Quotes for forgiveness
page 8

“Pass by us, and forgive us our happiness.”

The Idiot (1868–9)

“Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!”

Emily Brontë (1818–1848) English novelist and poet

Remembrance (1846)

Love, Youth, World, Hope

“Had she only realized that it is only hypocrites who cannot forgive hypocrisy, whereas those who search for truth are too conscious of the maze to be hard on others – than the bitter flow of her thoughts might have been stopped and the catastrophe averted. But it was not conceivable to her that he should forgive – or that she should accept forgiveness, for to her forgiveness meant a triumph of one person over another.”

E.M. Forster (1879–1970) English novelist

Albergo Empedocle
The Life to Come and other stories (1972)

Truth, Search, Personality

“Please forgive my accuser…and, actually, thank God for him. I am trusting that his action will make me, my wife and family, and ultimately all of you, stronger. He didn't violate you; I did.”

Ted Haggard (1956) American minister

In a letter to New Life Church; published in Colorado Springs Gazette, November 5, 2006.

God, Family

“Women can never forgive me; they hate me, they feel I am disarming them. I show them without their coquetry.”

Edgar Degas (1834–1917) French artist

Quoted by Julian Barnes, 'The Artist As Voyeur' (1996), from The Grove Book of Art Writing, ed. Martin Gayford and Karen Wright (Grove Press, 2000)
quotes, undated

Women, Hate, Feeling

“Christianity is this: A belief in the inspiration of the Scriptures, the atonement, the life, death, and resurrection of Christ, an eternal reward for the believers in Christ, and eternal punishment for the rest of us. Now, take from Christianity its miracles, its absurdities of the atonement and fall of man and the inspiration of the Scriptures, and I have no objection to it as I understand it. I believe, in the main, in the Christianity which I suppose Christ taught, that is, in kindness, gentleness, forgiveness. I do not believe in loving enemies; I have pretty hard work to love my friends.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

"The Brooklyn Divines." Brooklyn Union (Brooklyn, NY), 1883.

Love, Life, Death, Understanding

“Everything in existence prays for the forgiveness of the person who teaches the Qur’an - even the fish in the sea.”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Usulul Kafi, Volume 3, Page 301
Shi'ite Hadith

Fish, Personality, Sea

“Boundless compassion for all living beings is the surest and most certain guarantee of pure moral conduct, and needs no casuistry. Whoever is filled with it will assuredly injure no one, do harm to no one, encroach on no man's rights; he will rather have regard for every one, forgive every one, help every one as far as he can, and all his actions will bear the stamp of justice and loving-kindness. … In former times the English plays used to finish with a petition for the King. The old Indian dramas close with these words: "May all living beings be delivered from pain."”

Arthur Schopenhauer book On the Basis of Morality

Tastes differ; but in my opinion there is no more beautiful prayer than this. Part III, Ch. VIII, 4, pp. 213 https://archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala#page/213/mode/2up-214 First line often paraphrased as: Compassion is the basis of all morality. On the Basis of Morality (1840)

Love, Pain, Justice, Beauty

“Okay bear with me this'll be a little tough. You should know this isn't the first time I thought about leaving. I thought about it some twenty years ago when a check that would soon become a part of Cincinnati folklore, made me see life from the bottom. To be honest, a thought about ending it all crossed my mind, but a more reasonable alternative seemed to be 'hey how about just leaving town? Running away? Starting life over, some place else?' You see, in political terms as well as human, here in Cincinnati, I was dead. But then in the, probably, the luckiest decision I ever made, I decided 'No! I'm staying put!' I would withstand all the jokes, all the ridicule. I'd pretend it didn't hurt, and I would give every ounce of my being to Cincinnati. 'Why in time,' I was thinking, 'you'd have to like me. Or if not like me, at least respect me.' And I'd run for council even unendorsed. And I'd prove to you I could be the best public servant you ever had, or I'd die trying. Be it as a mayor, an anchor, or a commentator, whatever it took, I was determined to have you know that I was more than a check and a hooker on a one night stand. But something happened along the way. Maybe it's God's way of teaching us. I don't know, but you see? In trying to prove something to you, I learned something about me. I learned that I had fallen in love with you. With Cincinnati. With you who taught me more about life, and caring, and forgiving, and also most importantly, giving. Giving something back. Which is part of the reason… I have been… Excuse me. So sad this week. why… Why it's so hard to say goodbye. God bless you, and goodbye.”

Jerry Springer (1944) American television presenter, former lawyer, politician, news presenter, actor, and musician

his final commentary at NBC's WLWT in Ohio, January 1993 This American Life http://www.thislife.org/pages/descriptions/04/258.html, Ep. 258, 01/30/04, Leaving the Fold; Act One.

Love, Life, God, Sadness

“Justice doesn’t exist! We did worse things. Nobody deserves to go to that place, Alec said. Anyway, weren’t you Christian types supposed to forgive everybody?
I will shed no tears for that bastard’s damnation, said Nicholas stonily.
No wonder nobody’s left that believes in your stupid religion, said Alec.”

Kage Baker book The Machine's Child

Source: The Machine's Child (2006), Chapter 21, “Santa Catalina Island, 1923 AD” (p. 218)

Stupidity, Religion, Justice, Tear

“I suppose I want to leave a word with you tonight, that seems to have been applicable and important to everyone lately. And that is — remember Mercy, Love and Forgiveness, because this seems to be lacking, and causing and creating a lot of problems for people because it is so lacking. So remember that, first and foremost. And if you're already doing a good job at that, you think — good for you! Step it up a bit! That's your challenge. As for me, I must work on these things always too!”

Ysabella Brave (1979) American singer

"Bit of Rambling in July" (July 13, 2010) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15oNaXvjXg4

Love, People, Problem, Thinking

“Our Christian God, the merciful, forgiving God, the personification of eternal love, our father, as Christ has taught us, had absolutely not the slightest thing in common with the vengeful bloodthirsty, angry old Jaweh of the Jews…the old Jew-God Jaweh is…identical with Satan!”

Wilhelm II, German Emperor (1859–1941) German Emperor and King of Prussia

Letter to Eva Chamberlain-Wagner (14 April 1927), quoted in John C. G. Röhl, Wilhelm II: Into the Abyss of War and Exile 1900-1941 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), p. 1236
1920s

Love, God, Christ

“There's no hatred that can ever be satisfied either in this world or the next, and the hatred that one has for oneself is probably the one for which there is no forgiveness.”

