Quotes about compassion
page 8

Kenneth Chenault photo

“Compassion can be offered without sacrificing a sense of urgency or a strong will to win.”

Kenneth Chenault (1951) American business executive

A Principled Leader (2004)
Context: After 9-11, I told our senior management team that this was a tremendous leadership challenge that each of us was facing and I wanted them to be courageous. I wanted them to be decisive, to not shirk away from taking tough actions. I also told them to be compassionate. If the organization believed that they were not compassionate, particularly in these times, they would lose their privilege to lead. I wouldn’t be the one to take away their leadership – the organization – the people — would. Compassion can be offered without sacrificing a sense of urgency or a strong will to win. That’s one of the values I believe in very strongly, and I talk about it in the organization. I want to win the right way. I’m very competitive. I’ve got a strong will to win, but I want to win the right way. That’s my focus.<!-- ** p. 17

Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“Compassion and intelligence walk together; they are not separate. Compassion acts through intelligence.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

Vol. I, p. 113 <!-- 90? intellectual cleverness that remains merely cynical and confined to the personal or partisan contrasted with wise compassionate awareness which transcends such bounds and abides with the eternal and universal qualities and vital resolutions beyond all mortal aims. -->
1980s, Letters to the Schools (1981, 1985)
Context: The very nature of intelligence is sensitivity, and this sensitivity is love. Without this intelligence there can be no compassion. Compassion is not the doing of charitable acts or social reform; it is free from sentiment, romanticism and emotional enthusiasm. It is as strong as death. It is like a great rock, immovable in the midst of confusion, misery and anxiety. Without this compassion no new culture or society can come into being. Compassion and intelligence walk together; they are not separate. Compassion acts through intelligence. It can never act through the intellect. Compassion is the essence of the wholeness of life.

Kofi Annan photo

“These values: compassion; solidarity; respect for each other - already exist in all our great religions. We can begin by reaffirming and demonstrating that the problem is not the Koran, nor the Torah nor the Bible. As I have often said, the problem is never the faith.”

Kofi Annan (1938–2018) 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations

World Civilisations: “ Bridging the World’s Divides http://kofiannanfoundation.org/newsroom/news/2010/10/history-world-100-objects-episode-98”. Lecture given at the British Museum London.
Context: These values: compassion; solidarity; respect for each other - already exist in all our great religions. We can begin by reaffirming and demonstrating that the problem is not the Koran, nor the Torah nor the Bible. As I have often said, the problem is never the faith. It is the faithful, and how we behave towards each other. It is these great, enduring and universal principles which are also enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We can use these values – and the frameworks and tools we have based on them - to bridge divides and make people feel more secure and confident of the future.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer photo

“Mere waiting and looking on is not Christian behavior. Christians are called to compassion and to action.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) German Lutheran pastor, theologian, dissident anti-Nazi

Source: Letters and Papers from Prison (1967; 1997), The view from below, p. 17
Context: There remains an experience of incomparable value. We have for once learned to see the great events of world history from below, from the perspective of the outcasts, the suspects, the maltreated — in short, from the perspective of those who suffer. Mere waiting and looking on is not Christian behavior. Christians are called to compassion and to action.

Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“Compassion being action without motive, without self-interest, without any sense of fear, without any sense of pleasure.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

6th Public Talk, Saanen (28 July 1970) 'The Mechanical Activity of Thought" http://www.jiddu-krishnamurti.net/en/the-impossible-question/1970-07-28-jiddu-krishnamurti-the-impossible-question-the-mechanical-activity-of-thought in The Impossible Question (1972) http://www.jkrishnamurti.org/krishnamurti-teachings/view-text.php?tid=9&chid=57009, Part I, Ch. 6], p. 63 J.Krishnamurti Online, Serial No. 330
1970s
Context: What does it mean to be compassionate? Not merely verbally, but actually to be compassionate? Is compassion a matter of habit, of thought, a matter of the mechanical repetition of being kind, polite, gentle, tender? Can the mind which is caught in the activity of thought with its conditioning, its mechanical repetition, be compassionate at all? It can talk about it, it can encourage social reform, be kind to the poor heathen and so on; but is that compassion? When thought dictates, when thought is active, can there be any place for compassion? Compassion being action without motive, without self-interest, without any sense of fear, without any sense of pleasure.

