„Compassion is a wound in the heart whence flows a common love to all mankind and which cannot be healed so long as any suffering lives in man.“

The Spiritual Espousals (c. 1340)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021.

John Ruysbroeck90

Flemish mystic 1293 - 1381

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„Compassion for animals is intimately connected with goodness of character, and it may be confidently asserted that he, who is cruel to living creatures, cannot be a good man. Moreover, this compassion manifestly flows from the same source whence arise the virtues of justice and loving-kindness towards men.“

— Arthur Schopenhauer German philosopher 1788 - 1860

Part III, Ch. VIII, 7, p. 223 https://archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala#page/223/mode/2up
On the Basis of Morality (1840)
Source: The Basis of Morality

Love, Men, Justice, Confidence

„Such wounds to the heart will probably never heal. But we cannot simply sit and stare at our wounds forever.“

— Haruki Murakami, book 1Q84

Source: 1Q84

Heart

„It's a long life, sweetheart, and time heals all wounds.“

— Cheryl Strayed, book Torch

Source: Torch

Life, Time

„But the soul cannot have any virtue if God is not loved with all the heart; for from that love flows the fulness of all grace, and without it no grace can flow into the soul, nor can it abide in it.“

— Bonaventure franciscan, bishop, cardinal, Doctor of the Church, catholic saint 1221 - 1274

Life of Christ

God, Soul, Heart, Love

„Weighing the sacrifices of the last war, we want to be true friends of a peace which will at last heal the wounds from which all have suffered.“

— Adolf Hitler Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party 1889 - 1945

Speech in Potsdam (21 March 1933), quoted in The Times (26 September 1939), p. 9
1930s

War, Peace, Suffering

„Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish;
Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal.“

— Thomas Moore, Come

Come, ye Disconsolate.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Heart

„Dignitary wounds cannot always be healed with the stroke of a pen.“

— Anthony Kennedy Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States 1936

Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U. S. ____, (2015), majority opinion.

„This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge, keeps his own wounds green, which otherwise would heal, and do well.... vindictive persons live the life of witches; who, as they are mischievous, so end they infortunate...“

— Francis Bacon English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and author 1561 - 1626

The Essays Or Counsels, Civil And Moral, Of Francis Ld. Verulam Viscount St. Albans (1857), Revenge

Personality, Life, Revenge

„Love heals. Heals and liberates. I use the word, not meaning sentimentality, but a condition so strong that it may be that which holds the stars in their heavenly positions and that which causes the blood to flow orderly in our veins.“

— Maya Angelou, book Mom & Me & Mom

Source: Mom & Me & Mom

Love, Star, Strong

„This was an evil beyond thinking. The killing of a man was not so evil as the killing of a boat. For a boat does not have sons, and a boat cannot protect itself, and a wounded boat does not heal.“

— John Steinbeck, book The Pearl

Source: The Pearl

Thinking, Evil

„What deep wounds ever closed without a scar?
The hearts bleed longest, and heals but to wear
That which disfigures it.“

— George Gordon Byron English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement 1788 - 1824

Heart

„The heart in which love and compassion for all living beings resides, can have no room for seeking after personal pleasures. O friend, take care to do no harm to any living creature; to hurt his creation is to forget the Creator.“

— Khwaja Abdullah Ansari Persian writer 1006 - 1089

Quoted in Tales of the Mystic East: An Anthology of Mystic and Moral Tales Taken from the Teachings of the Saints (Radha Soami Satsang Beas, 1997), p. 208

Love, Pleasure, Heart, Hurt

„Stab the body and it heals, but injure the heart and the wound lasts a lifetime.“

— Mineko Iwasaki Japanese Geisha 1949

Heart, Heartbreaking, Hurtful

„Living in the world as a cripple allows you to see more clearly the crippled hearts of some people whose bodies are whole and sound. All of us, from time to time, suffer this crippling. Some suffer it daily and nightly; and while most of us, nearly all of us, have compassion and love in our hearts, we cannot of will not see these barely visible wounds of other human beings, and so cannot or will not pick up the telephone or travel to someone’s house or write a note or make some other seemingly trifling gesture to give to someone what only we, and God, can give: an hour’s respite, or a day’s, or a night’s; and sometimes more than respite: sometimes joy.“

— Andre Dubus Novelist, short story writer, teacher 1936 - 1999

A Woman in April.
Broken Vessels (1991)

Love, God, People, World

„What is a charitable heart? It is a heart which is burning with love for the whole creation, for men, for the birds, for the beasts … for all creatures. He who has such a heart cannot see or call to mind a creature without his eyes being filled with tears by reason of the immense compassion which seizes his heart; a heart which is softened and can no longer bear to see or learn from others of any suffering, even the smallest pain being inflicted upon a creature. That is why such a man never ceases to pray for the animals … [He is] … moved by the infinite pity which reigns in the hearts of those who are becoming united with God.“

— Isaac of Nineveh Eastern Orthodox saint 640 - 700

Mystic Treatises, cited in Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (1976), [//books.google.it/books?id=dxqvWwPSCSwC&pg=PA111 p. 111]; also cited and discussed in A. M. Allchin, The World is a Wedding (1978), p. 85. Quoted in Andrew Linzey, Animal Theology (1994), [//books.google.it/books?id=ESTjQYS_8hMC&pg=PA56 p. 56].

Love, Men, God, Pain