Georges Bernanos book Monsieur Ouine

Aucune haine ne saurait s’assouvir en ce monde ni dans l’autre, et la haine qu’on se porte à soi-même est probablement celle entre toutes pour laquelle il n’est pas de pardon!
The curé of Fenouille to the mayor, p. 208
Monsieur Ouine, 1943

World

“I want you to shake the hands of every Minister in the Provisional Government ( Irish Free State )who's responsible for my death. I forgive them and so must you, Erskine. The second will apply if ever you go into Irish politics. You must not speak of my execution in public.”

Robert Erskine Childers (1870–1922) Irish nationalist and author

Robert Erskine's last jail cell words to his son, also named Erskine, in November 1922. His son would become President of Ireland 52 years later. Cited in " The Riddle of Erskine Childers " By Andrew Boyle, Hutchinson, London (1977), pg. 320.
Literary Years and War (1900-1918), Last Years: Ireland (1919-1922)

Death

“Reginald sat in a corner of the Princess's salon and tried to forgive the furniture, which started out with an obvious intention of being Louis Quinze, but relapsed at frequent intervals into Wilhelm II.”

Saki (1870–1916) British writer

"Reginald in Russia"
Reginald in Russia (1910)

Princess

“All major religious traditions carry basically the same message, that is love, compassion and forgiveness … the important thing is they should be part of our daily lives.”

Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet

As quoted in Especially for Christians: Powerful Thought-provoking Words from the Past (2005) by Mark Alton Rose, p. 19

Love, Parting

“I also am other than what I imagine myself to be. To know this is forgiveness.”

Simone Weil (1909–1943) French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist

Source: Simone Weil : An Anthology (1986), Void and Compensation (1947), p. 200

Imagination

“Many a head that down had lain,
Impatient with its twelve hours' pain,
And wishing that the bed it prest,
Were, as the grave's, a long last rest,
Has sprung again at morning's call,
Forgiving, or forgetting all;
Lighting the weary weight of thought
With colours from the day-break brought,
Reading new promise in the sky,
And hearing Hope, the lark on high.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

The Vow of the Peacock (1835)

Pain, Hope, Light, Reading

“They’ll never forget, never forgive, no matter who the enemy is, son. Better just to start a new life. Be someone else.”

Jeff VanderMeer book Finch

Source: Finch (2009), p. 303

Life, Forgetting

“When streams of unkindness, as bitter as gall,
Bubble up from the heart to the tongue,
And Meekness is writhing in torment and thrall,
By the hands of Ingratitude wrung, —
In the heat of injustice, unwept and unfair,
While the anguish is festering yet,
None, none but an angel or God can declare
"I now can forgive and forget."”

Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810–1889) English writer and poet

Forgive and Forget, l. 1-8.
Ballads for the Times (1851)

God, Angels, Heart, Forgetting

“Whether men soar to outer space or dive to the bottom of the deepest ocean they will find themselves as they are, unchanged, because they will not have forgotten themselves nor remembered to exercise the charity of forgiveness.”

Meher Baba (1894–1969) Indian mystic

64 : Forgive and Forget, p. 110.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)

Men, Exercises

“Even if you have been neglecting your body, you'll find that our cells are so much more forgiving than we are. The second you start loving your body, it starts loving you back. It doesn't hold grudges. As soon as you start feeding yourself better emotionally, spiritually, and physically, everything responds in the positive.”

Steve Maraboli (1975)

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 28

Love

“Something won’t forgive it all ~ "Sense"”

Pete Yorn (1974) American musician

Song lyrics

Sense

“Here I swear, and as I break my oath may Infinity Eternity blast me, here I swear that never will I forgive Christianity! It is the only point on which I allow myself to encourage revenge… Oh, how I wish I were the Antichrist, that it were mine to crush the Demon, to hurl him to his native Hell never to rise again — I expect to gratify some of this insatiable feeling in Poetry.”

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) English Romantic poet

Letter to Thomas Jefferson Hogg (3 January 1811)

Feeling, Hell, Revenge

“If the men were without passions, it would be forgivable to see Machiavel try to give some to them; he would be the new Prometheus bringing celestial fire to breathe life into robots. But no man is without passions. When they are moderated, they are the heart of the enterprise; but when the brake is stripped of them, they are its destruction.”

Frederick II of Prussia book Anti-Machiavel

Source: Anti-Machiavel, Ch. 6 : New States That The Prince Acquires By His Valor And His Own Weapons

Life, Men, Passion, Heart

“Government by inquisition has never been good. However, since January 1979, our country has been under the yoke of inquisitorial power. Five centuries after the Spanish Inquisition, Iran is living under the terror of a new Torquemada who is more pitiless and more sinister than its predecessor. In fact the Inquisition tribunals did not sentence men to be executed unless they were known to be heretics. They had the opportunity to recant and to repent; and they would call witnesses, which the Iranian Torquemada does not allow.
The tribunals are said to be Islamic. But the truth cannot be overlooked, and genuine Islamic law insists on the right of an accused man to defend himself. Islam is never served by hatred, vengeance and murder, but by justice, goodness, forgiveness and high moral standards. This explosion of hatred, supposedly "in the name of God", is an insult to God and to our religion. And this insult, I repeat, unfortunately threatens to do great harm to Islam, just as the Inquisition did great harm to Catholicism.”

Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1919–1980) Shah of Iran

Page 209
Publications, The Shah's Story (1980), On Islam and the Islamic Revolution

Men, God, Truth, Religion

“The appeal to heaven breaks off.
The petals begin to fall, in self-forgiveness.
It is a flower. On this mountainside it is dying.”

Galway Kinnell (1927–2014) Poet

Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock (1976).

Flowers

“This pioneer of sexology [Krafft-Ebing] even came to question whether homosexuality might be innate (and people began to forgive us for living, as if it would matter to anyone if being an Atlético de Madrid fan was innate or not.)”

Miss Shangay Lily (1963–2016) Spanish artivist and drag queen

Miss Shangay Lily, Mari, ¿me pasas el poppers?

People, Question

“Let me die in this old uniform in which I fought my battles. May God forgive me for ever having put on another.”