Jiddu Krishnamurti photo

“Are you trying to grasp the quality of intelligence, compassion, the immense sense of beauty, the perfume of love and that truth which has no path to it?”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

Last Talks at Saanen, 1985 (1987), p. 158
1980s
Context: The questioner says, how can the conditioned brain grasp the unlimited, which is beauty, love, and truth? What is the ground of compassion and intelligence, and can it come upon us — each one of us? Are you inviting compassion? Are you inviting intelligence? Are you inviting beauty, love, and truth? Are you trying to grasp it? I am asking you. Are you trying to grasp the quality of intelligence, compassion, the immense sense of beauty, the perfume of love and that truth which has no path to it? Is that what you are grasping — wanting to find out the ground upon which it dwells? Can the limited brain grasp this? You cannot possibly grasp it, hold it. You can do all kinds of meditation, fast, torture yourself, become terribly austere, having one suit, or one robe. All this has been done. The rich cannot come to the truth, neither the poor. Nor the people who have taken a vow of celibacy, of silence, of austerity. All that is determined by thought, put together sequentially by thought; it is all the cultivation of deliberate thought, of deliberate intent.

Margaret Fuller photo

“On the boundless plain careering
By an unseen compass steering, Wildly flying, reappearing, —
With untamed fire their broad eyes glowing
In every step a grand pride showing,
Of no servile moment knowing”

Margaret Fuller (1810–1850) American feminist, poet, author, and activist

Life Without and Life Within (1859), The Captured Wild Horse
Context: p>On the boundless plain careering
By an unseen compass steering, Wildly flying, reappearing, —
With untamed fire their broad eyes glowing
In every step a grand pride showing,
Of no servile moment knowing, —Happy as the trees and flowers, In their instinct cradled hours,
Happier in fuller powers, —See the wild herd nobly ranging,
Nature varying, not changing,
Lawful in their lawless ranging.</p

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad photo
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad photo
Kuruvilla Pandikattu photo
Bal Gangadhar Tilak photo

“The Congress movement was for a long time purely occidental in its mind, character and methods, confined to the English-educated few, founded on the political rights and interests of the people read in the light of English history and European ideals, but with no roots either in the past of the country or in the inner spirit of the nation. ... To bring in the mass of the people, to found the greatness of the future on the greatness of the past, to infuse Indian politics with Indian religious fervour and spirituality are the indispensable conditions for a great and powerful political awakening in India. Others, writers, thinkers, spiritual leaders, had seen this truth. Mr. Tilak was the first to bring it into the actual field of practical politics. ... There are always two classes of political mind: one is preoccupied with details for their own sake, revels in the petty points of the moment and puts away into the background the great principles and the great necessities, the other sees rather these first and always and details only in relation to them. The one type moves in a routine circle which may or may not have an issue; it cannot see the forest for the trees and it is only by an accident that it stumbles, if at all, on the way out. The other type takes a mountain-top view of the goal and all the directions and keeps that in its mental compass through all the deflections, retardations and tortuosities which the character of the intervening country may compel it to accept; but these it abridges as much as possible. The former class arrogate the name of statesman in their own day; it is to the latter that posterity concedes it and sees in them the true leaders of great movements. Mr. Tilak, like all men of pre-eminent political genius, belongs to this second and greater order of mind.”

