Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist
Section 1, paragraph 44, lines 1-2.
The Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848)
Source: De architectura (The Ten Books On Architecture) (~ 15BC), Book II, Chapter VII, Sec. 2
Context: Travertine and all stone of that class can stand injury whether from a heavy load laid upon it or from the weather; exposure to fire, however, it cannot bear, but splits and cracks to pieces at once. This is because in its natural composition there is but little moisture and not much of the earthy, but a great deal of air and of fire. Therefore, it is not only without the earthy and watery elements, but when fire, expelling the air from it by the operation and force of heat, penetrates into its inmost parts and occupies the empty spaces of the fissures there comes a great glow and the stone is made to burn as fiercely as do the particles of fire itself.
Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist
Section 1, paragraph 44, lines 1-2.
The Manifesto of the Communist Party (1848)
Niccolo Machiavelli book The Prince
Source: The Prince (1513), Ch. 3; Variant translation: Never do any enemy a small injury for they are like a snake which is half beaten and it will strike back the first chance it gets.
Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist
1990s, Nobel Prize acceptance speech (1993)
Context: I am also here today as a representative of the millions of people across the globe, the anti-apartheid movement, the governments and organisations that joined with us, not to fight against South Africa as a country or any of its peoples, but to oppose an inhuman system and sue for a speedy end to the apartheid crime against humanity.
These countless human beings, both inside and outside our country, had the nobility of spirit to stand in the path of tyranny and injustice, without seeking selfish gain. They recognised that an injury to one is an injury to all and therefore acted together in defense of justice and a common human decency.
Maimónides book The Guide for the Perplexed
Source: Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190), Part III, Ch.11
F. E. Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead (1872–1930) British politician
"State Toryism and Social Reform" in Unionist Policy and Other Essays (1913). Pg 46.
Context: We stand for the State and for the unity which, whether in the form of kingdom or empire or class solidarity, the State alone can bring. Above all stands the State and in that phrase lies the essence of Toryism. Our ancestors left it to us, and not the least potent method of preserving it is to link the conception of State Toryism with the practice of Social Reform.
“How stupid and shortsighted the ruling class really is! Cupidity is stone blind. It has no vision.”
Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader
The Canton, Ohio Speech, Anti-War Speech (1918)
Context: How stupid and shortsighted the ruling class really is! Cupidity is stone blind. It has no vision. The greedy, profit-seeking exploiter cannot see beyond the end of his nose. He can see a chance for an "opening"; he is cunning enough to know what graft is and where it is, and how it can be secured, but vision he has none — not the slightest. He knows nothing of the great throbbing world that spreads out in all directions. He has no capacity for literature; no appreciation of art; no soul for beauty. That is the penalty the parasites pay for the violation of the laws of life.
Peter Kropotkin (1842–1921) Russian zoologist, evolutionary theorist, philosopher, scientist, revolutionary, economist, activist, geogr…
Source: Law and Authority (1886), III
James Braid (1795–1860) Scottish surgeon, hypnotist, and hypnotherapist
The case of treating deafness by hypnotizing, in in “Neurypnology; or, The rationale of nervous sleep, considered in relation ...”, p. 223.
Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader
The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)
“Nobody can judge an internal injury by the size of the superficial wound.”
Salman Rushdie book The Satanic Verses
Variant: You can't judge an internal injury by the size of the hole.
Source: The Satanic Verses