Benedict Arnold (1741–1801) Continental and later British Army general during the American Revolutionary War

Unverified, but reportedly said by Arnold on his deathbed in 1801, requesting to wear the uniform of the Colonial Army from before his defection to the British, as quoted in The Picturesque Hudson http://www.kellscraft.com/PicturesqueHudson/PicturesqueHudson08.html (1915) by Clifton Johnson

God

“Yet all this is not ressentiment. These are only stages in the development of its sources. Revenge, envy, the impulse to detract, spite, *Schadenfreude*, and malice lead to ressentiment only if there occurs neither a moral self-conquest (such as genuine forgiveness in the case of revenge) nor an act or some other adequate expression of emotion (such as verbal abuse or shaking one's fist), and if this restraint is caused by a pronounced awareness of impotence. There will be no ressentiment if he who thirsts for revenge really acts and avenges himself, if he who is consumed by hatred harms his enemy, gives him “a piece of his mind,” or even merely vents his spleen in the presence of others. Nor will the envious fall under the dominion of ressentiment if he seeks to acquire the envied possession by means of work, barter, crime, or violence. Ressentiment can only arise if these emotions are particularly powerful and yet must be suppressed because they are coupled with the feeling that one is unable to act them out—either because of weakness, physical or mental, or because of fear. Through its very origin, ressentiment is therefore chiefly confined to those who serve and are dominated at the moment, who fruitlessly resent the sting of authority. When it occurs elsewhere, it is either due to psychological contagion—and the spiritual venom of ressentiment is extremely contagious—or to the violent suppression of an impulse which subsequently revolts by “embittering” and “poisoning” the personality. If an ill-treated servant can vent his spleen in the antechamber, he will remain free from the inner venom of ressentiment, but it will engulf him if he must hide his feelings and keep his negative and hostile emotions to himself.”

Max Scheler (1874–1928) German philosopher

Das Ressentiment im Aufbau der Moralen (1912)

Hostility, Fear, Feeling, Revenge

“You played and sang a snatch of song,
A song that all-too well we knew;
But whither had flown the ancient wrong;
And was it really I and you?
O, since the end of life's to live
And pay in pence the common debt,
What should it cost us to forgive
Whose daily task is to forget?”

William Ernest Henley (1849–1903) English poet, critic and editor

Source: Poems (1898), Rhymes And Rhythms, XV

Life, Forgetting

“It is always easier to get forgiveness than permission.”

Lois McMaster Bujold Vorkosigan Saga

This seems to be derived from a statement attributed to Rear Admiral Grace Hopper, and which she regularly used in her public addresses: "It's easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission."
Vorkosigan Saga, A Civil Campaign (1999)

““We do not have a belief, in my way of looking at religion, that says we have to discriminate against anybody,” he said, noting that Jesus Christ reached out to the social outcasts of his time. “If you were to apply those standards to the teaching of Jesus, I don’t think they fit."
A passage in the Gospel of John about Jesus’ outreach makes the point, he said, “that we have a belief in forgiveness and that we do not have to discriminate unduly against anyone on the basis of our own religious beliefs.””

Nathan Deal (1942) American politician

reported by Trudy Ring, "Georgia Governor: 'License to Discriminate' Bill Isn't Christian," The Advocate, March 3, 2016 http://www.advocate.com/politics/2016/3/03/georgia-governor-license-discriminate-bill-isnt-christian?team=social

Religion, Way, Thinking, Time

“Why, when the world gets to understand about it I expect that two men or two women, or a man and a woman, will come in here, and say to me, 'We have quarrelled and outraged each other, we have injured our friend, our wife, our husband; we regret, we would forgive, but we cannot, because we remember. Put between us the atonement of forgetfulness, that we may love each other as of old.”

Edward Bellamy (1850–1898) American author and socialist

Source: Dr. Heidenhoff's Process http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7052/7052-h/7052-h.htm (1880), Ch. 11.

Love, Women, Men, World

“The Reconciliation, Tolerance and Unit Bill is about unity. It is about forgiveness and working together. Above all, it is about the security of our future - different races, one nation. That is what the Bill is all about.”

Naiqama Lalabalavu (1953) Fijian politician

Parliamentary speech, 17 November 2005 (excerpts)

Future

“Forgiveness, not vengeance, yields peace and security.”

Newton Lee American computer scientist

Google It: Total Information Awareness, 2016

Peace

“The more you make yourselves humble and ask for forgiveness, the more your true exaltedness is seen. Humility is a sign of exaltedness. The preface of a spotlessly pure heart (Iman-Islam) is patience (sabur), contentment and gratitude (shakur), having trust in God (tawakkal), and praising Him for everything that happens to us, saying, “Al-hamdu lillah!” Therefore, without feeling shame, ask forgiveness whenever necessary. This will be good. Allah, the Lone One who rules and sustains (Allahu ta’ala Nayan), will protect you and me.”

Bawa Muhaiyaddeen (1900–1986) Sri Lankan Sufi leader

God, Feeling, Heart, Patience

“The majority of therapists work under the influence of destructive interpretations culled from both Western and Oriental religions, which preach forgiveness to the once-mistreated child. Thereby, they create a new vicious circle for people who, from their earliest years, have been caught in the vicious circle of pedagogy. For forgiveness does not resolve latent hatred and self-hatred but rather covers them up in a very dangerous way.”

Alice Miller (1923–2010) Swiss psychologist

Breaking Down the Wall of Silence (Abbruch der Schweigemauer) (1990)

People, Religion, Way

“Disagreements don't cause disunity, a lack of forgiveness does.”

Loren Cunningham (1935) American missionary

Cited in: George Otis Jr, The God They Never Knew, 1978, p. 7-8.
retrieved from http://web.archive.org/web/20011115090120/http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/1082/geotisjr.htm on 19:19, 2 May 2007, (UTC)

“The most moving appeal from the greatest of orators, the most beautifully written declaration of rights, the finest interpretation of American ideals by any living American finds the immigrant unresponsive if he has suffered injustice, if he has been denied a hearing, or if he has failed to see realized in the land of his dreams the things for which he left his native land. He forgives the man who has wronged him; he never forgets the government that has failed him. The law which was passed in one of the States prohibiting an alien from owning a dog, the enforcement of which resulted in deception and lying, has done much to imperil the immigrant's faith in the justice of American ideals. It reached his heart and his home, and he has never understood a country whose highest authority the court sanctioned such discriminations.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

Faith, Justice, Law, Dogs

“Last year (October 2004), the nation celebrated a week of reconciliation and forgiveness, supported by all our main religions and numerous civic organizations and individuals from all our ethnic groups. Some of those who had suffered particular hurt in 2000, questioned the motives behind this and did not feel they could take part. Their views must be respected. They endured an ordeal which left deep wounds.”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Religion, Feeling, Motivation, Question

“Instead of exhibiting talent in the hope that the world would forgive their eccentricities, they have exhibited only their eccentricities, in the hope that the world would give them credit for talent.”

