“To prevent the recurrence of misery is, alas! beyond the power of man.”

—  Thomas Robert Malthus

Source: An Essay on The Principle of Population (First Edition 1798, unrevised), Chapter V, paragraph 25, lines 4-5

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "To prevent the recurrence of misery is, alas! beyond the power of man." by Thomas Robert Malthus?
Thomas Robert Malthus photo
Thomas Robert Malthus 60
British political economist 1766–1834

Related quotes

Thomas Haynes Bayly photo

“Those that have wealth must be watchful and wary,
Power, alas! naught but misery brings!”

Thomas Haynes Bayly (1797–1839) English poet, songwriter, dramatist, and writer

I'd be a Butterfly, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

“… alas, raising a young lady is a mystery even beyond an enchanter's skill.”

Lloyd Alexander book The Castle of Llyr

Source: The Castle of Llyr

Felicia Hemans photo

“Alas for love, if thou wert all,
And naught beyond, O Earth!”

Felicia Hemans (1793–1835) English poet

The Graves of a Household, st. 8.

Max Horkheimer photo

“The characteristic activity of science is not construction, but induction. The more often something has occurred in the past, the more certain that it will in all the future. Knowledge relates solely to what is and to its recurrence. New forms of being, especially those arising from the historical activity of man, lie beyond empiricist theory. Thoughts which are not simply carried over from the prevailing pattern of consciousness, but arise from the aims and resolves of the individual, in short, all historical tendencies that reach beyond what is present and recurrent, do not belong to the domain of science.”

Max Horkheimer (1895–1973) German philosopher and sociologist

Source: "The Latest Attack on Metaphysics" (1937), p. 144.

Thomas Gray photo

“Alas, regardless of their doom,
The little victims play!
No sense have they of ills to come,
Nor care beyond today.”

Thomas Gray (1716–1771) English poet, historian

St. 6
Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College http://www.thomasgray.org/cgi-bin/display.cgi?text=odec (written 1742–1750)

Chen Shih-chung photo

“The control and prevention of diseases and epidemics should go beyond boundaries.”

Chen Shih-chung politician

Chen Shih-chung (2017) cited in " No WHA invite, but Taiwan's going anyway http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/national/national-news/2017/05/10/497115/No-WHA.htm" on The China Post, 10 May 2017

Eleanor Roosevelt photo

“When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?”

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States

As quoted in "On The Universal Declaration of Human Rights" by Hillary Rodham Clinton in Issues of Democracy Vol. 3, No. 3 (October 1998), p. 11

Marcus Aurelius photo

“Because your own strength is unequal to the task, do not assume that it is beyond the powers of man; but if anything is within the powers and province of man, believe that it is within your own compass also.
Marcus Aurelius”

Marcus Aurelius book Meditations

Source: Meditations

Thaddeus Stevens photo

“Our object should be not only to end this terrible war now, but to prevent its recurrence. All must admit that slavery is the cause of it. Without slavery we should this day be a united and happy people… The principles of our Republic are wholly incompatible with slavery.”

Thaddeus Stevens (1792–1868) American politician

"Subduing the Rebellion" (22 January 1862), as quoted in The Selected Works of Thaddeus Stevens http://books.google.com/books?id=A0Fs655TKfsC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
1860s

James Clerk Maxwell photo

“Happiness and Misery must inevitably increase with increasing Power and Knowledge”

James Clerk Maxwell (1831–1879) Scottish physicist

Letter to Lewis Campbell (9 November 1851) in Ch. 6 : Undergraduate Life At Cambridge October 1850 to January 1854 — ÆT. 19-22, p. 158
The Life of James Clerk Maxwell (1882)
Context: I believe, with the Westminster Divines and their predecessors ad Infinitum that "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him for ever."
That for this end to every man has been given a progressively increasing power of communication with other creatures.
That with his powers his susceptibilities increase. That happiness is indissolubly connected with the full exercise of these powers in their intended direction. That Happiness and Misery must inevitably increase with increasing Power and Knowledge. That the translation from the one course to the other is essentially miraculous, while the progress is natural. But the subject is too high. I will not, however, stop short, but proceed to Intellectual Pursuits.

Related topics