Bal Gangadhar Tilak (1856–1920) Indian independence activist

Sri Aurobindo, (From an introduction to a book entitled Speeches and Writings of Tilak.), quoted from Sri Aurobindo, ., Nahar, S., Aurobindo, ., & Institut de recherches évolutives (Paris). India's rebirth: A selection from Sri Aurobindo's writing, talks and speeches. Paris: Institut de Recherches Evolutives. 3rd Edition (2000). https://web.archive.org/web/20170826004028/http://bharatvani.org/books/ir/IR_frontpage.htm

Joseph Addison photo
John Ruskin photo
Natalie Wynn photo
Noah Levine photo
Alex Grey photo
John Pilger photo
Vimalakirti photo

“Therefore, you should be revulsed by such a body. You should despair of it and should arouse your admiration for the body of the Tathagata. Friends, the body of a Tathagata is the body of Dharma, born of gnosis. The body of a Tathagata is born of the stores of merit and wisdom. It is born of morality, of meditation, of wisdom, of the liberations, and of the knowledge and vision of liberation. It is born of love, compassion, joy, and impartiality. It is born of charity, discipline, and self-control. It is born of the path of ten virtues. It is born of patience and gentleness. It is born of the roots of virtue planted by solid efforts. It is born of the concentrations, the liberations, the meditations, and the absorptions. It is born of learning, wisdom, and liberative technique. It is born of the thirty-seven aids to enlightenment. It is born of mental quiescence and transcendental analysis. It is born of the ten powers, the four fearlessnesses, and the eighteen special qualities. It is born of all the transcendences. It is born from sciences and superknowledges. It is born of the abandonment of all evil qualities, and of the collection of all good qualities. It is born of truth. It is born of reality. It is born of conscious awareness. Friends, the body of a Tathagata is born of innumerable good works. Toward such a body you should turn your aspirations, and, in order to eliminate the sicknesses of the passions of all living beings, you should conceive the spirit of unexcelled, perfect enlightenment.”

Chapter 2 http://www.fodian.net/world/0475_02.html
Vimalakirti Sutra, Robert Thurman's translation, 1991

William Faulkner photo

“I try to root the language of my poetry in kindness, forgiveness, compassion and curiosity, that is the way I want to live, but of course that’s not to say anger and resentment and envy and other difficult emotions don’t make a noise in my work…”

On his preferred themes in “Deaf poetics: Conversation with Raymond Antrobus" https://poetryinternationalonline.com/conversation-with-raymond-antrobus/ (Poetry International; 2018 Oct 11)

Alexey Navalny photo

“The inner compass of Alexei Navalny says where to go to Alexei Navalny, and everything else is uninteresting to me.”

Alexey Navalny (1976) Russian anti-corruption activist

Original: Original Russian: Нет такого спонсора, которому я хотел бы угодить. Благодаря этому, кстати, мы сейчас на свою избирательную кампанию собрали 39 миллионов точно также маленькими пожертвованиями, поэтому мы абсолютно свободны, и я очень наслаждаюсь этим положением, что я вообще могу что угодно делать, то, что я хочу. Внутренний компас Алексея Навального говорит, куда идти Алексею Навальному, а все остальное мне неинтересно.
Source: Echo of Moscow http://echo.msk.ru/guests/voices/1053.html (2013)

Coraline Ada Ehmke photo

“The Ruby community has no moral compass. Just aphorisms and self-congtatulatory, masturbatory bullshit.”

Coraline Ada Ehmke technologist, activist, and transgender feminist

Source: CoralineAda On Twitter https://twitter.com/CoralineAda/status/1029170443884945409,

Thomas Jefferson photo

“About to enter, fellow-citizens, on the exercise of duties which comprehend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and consequently those which ought to shape its Administration. I will compress them within the narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none; the support of the State governments in all their rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns and the surest bulwarks against antirepublican tendencies; the preservation of the General Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the people -- a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided; absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism; a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace and for the first moments of war till regulars may relieve them; the supremacy of the civil over the military authority; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burthened; the honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith; encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid; the diffusion of information and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason; freedom of religion; freedom of the press, and freedom of person under the protection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These principles form the bright constellation which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment. They should be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by which to try the services of those we trust; and should we wander from them in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps and to regain the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America

1800s, First Inaugural Address (1801)

