of my moral being, and presumably it is this that is the well-spring of my art.”

— Richard Wagner

Selected Letters of Richard Wagner, translated by Stewart Spencer and Barry Millington (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1987), pp. 422-424 http://www.animal-rights-library.com/texts-c/wagner02.htm

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Richard Wagner 39

German composer, conductor 1813–1883

Dodie Smith book I Capture the Castle

Source: I Capture the Castle

“So,” I said at last, staring at my hands. “How’s, uh, your car?”

“I left it out on the street. Figured it’ll be fine there while I’m gone.”

Richelle Mead book The Indigo Spell

Source: The Indigo Spell

“Holy crap,” I said. While staring off at Rose and Dimitri, a brilliant flash had caught my eye—a flash on Rose’s finger.
“What’s that?” I exclaimed. “Did you rob Lissa’s crown jewels?”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: The Ruby Circle

“Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind then that I was not one bit better than the meanest on earth. I said then, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it; and while there is a criminal element, I am of it; and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

Federal Court statement (1918)

“As with my hat upon my head
I walk'd along the Strand,
I there did meet another man
With his hat in his hand.”

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) English writer

George Steevens, 310
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919), Johnsoniana

“.. The movement and the rustle of the branches [in the forest, while losing his attention for chasing] delights me. The clouds float past and I lift my head to follow their flight, or think about some madrigal, when a slight sound, which has been going on for a little while, rouses me slowly from my dream.; at least I turn my head and see, to my grief, a little white scut just disappearing into the thicket…”

Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) French painter

Quote in a letter to Delacroix' friend Achille Peron - 16 September 1819, Paris; as quoted in Eugene Delacroix – selected letters 1813 – 1863, ed. and translation Jean Stewart, art Works MFA publications, Museum of Fine Art Boston, 2001, p. 51
1815 - 1830