Charles Caleb Colton (1777–1832) British priest and writer

Vol. I; XVI
Lacon (1820)

World, Hope

“Some of the strongest supporters of the war declare that we are a Christian nation, yet use their religious beliefs to justify the war. They claim it is our Christian duty to remake the Middle East and attack the Muslim infidels. Evidently I have been reading from a different Bible. I remember something about “Blessed are the peacemakers.” My beliefs aside, Christian teaching of nearly a thousand years reinforces the concept of “The Just war theory.” This Christian theory emphasizes six criteria needed to justify Christian participation in war… The war in Iraq fails to meet almost all of these requirements. This discrepancy has generated anger and division within the Christian community. Some are angry because the war is being fought out of Christian duty, yet does not have uniform support from all Christians. Others are angry because they see Christianity as a religion as peace and forgiveness, not war and annihilation of enemies.”

Ron Paul (1935) American politician and physician

Why Are Americans So Angry?, June 29, 2006 http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2006/cr062906.htm 2000s, 2006-2009

War, Peace, Religion, Communication

“The virtues of forgiveness and mercy must frequently be exercised together. Because we live in a world where there is much harshness, hostility, and meanness, there is also much need for all of us to be more merciful.”

Gordon B. Hinckley book Standing for Something

Standing for Something: Ten Neglected Virtues That Will Heal Our Hearts and Homes.

Hostility, World, Exercises

“You should've said no, you should've gone home.
You should've thought twice before you let it all go.
You should've known that word 'bout what you did with her
Would get back to me…And I should've been there, in the back of your mind.
I shouldn't be asking myself why.
You shouldn't be begging for forgiveness at my feet…
You should've said no, baby and you might still have me.”

Taylor Swift (1989) American singer-songwriter

Should've Said No.
Song lyrics, Taylor Swift (2006)

Home, Baby

“I am of the sacred thread; my people, long generations before you were born, worshipped after this way. They discovered the only way for for my caste, and our feet love the path. They spent their lives, not in winnning bread, not in accumulating wealth, but in thinking about religion. For five thousand years they have been thinking, and here are their thoughts. (He tapped his Vedas gently with his finger.) There are thoughts here that you English, clever as you are in science and machines, can never understand. All the good things in the Bible - love to the neighbour, forgiveness of injuries, purity of life and motive, and many more besides.”

Totaram Sanadhya (1876–1947) Fijian writer

Quoted in J.W. Burton, The Fiji Of To-Day, (Charles H. Kelly, London, 1910).

Love, Life, People, Religion

“Forgiveness of enemies can only come upon their repentance.”

William Blake (1757–1827) English Romantic poet and artist

1780s, Annotations to Lavater (1788)

“All Christian missionaries say that Jesus was a very calm and peace loving person. But in reality he was a hot-tempered persons destitute of knowledge and who behaved like a wild savage. This shows that Jesus was neither the son of God, nor had he any miraculous powers. He did not possess the power to forgive sins. The righteous people do not stand in need of any mediator like Jesus. Jesus came to spread discord which is going on everywhere in the world. Therefore, it is evident that the hoax of Christ’s being the Son of God, the knower of the past and the future, the forgiver of sin, has been set up falsely by his disciples. In reality, he was a very ordinary ignorant man, neither learned nor a yogi.”

Dayanand Saraswati (1824–1883) founder of the Arya Samaj, a Hindu reform movement

"Hindu Nationalists of Modern India" by Jose Kuruvachira, p. 20

Love, God, People, World

“Forgetting when God does it in relation to sin, is the opposite of creating, since to create is to bring forth from nothing and to forget is to take back into nothing. What is hidden from my eyes, that I have never seen; but what is hidden behind my back, that I have seen. The one who loves forgives in this way; he forgives, he forgets, he blots out the sin, in love he turns toward the one he forgives; but when he turns toward him, he of course, cannot see what is lying behind his back.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

Source: 1840s, Works of Love (1847), p. 296

Love, God, Way, Lying

“Oh it tears me up
I try to hold on but it hurts too much
I try to forgive, but it's not enough to make it all okay.”

James Morrison (1984) English singer-songwriter and guitarist

Broken Strings
Song lyrics, Undiscovered (James Morrison album) (2006)

Tear, Hurt

“Forgiveness is praised by the Christian and the Vaishnava, but for me, I ask, "What have I to forgive and whom?"”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

Thoughts and Aphorisms (1913), Jnana

“Poet, Singer, Great Heart,
May our God bless your name,
And the womb that held you, and the breasts that gave you milk.
And may God forgive us all.”

Khalil Gibran book Jesus, The Son of Man

A Man From Lebanon: Nineteen Centuries Afterward
Source: Jesus, The Son of Man (1928)

God, Heart

“I know I will regret this for the rest of my life. I'm absolutely gutted. I hope in time I can earn back respect and forgiveness.”

Steve Smith (cricketer) (1989) Australian international cricketer

Steve Smith after ball-tampering incident in March 2018. https://www.cricket.com.au/news/steve-smith-press-conference-ball-tampering-scandal-speaks-regret-bancroft-warner/2018-03-29

Life, Hope, Time

“A marriage based on full confidence, based on complete and unqualified frankness on both sides; they are not keeping anything back; there's no deception underneath it all. If I might so put it, it's an agreement for the mutual forgiveness of sin.”

Henrik Ibsen The Wild Duck

Hjalmar, Act IV
The Wild Duck (1884)

Marriage, Confidence

“I've looked on many women with lust. I've committed adultery in my heart many times. God knows I will do this and forgives me.”

Jimmy Carter (1924) American politician, 39th president of the United States (in office from 1977 to 1981)

Interview in Playboy magazine (1976), while a candidate for President.
Pre-Presidency

Women, God, Time, Heart

“The more a man knows, the more he forgives.”

Catherine the Great (1729–1796) Empress of Russia

Widely attributed to Catherine II online, this has been attributed to Confucius in published books, but no print sources attribute this to Catherine.
Misattributed

“How completely, how thoroughly he has stolen my child. I have never even tried to forgive him.”

Octavia E. Butler book Parable of the Talents

Epilogue (p. 446)
Parable of the Talents (1998)

“All true love to God is preceded in the heart by these two things — a sense of sin, and an assurance of pardon. There is no love possible — real, deep, genuine, worthy of being called love of God — which does not start with the belief of my own transgression, and with the thankful reception of forgiveness in Christ.”

Alexander Maclaren (1826–1910) British minister

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 397.

Love, God, Sense, Heart

“[T]he greatest efforts made by the defeated insurgents since the close of the war have been to promulgate the idea that the cause of liberty, justice, humanity, equality, and all the calendar of the virtues of freedom, suffered violence and wrong when the effort for southern independence failed. This is, of course, intended as a species of political cant, whereby the crime of treason might be covered with a counterfeit varnish of patriotism, so that the precipitators of the rebellion might go down in history hand in hand with the defenders of the government, thus wiping out with their own hands their own stains; a species of self-forgiveness amazing in its effrontery, when it is considered that life and property—justly forfeited by the laws of the country, of war, and of nations, through the magnanimity of the government and people—was not exacted from them.”