Bernie Sanders photo
J. Howard Moore photo
J. Howard Moore photo
Roy Jenkins photo
Mahatma Gandhi photo

“That I address you as a friend is no formality. I own no foes. My business in life has been for the past 33 years to enlist the friendship of the whole of humanity by befriending mankind, irrespective of race, colour or creed. … We have no doubt about your bravery or devotion to your fatherland, nor do we believe that you are the monster described by your opponents… But your own writings and pronouncements and those of your friends and admirers leave no room for doubt that many of your acts are monstrous and unbecoming of human dignity, especially in the estimation of men like me who believe in human friendliness. Such are your humiliation of Czechoslovakia, the rape of Poland and the swallowing of Denmark. I am aware that your view of life regards such spoliations as virtuous acts. But we have been taught from childhood to regard them as acts degrading humanity…Hence we cannot possibly wish success to your arms…. But ours is a unique position. We resist British imperialism no less than Nazism… If there is a difference, it is in degree. One-fifth of the human race has been brought under the British heel by means that will not bear scrutiny… Our resistance to it does not mean harm to the British people. We seek to convert them, not to defeat them on the battle-field… No spoliator can compass his end without a certain degree of co-operation, willing or unwilling, of the victim…. The rulers may have our land and bodies but not our souls…. We know what the British heel means for us and the non-European races of the world. But we would never wish to end the British rule with German aid… We have found in non-violence a force which, if organized, can without doubt match itself against a combination of all the most violent forces in the world… If not the British, some other power will certainly improve upon your method and beat you with your own weapon. You are leaving no legacy to your people of which they would feel proud.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

Letter to Hitler. 24 December 1940. Quoted from Koenraad Elst: Return of the Swastika (2007). (Also in https://web.archive.org/web/20100310135408/http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/articles/fascism/gandhihitler.html)
1940s

Tulsi Gabbard photo

“It is in the spirit of compassion and respect for the freedom and dignity of all people that I’m offering to serve you as your President. Join me this Saturday for the official kickoff of our campaign.”

Tulsi Gabbard (1981) U.S. Representative from Hawaii's 2nd congressional district

(28 January 2019) https://twitter.com/TulsiGabbard/status/1089913322252709889
Twitter account, January 2019

Fyodor Dostoyevsky photo
Edward Bellamy photo
Neelam Sanjiva Reddy photo
Bal Gangadhar Tilak photo

“The Congress movement was for a long time purely occidental in its mind, character and methods, confined to the English-educated few, founded on the political rights and interests of the people read in the light of English history and European ideals, but with no roots either in the past of the country or in the inner spirit of the nation…. To bring in the mass of the people, to found the greatness of the future on the greatness of the past, to infuse Indian politics with Indian religious fervour and spirituality are the indispensable conditions for a great and powerful political awakening in India. Others, writers, thinkers, spiritual leaders, had seen this truth. Mr. Tilak was the first to bring it into the actual field of practical politics….. There are always two classes of political mind: one is preoccupied with details for their own sake, revels in the petty points of the moment and puts away into the background the great principles and the great necessities, the other sees rather these first and always and details only in relation to them. The one type moves in a routine circle which may or may not have an issue; it cannot see the forest for the trees and it is only by an accident that it stumbles, if at all, on the way out. The other type takes a mountain-top view of the goal and all the directions and keeps that in its mental compass through all the deflections, retardations and tortuosities which the character of the intervening country may compel it to accept; but these it abridges as much as possible. The former class arrogate the name of statesman in their own day; it is to the latter that posterity concedes it and sees in them the true leaders of great movements. Mr. Tilak, like all men of pre-eminent political genius, belongs to this second and greater order of mind.”