George Henry Thomas (1816–1870) United States Army general

Report to General Ulysses S. Grant (17 November 1868)

Life, War, People, Justice

“This was a very serious sin in my past for which I am, of course, completely responsible. Several years ago, I asked for and received forgiveness from God and my wife in confession and marriage counseling. Out of respect for my family, I will keep my discussion of the matter there - with God and them. But I certainly offer my deep and sincere apologies to all I have disappointed and let down in any way.”

David Vitter (1961) U.S. Senator from Louisiana

Douglass K. Daniel, "Senator's number on escort service list" http://web.archive.org/web/20070715094917/news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070710/ap_on_go_co/vitter_dc_madam, Associated Press, July 10, 2007.

God, Marriage, Family, Disappointment

“O forgive! Thy sons live from Thee reft;
Praised for grace, Turn thy face to those left,
"Forgiven!"”

Yom Tov of Joigny English rabbi

Omnam Kayn, trans. from the Hebrew by Israel Zangwill

“"To forgive oneself"—? No, that doesn't work: we have to be forgiven. But we can only believe this is possible if we ourselves can forgive.”

Dag Hammarskjöld (1905–1961) Swedish diplomat, economist, and author

Markings (1964)

“Abu Hurayra reported that the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, said, "Sadaqa does not decrease property and Allah only increases a slave in might by forgiveness and no one is humble for the sake of Allah without Allah elevating him."”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Riyadh-as-Saliheen by Imam Al-Nawawi, volume 4, hadith number 603
Sunni Hadith

Peace

“Much as I would tend my manor in peace, peace needs the consent of all, while one alone may raise a war. I swore an oath to protect the defenseless and punish peace-breakers, and that includes peace-breaking Herrenfolk. Your priests say to forgive your enemy, and that is well, or revenge follows revenge until eternity. But between a man who will stop at nothing and one who will hesitate at anything, the advantage is generally to the former. The pagans had right, too. It is a false peace to be overforgiving. Your enemy may read forbearance as weakness and so be drawn to strike.”

Michael Flynn book Eifelheim

Source: Eifelheim (2006), Chapter XIV (p. 252)

War, Peace, Revenge, Reading

“To try curing someone of a "vice," of what is the deepest thing he has, is to attack his very being, and this is indeed how he himself understands it, since he will never forgive you for wanting him to destroy himself in your way and not his.”

Emil M. Cioran (1911–1995) Romanian philosopher and essayist

Drawn and Quartered (1983)

Way, Understanding

“The Germans will never forgive the Jews for Auschwitz.”

Zvi Rex (1909)

The quote is associated with Theodor Adorno's analysis of a "secondary antisemitism", often explained as an antisemitism not despite of but because of Auschwitz. In Der ewige Antisemit (The Eternal Antisemite) Broder wrote in chapter 5, titled The offender as probation officer, or The Germans will never forgive the Jews for Auschwitz: And for Auschwitz, a sagacious Israeli once said, for Auschwitz the Germans will never forgive us. In 1988, Gunnar Heinsohn identified Broder's sagacious Israeli as Zvi Rix, a friend of his (Heinsohn's), born in Vienna in 1909 and died in Rechovot/Israel in 1981, who had used to concentrate the drive of antizionism in the sentence: »For Auschwitz the Germans will never forgive us!« In 2005, Heinsohn in his book Söhne und Weltmacht (Sons and World-Power) suggested, that Rix had read his Hobbes, and quoted from Leviathan: "To have done more hurt to a man than he can [...] expiate inclineth the doer to hate the sufferer." But Rix may as well have read the book Post Mortem. The Jews in Germany--now (1968) by Leo Katcher, where the German Jewish journalist Hilde Walter is quoted as follows: "It seems the Germans will never forgive us Auschwitz. That is their sickness and they desperately want a cure. But they want it to be easy, painless. They refuse to go under the knife by facing up to the past and their part in it." The script for Axel Corti's film Where To and Back Part 2: Santa Fe (winner of a Nymphe d'Or award at the Monte Carlo Festival in February 1986) has the Austrian Jew Treumann who has found refuge in New York during World War II say about his former countrymen: "They'll never forgive us for what they did to us." This caused protests from writers Hans Sahl as well as Stefan Heym, who claimed certain rights to variants of this line, screenwriter Georg Stefan Troller revealed in 2013. But when Troller met with Heym the next time in Paris, Heym generously waived any objections: Jewish jokes are wanderers like the famous punchlines of the comedians. The original author cannot be ascertained any more. In 1982 a line, which Walter Mehring had sent his fellow refugee from Nazi Germany Hans Sahl in 1948, had been published in Germany: Source: „Und Auschwitz, sagte mal ein kluger Israeli, 'Auschwitz werden uns die Deutschen nie verzeihen'". Henryk M. Broder: Der ewige Antisemit. Kapitel 5: Der Täter als Bewährungshelfer oder Die Deutschen werden den Juden Auschwitz nie verzeihen. 1st edition Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag Frankfurt/Main 1986, p. 130; edition btb Berlin 2005, p. 158 books.google https://books.google.de/books?id=VQ4_AQAAIAAJ&q=israeli Source: Ein 1909 in Wien geborener und 1981 in Rechovot/Israel gestorbener Freund, Zvi Rix, pflegte den Grund des Antizionismus in der Sentenz zu verdichten: »Auschwitz werden uns die Deutschen niemals verzeihen!«. Gunnar Heinsohn: Was ist Antisemitismus? Eichborn, Frankfurt/Main 1988, p. 115. Source: Gunnar Heinsohn: Söhne und Weltmacht. Orell-Füssli 2005. V. Youth bulges im transnationalen Terror. p. 139 Source: Thomas Hobbes: Of Man, Being the First Part of Leviathan. Chapter XI: Of the Difference of Manners. bartleby.com http://www.bartleby.com/34/5/11.html Source: Leo Katcher: Post Mortem. The Jews in Germany--now. Hamish Hamilton London 1968, p. 87-8 https://books.google.de/books?id=Qc27AAAAIAAJ&q=%22their+sickness%22, Delacorte Press 1968, p. 89 books.google https://books.google.de/books?id=z9JtAAAAMAAJ&q=%22It+seems+the+Germans%22 . Atina Grossmann: Trauma, Memory and Motherhood, in Archiv für Sozialgeschichte vol. 38 (1998), p. 234 https://books.google.de/books?id=2LfZAAAAMAAJ&q=dps https://books.google.de/books?id=2LfZAAAAMAAJ&q=154+f. (also in Richard Bessel, Dirk Schumann: Life after Death 2003, p. 120 http://librarun.org/book/53490/134) with reference to Norbert Mühlen: The Return of Germany. A Tale of Two Countries https://books.google.de/books?id=QeM9AAAAIAAJ, Chicago 1953, p. 154-5, quotes, Jewish DPs in Germany after the war had joked among themselves: "The Germans will never forgive us for what they did to us." This however can not be found in Mühlen op.cit. Source: Alex Corti's Films Explore World War II's Impact http://www.nytimes.com/1988/07/24/movies/alex-corti-s-films-explore-world-war-ii-s-impact.html by Annette Insdorf. The New York Times July 24, 1988 Source: „Judenwitze sind wie die berühmten Wanderpointen der Humoristen. Der eigentliche Urheber ist nicht mehr auszumachen. [...].“ Excerpt http://www.verlagberlinbrandenburg.de/upload/PDF/978-3-942476-56-0/F.F.dabei_Nr._16_2013_27.07.-09.08.2013.pdf from Therese Hörnigk (ed.): Ich habe mich immer eingemischt. Erinnerungen an Stefan Heym. Verlag für Berlin-Brandenburg 2013, p. 156

“Dear friends, liberty is the most precious of gifts. My generation never had to fight for this freedom, it was offered to us on a silver platter, by people who fought for it with their lives. All throughout Europe American cemeteries remind us of the young boys who never made it home, and whose memory we cherish. My generation does not own this freedom; we are merely its custodians. We can only hand over this hard won liberty to Europe’s children in the same state in which it was offered to us. We cannot strike a deal with mullahs and imams. Future generations would never forgive us. We cannot squander our liberties. We simply do not have the right to do so.”

Geert Wilders (1963) Dutch politician

2000s, Speech at the Four Seasons, New York (25 September 2008)

Children, People, Home, Boy

“Esperando (Cuando Cuba Sea Libre) is probably one of the most personal songs from the new [September, 2007] CD, "90 Millas"... as it really speaks about the celebration, nostalgia and emotion that will happen the day Cuba is free. If we're to move forward in Cuba, we really have to have a lot of forgiveness for each other and look towards the future.”

Gloria Estefan (1957) Cuban-American singer-songwriter, actress and divorciada

www.gloriaestefan.com (March 28, 2007)
2007, 2008

Nostalgia, Future, Personality, Sea

“My problem was that I felt ashamed of feeling sad or angry. Now, I don't hide my vulnerability in my lyrics. There's no way I was going to get raped and not get something out of it. I learned about power and hope and forgiveness. I like who I am now and I wouldn't be who I am if that hadn't happened.”

Fiona Apple (1977) singer-songwriter, musician

ELLE, "Fiona Apple is NOT the next Alanis, thank you" October [1996]

Sadness, Hope, Way, Feeling

“The hours will hardly forgive you, those hours that are wearing away the days, those days that are gnawing away the years.”

Luis de Góngora (1561–1627) Spanish Baroque lyric poet

Mal te perdonarán a ti las horas;
las horas que limando están los días,
los días que royendo están los años.
"De la brevedad engañosa de la vida", line 12, cited from J. M. Cohen (ed.) The Penguin Book of Spanish Verse (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1962) p. 278. Translation from the same source.

“He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself, for every man hath need to be forgiven.”

Edward Herbert, 1st Baron Herbert of Cherbury (1583–1648) Anglo-Welsh soldier, diplomat, historian, poet and religious philosopher

Source: The Autobiography, P. 34

“Mr. Owen looked upon men through the spectacles of his own good-nature. He seldom took Lord Brougham's advice "to pick his men." He never acted on the maxim that the working class are as jealous of each other as the upper classes are of them. The resolution he displayed as a manufacturer he was wanting in as a founder of communities…. No leader ever took so little care as Mr, Owen in guarding his own reputation. He scarcely protested when others attached his name to schemes which were not his. The failure of Queenwood was not chargeable to him. When his advice was not followed he would say : "Well, gentlemen, I tell you what you ought to do. You differ from me. Carry out your own plans. Experience will show you who is right." When the affair went wrong then it was ascribed to him. Whatever failed under his name the public inferred failed through him. Mr. Owen was a general who never provided himself with a rear guard. While he was fighting in the front ranks priests might come up and cut off his commissariat. His own troops fell into pits against which he had warned them. Yet he would write his next dispatch without it occurring to him to mention his own defeat, and he would return to his camp without missing his army. Yet society is not so well served that it need hesitate to forgive the omissions of its generous friends. To Mr. Owen will be accorded the distinction of being a philosopher who devoted himself to founding a Science of Social Improvement and a philanthropist who gave his fortune to advance it. Association, which was but casual before his day, he converted into a policy and taught it as an art. He substituted Co-operation for coercion in the conduct ot industry and the willing co-operation of intelligence certain of its own reward, for sullen labour enforced by the necessity of subsistence, seldom to be relied on and never satisfied.”

George Holyoake (1817–1906) British secularist, co-operator, and newspaper editor

George Jacob Holyoake in The History of Co-operation in England (1875; 1902).

Men, Art, Intelligence, Communication

“Repentance, tolerance, forgiveness and sharing to name a few, are some divinely empowered words and processes without which it is difficult to see, how we could be here today as an active member of the international community.”

Josefa Vosanibola Fijian politician

Speech to the House of Representatives, 12 August 2005

Communication

“I've heard all the usual Sweetness and Light that kids get pushed at them—how they should always forgive, how there’s some good in the worst of us, etc. But when I see a black widow, I step on it; I don’t plead with it to be a good little spider and please stop poisoning people. A black widow spider can’t help it—but that’s the point.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Have Space Suit—Will Travel

Source: Have Space Suit—Will Travel (1958), Chapter 10

People, Light, Help

“Men are apt to offend ('tis true) where they find most goodness to forgive.”

William Congreve The Old Bachelor

Act IV, scene xi
The Old Bachelor (1693)

Men

“The ineffable joy of forgiving and being forgiven forms an ecstasy that might well arouse the envy of the gods.”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard (1927)

God, Joy, Envy

“There is power in forgiveness.”

Phil McGraw (1950) American television host, psychologist, actor and film producer

“God's forgiveness is unconditional. There is no condition whatsoever in man which would make him worthy of forgiveness. If forgiveness were conditional, conditioned by man, no one could be accepted and no one could accept himself. We know that this is our situation, but we loathe to face it.”