Bal Gangadhar Tilak (1856–1920) Indian independence activist

Sri Aurobindo, (From an introduction to a book entitled Speeches and Writings of Tilak.), quoted from Sri Aurobindo, ., Nahar, S., Aurobindo, ., & Institut de recherches évolutives (Paris). India's rebirth: A selection from Sri Aurobindo's writing, talks and speeches. Paris: Institut de Recherches Evolutives. 3rd Edition (2000). https://web.archive.org/web/20170826004028/http://bharatvani.org/books/ir/IR_frontpage.htm

Rajinikanth photo

“Rajnikanth’s dedication, compassion for the welfare of co-artistes and passion for cinema have been key factors for his success as a mass-entertainer.”

Rajinikanth (1950) Indian actor

Sankar Narayan alias ‘Cable’ Sankar, an Assistant Director and a writer on film industry trends
Decoding Rajinikanth

Thomas Young (scientist) photo
Teal Swan photo
Dietrich Bonhoeffer photo

“Jesus Christ has to suffer and be rejected. … Suffering and being rejected are not the same. Even in his suffering Jesus could have been the celebrated Christ. Indeed, the entire compassion and admiration of the world could focus on the suffering. Looked upon as something tragic, the suffering could in itself convey its own value, its own honor and dignity. But Jesus is the Christ who was rejected in his suffering. Rejection removed all dignity and honor from his suffering. It had to be dishonorable suffering. Suffering and rejection express in summary form the cross of Jesus. Death on the cross means to suffer and to die as one rejected and cast out. It was by divine necessity that Jesus had to suffer and be rejected. Any attempt to hinder what is necessary is satanic. Even, or especially, if such an attempt comes from the circle of disciples, because it intends to prevent Christ from being Christ. The fact that it is Peter, the rock of the church, who makes himself guilty doing this just after he has confessed Jesus to be the Christ and has been commissioned by Christ, shows that from its very beginning the church has taken offense at the suffering of Christ. It does not want that kind of Lord, and as Christ's church it does not want to be forced to accept the law of suffering from its Lord.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) German Lutheran pastor, theologian, dissident anti-Nazi

Source: Discipleship (1937), Discipleship and the Cross, p. 84

Marilyn Ferguson photo
Céline Sciamma photo

“The last scene came really, really early, disconnected from even the idea of a woman painter…I wanted to write a love story and I thought, ‘What do I want to tell?’ And that scene came up really, really quickly, alone, by itself. The weird compass of the film was its last scene. That’s a compass, but it’s a high pressure one.”

Céline Sciamma (1978) French director and screenwriter

On her creative process for Portrait of a Lady on Fire in “‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’ Filmmaker Céline Sciamma Is Trying to Break Your Heart” https://www.indiewire.com/2019/12/portrait-of-a-lady-on-fire-filmmaker-celine-sciamma-interview-1202193537/ in IndieWire (2019 Dec 05)

Alastair Reynolds photo
David Pearce (philosopher) photo

“More controversially, technology can accelerate the transition from harming to helping free-living sentient beings: mankind's fitfully expanding "circle of compassion."”

David Pearce (philosopher) (1959) British transhumanist

The civilising process needn't be species-specific but instead extend to free-living dwellers in tomorrow's wildlife parks. Every cubic metre of the biosphere will soon be computationally accessible to surveillance, micro-management and control. Fertility regulation via immunocontraception can replace Darwinian ecosystems governed by starvation and predation. Any species of obligate carnivore we choose to preserve can be genetically and behaviourally tweaked into harmlessness. Asphyxiation, disembowelling, and agonies of being eaten alive can pass into the dustbin of history.

" High-tech Jainism https://www.hedweb.com/transhumanism/neojainism.html", The World Transformed, Jul. 2014

Dan Abnett photo
Marianne Williamson photo
Gavin Free photo

“If we have the smegging compass, Jeremy, you don't need to look at the farting sun.”

Gavin Free (1988) English filmmaker

"Let's Play Minecraft: Ep. 236 - Voyage of the Dumb Treaders" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1MLhR5OzWw. youtube.com. December 2, 2016. Retrieved February 21, 2019.

Tenzin Gyatso photo
Patañjali photo

“Undisturbed calmness of mind is attained by cultivating friendliness toward the happy, compassion for the unhappy, delight in the virtuous, and indifference toward the wicked.”