Paul Tillich (1886–1965) German-American theologian and philosopher

Chap. 1: "To Whom Much is Forgiven..."
The New Being (1955)

God

“O God, if there is a God, forgive him his sins, if there is such a thing as sin.”

Evelyn Waugh book Brideshead Revisited

Brideshead Revisited (1945)

God

“The condemned man found himself transformed into a hero by the sheer extend of his widely advertised crimes, and sometimes the affirmation of his belated repentance. Against the law, against the rich, the powerful, the magistrates, the constabulary or the watch, against taxes and their collectors, he appeared to have waged a struggle with which one all too easily identified. The proclamation of these crimes blew up to epic proportions the tiny struggle that passed unperceived in everyday life. If the condemned man was shown to be repentant, accepting the verdict, asking both God and man for forgiveness for his crimes, it was as if he had come through some process of purification: he died, in his own way, like a saint.”

Michel Foucault book Discipline and Punish

Source: Discipline and Punish (1977), Chapter One: The Spectacle of the scaffold, pp. 67

Life, God, Law, Way

“May we not say, perhaps, that the evil man is annihilated because he wished to be annihilated, or that he did not wish strongly enough to eternalize himself because he was evil? May we say that it is not believing in the other life which causes a man to be good, but rather that being good causes him believe in it? And what is being good and being evil? These states belong to the sphere of ethics, not of religion; or rather, does not the doing good though being evil pertain to ethics, and the being good [forgivable] though doing evil, to religion?”

Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) 19th-20th century Spanish writer and philosopher

The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), X : Religion, the Mythology of the Beyond and the Apocatastasis

Life, Religion, Evil

“Great women scholars like Jane Harrison and Gisela Richter were produced by the intellectual discipline of the masculine classical tradition, not the wishy-washy sentimentalism of clingy, all-forgiving sisterhood, from which no first-rate book has yet emerged. Every year, feminists provide more and more evidence for the old charge that women can neither think nor write.”

Camille Paglia (1947) American writer

Source: Sex, Art and American Culture : New Essays (1992), Junk Bonds and Corporate Raiders : Academe in the Hour of the Wolf, p. 244

Women, Books, Thinking

“The Mosaic dispensation was better adapted to prevent the commission of sin than the Christian system. Under that dispensation, if you committed a sin, you had to bring a sacrifice—dove, sheep, or bullock, now, when a sin is committed, the Christian says, “Charge it,” “Put it on the slate, If I don’t pay it the Savior will.” In this way, rascality is sold on a credit, and the credit system of religion breeds extravagance in sin. The Mosaic dispensation was based upon far better business principles. The debt had to be paid, and by the man who owed it. We are told that the sinner is in debt to God, and that the obligation is discharged by the Savior. The best that can be said of such a transaction is that the debt is transferred, not paid. As a matter of fact, the sinner is in debt to the person he has injured. If you injure a man, it is not enough to get the forgiveness of God—you must get the man’s forgiveness, you must get your own. If a man puts his hand in the fire and God forgives him, his hand will smart just as badly.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Some Reasons Why (1881)

God, Religion, Way, Business

“Some enacted the charade of seeking forgiveness of their victims, claiming that this was their custom and tradition, but without showing a semblance of remorse for their wicked ways. Such pretence of piety will not heal the trauma of the hostages and their loved ones for their 56-day stopover into hell. Or wash away the tears of Filipo Seavula's young wife, suddenly made widow in a violent act of treason, or her young orphaned son, or diminish the daily agony of parents, suddenly made jobless, as they strive to feed their hungry children.”

Vijay R. Singh (1931–2006) Fijian politician

Speaking Out (2006)

Love, Children, Way, Hell

“Too late I stayed,—forgive the crime!
Unheeded flew the hours;
How noiseless falls the foot of time
That only treads on flowers.”

William Robert Spencer (1770–1834) British poet

Lines to Lady A. Hamilton, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919). Compare: "The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time", William Shakespeare, All's Well that Ends Well, Act v. Scene 3.

Flowers, Time

“It is my considered opinion that the so called Kashmir problem, we have been facing, since 1947 has never been viewed in a historical perspective. That is why it has defied solution so far, and its end is not in sight in the near future. Politicians at the helm of affairs during this nearly half a century have been living from hand to mouth and are waiting for Pakistan to face them with a fait accompli. Once againg they are out to hand over Kashmir and its people to be butchers who have devastated this fair land and destroyed its rich eulture. … It is therefore high time that we renounce this ritual and have a look at the problem in a historical perspective. I should like to warn that histories of Kashmir written by Kashmiri Hindus in modern times are worse than useless for this purpose. I have read almost all of them, only to be left wondering at the piteous state to which the Hindu mind in Kashmir has been reduced. I am not taking these histories into account except for bits and pieces which fall into the broad pattern. … What distinguishes the Hindu rulers of Kashmir from Hindu rulers elsewhere is that they continued to recruit in their army Turks from Central Asia without realizing that the Turks had become Islamicized and as such were no longer mere wage earners. One of Kashmir's Hindu rulers Harsha (1089-1101 CE) was persuaded by his Muslim favourites to plunder temple properties and melt down icons made of precious metal. Apologists of Islam have been highlighting this isolated incident in order to cover up the iconoclastic record of Islam not only in Kashmir but also in the rest of Bharatvarsha. At the same time they conceal the fact that Kashmir passed under the heel of Islam not as a result of the labours of its missionaries but due to a coup staged by an Islamicised army. … Small wonder that balance of farces in Kashmir should have continued to tilt in favour of Islamic imperialism till the last Hindu has been hounded out of his ancestral homeland. Small wonder that the hoodlums strut around not only in the valley but in the capital city of Delhi with airs of injured innocence. Small wonder that the Marxist-Muslim combine of scribes who dominate the media blame Jagmohan for arranging an overnight and enmasse exodus of the Hindus from the valley. (They cannot forgive Jagmohan for bringing back Kashmir to India at a time when the combine was hoping that Pakistan would face India with an accomplished fact.) Small wonder that what Arun Shourie has aptly described as the "Formula Factory"”

Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist

the Nayars, the Puris, the Kotharis, the Dhars, the Haksars, the Tarkundes - should be busy devising ways for handing over the Kashmir Hindus to their age-old oppressors. Kashmir: The Problem is Muslim Extremism by Sita Ram Goel https://web.archive.org/web/20080220033606/http://www.kashmir-information.com/Miscellaneous/Goel1.html

People, Age, Hope, Way

“It was the scriptures that urged the people of this land to be tolerant and forgiving of others, even though they disagreed with their values and ways of life.”

Josefa Vosanibola Fijian politician

Speech to the House of Representatives, 12 August 2005

Life, People, Way

“Anas said, "A man came to the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace, and said, 'Messenger of Allah, I want to travel, so provision me.' He said, 'May Allah provision you with taqwa.' He said, 'Give me more.' He said, 'And forgive your wrong actions.' He said, 'Give me more.' He said, 'And may He make good easy for you wherever you are.'"”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Riyadh-as-Saliheen by Imam Al-Nawawi, volume 5, hadith number 717
Sunni Hadith

Peace, Travel

“Earth to Bella - You're treading water successfully.
But are you really?
Don't you want to see the deep?
It's not so hard.
Just forgive yourself and feel the water open in.”

Brandon Boyd (1976) American rock singer, writer and visual artist

Lyrics, Light Grenades (2006)

Feeling, Water

“Forgive my pants for remaining unshitten.”

Charlie Brooker (1971) journalist, broadcaster and writer from England

Discussing Twilight in The Guardian 12 July 2010. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/12/charlie-booker-twilights-unscary-monsters Guardian columns

“You did late review my lays,
Crusty Christopher;
You did mingle blame and praise,
Rusty Christopher.
When I learnt from whom it came,
I forgave you all the blame,
Musty Christopher;
I could _not_ forgive the praise,
Fusty Christopher.”

John Wilson (1785–1854) Scottish advocate, literary critic and author (1785-1854)

To Christopher North http://www.fullbooks.com/The-Early-Poems-of-Alfred-Lord-Tennyson10.html by Alfred Tennyson. About

“The forgiveness of Christ is complete, and without condition. It is not dependent on an apology, or tied to a punishment.”

Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji

Additional remarks about the proposed Reconciliation and Unity Commission, Address to the nation at the National Day of Prayer in Fiji combined church service http://www.fiji.gov.fj/publish/page_4615.shtml, Post Fiji Stadium, Suva, 15 May 2005

Christ, Dependency

“What do you say? cried they; do you call it Entelechy or Endelechy? Truly, truly, sweet cousins, quoth Panurge, we are a silly sort of grout-headed lobcocks, an't please you; be so kind as to forgive us if we chance to knock words out of joint. As for anything else, we are downright honest fellows and true hearts.”

Francois Rabelais book Gargantua and Pantagruel

Source: Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532–1564), Fifth Book (1564), Chapter 19 : How we arrived at the queendom of Whims or Entelechy

Chance, Heart

“The featherweights must beg now. They must beg for pardon, beg for forgiveness. If that's the case, if they apologize and beg, I'll leave the division. I won't terrorize them anymore. They can have their division back. They can go back to being on the prelims and I'll go to the lightweight division.”

Conor McGregor (1988) Irish mixed martial artist and boxer

UFC 189 world tour: LA media scrum https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk4GeTP7Iss (March 2015), MMA Fighting 2010s, 2015

“It is better for a leader to make a mistake in forgiving than to make a mistake in punishing.”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 1011
Sunni Hadith

“He forgave these Tropemen, then felt contempt for himself for the presumption of extending forgiveness, then forgave again, then cursed his own vanity, forgave once more, condemned his presumption, and at last forgave even himself.”

Michael Bishop (1945) American writer

Source: A Funeral for the Eyes of Fire (1975), Chapter 14, “Denouement: Ascent to the Acropolis” (p. 265)

“There are sins that men commit for which they cannot receive forgiveness in this world, or in that which is to come, and if they had their eyes open to see their true condition, they would be perfectly willing to have their blood spilt upon the ground, that the smoke thereof might ascend to heaven as an offering for their sins, and the smoking incense would atone for their sins, whereas, if such is not the case, they will stick to them and remain upon them in the spirit world … I do know that there are sins committed, of such a nature that if the people did understand the doctrine of salvation, they would tremble because of their situation. And furthermore, I know that there are transgressors, who, if they knew themselves, and the only condition upon which they can obtain forgiveness, would beg of their brethren to shed their blood, that the smoke thereof might ascend to God as an offering to appease the wrath that is kindled against them, and that the law might have its course. I will say further; I have had men come to me and offer their lives to atone for their sins. It is true that the blood of the Son of God was shed for sins through the fall and those committed by men, yet men can commit sins which it can never remit. As it was in ancient days, so it is in our day.”

Brigham Young (1801–1877) Latter Day Saint movement leader

Journal of Discourses 4:53 (September. 21, 1856)
Brigham Young describes the doctrine of Blood Atonement
1850s

Men, God, People, World

“Your 'thoughts' should be about steps to take to stop this carnage. Your 'prayers' should be for forgiveness if you do nothing -- again.”

Chris Murphy (1973) American politician

senator has had enough of 'thoughts' and 'prayers'" http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/02/politics/san-bernardino-chris-murphy-connecticut-tweet/"Connecticut, CNN Politics, 3 December 2015.

“Science is a search for truth –whatever the truth may turn out to be, even if it’s evidently not what we wanted to believe it was. In science, it doesn’t matter what you believe; all that matters is why you believe it. This is why real science disallows faith, promising instead to remain objective, to follow wherever the evidence leads, and either correct or reject any and all errors along the way even if it challenges whatever we think we know now. But creationist organizations post written declarations of their unwavering obligation to uphold and defend their preconceived notions, declaring in advance their refusal to ever to let their minds be changed by any amount of evidence that is ever revealed. Anti-science evangelists display their statement of faith proudly on their own forums, as if admitting to a closed and dishonest mind wasn’t something to ashamed of or beg forgiveness for. They don’t want to do science. They want to un-do science! They try to segregate experimental science from historical science, ignoring the fact that both are based on empirical observations and both can be checked with testable hypotheses. Worse, they want to redefine science in general so that astrology, subjective convictions of faith, and excuses of magic can supplant the scientific method whenever necessary in defense of their beliefs. They’re only open to critical inquiry so long as that is not permitted to challenge the sacred scriptures nor vindicate any of the fields of study to which they’re already opposed. In short, everything science stands for, -or hopes to achieve- is threatened by the political agenda of these superstitious subversives.”

Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast

"12th Foundational Falsehood of Creationism" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TkY7HrJOhc Youtube (April 19, 2008) Youtube, Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism

Truth, Faith, Hope, Way

“Sick in my soul I tried to face the ordeal of seeking forgiveness. From whom? What God, what Christ? They were myths I once believed, and now they were beliefs I felt were myths.”

John Fante book Ask the Dust

Ask the Dust (1939)

God, Soul, Christ

Quotes for forgiveness page 8

Quotes for forgiveness
page 8