Patañjali (-200–-150 BC) ancient Indian scholar(s) of grammar and linguistics, of yoga, of medical treatises

Patanjali, in Being Consciousness Bliss: A Seeker's Guide http://books.google.co.in/books?id=AEo58-ihNygC&pg=PA205, p. 205.

Amit Ray photo

“Emotional intelligence is the foundation of leadership. It balances flexibility with toughness, vision with passion, compassion with justice.”

Amit Ray (1960) Indian author

Mindfulness Meditation for Corporate Leadership and Management (2017)

Tenzin Gyatso photo
Mike Huckabee photo

“Oh please. No ethic lectures from you, you cheap carny hustler... [Y]ou since you sold your moral compass for dimes long ago.”

Mike Huckabee (1955) Arkansas politician

Mike Murphy, Twitter post https://twitter.com/murphymike/status/1119384870071857152 (19 April 2019)

Helena Roerich photo
Alice A. Bailey photo
Enoch Powell photo

“So long as the figures 'now superseded' and the academic projections based upon them held sway, it was possible for politicians to shrug their shoulders. With so much of immediate and indisputable importance on their hands, why should they attend to what was forecast for the end of the century, when most of them would be not only out of office but dead and gone? … It was not for them to heed the cries of anguish from those of their own people who already saw their towns being changed, their native places turned into foreign lands, and themselves displaced as if by a systematic colonisation. For these the much vaunted compassion of the parties and politicians was not available: the parties and the politicians preferred to be busy making speeches on race relations; and if any of their number dared to tell them the truth, even less than the whole truth, about what was happening and what would happen here in England, they denounced them as racialist and turned them out of doors. They could feel safe; for they said in their hearts: 'If trouble comes, it will not be in our time; let the next generation see to it!'”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

… The explosive which will blow us asunder is there and the fuse is burning, but the fuse is shorter than had been supposed. The transformation which I referred to earlier as being without even a remote parallel in our history, the occupation of the hearts of this metropolis and of towns and cities across England by a coloured population amounting to millions, this before long will be past denying. It is possible that the people of this country will, with good or ill grace, accept what they did not ask for, did not want and were not told of. My own judgment—it is a judgment which the politician has a duty to form to the best of his ability—I have not feared to give: it is—to use words I used two years and a half ago—that 'the people of England will not endure it'.
Source: Speech to the Carshalton and Banstead Young Conservatives at Carshalton Hall (15 February 1971), from Still to Decide (1972), pp. 202-203

Mehmet Görmez photo

“We all know that the perpetrators of the terrorist attacks in Paris, Brussels, Ankara and Istanbul have nothing to do either with Islam, which brought peace and mercy to humanity, or with Muhammad, prophet of compassion, or the Quran.”

Mehmet Görmez (1959) Turkish civil servant

Source: Terror unrelated to Islam, Turkey’s top cleric says (April 10, 2016) https://www.aa.com.tr/en/turkey/terror-unrelated-to-islam-turkey-s-top-cleric-says/552678

Ted Kennedy photo

“There is a new wave of change all around us, and if we set our compass true, we will reach our destination — not merely victory for our Party, but renewal for our nation.”

Ted Kennedy (1932–2009) United States Senator

This last line references the last line of his DNC speech in 1980 where he said "the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
2000s, DNC Speech (2008)
And this November the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans, so with Barack Obama and for you and for me, our country will be committed to his cause. The work begins anew. The hope rises again. And the dream lives on.

John Lewis (civil rights leader) photo

“Our nation is founded on the principle that we do not have kings. We have presidents. And the Constitution is our compass. When you see something that is not right, not just, not fair, you have a moral obligation to say something. To do something. Our children and their children will ask us, ‘What did you do? What did you say?'”

John Lewis (civil rights leader) (1940) American politician and civil rights leader

For some, he concluded, this vote may be hard. But we have a mission and a mandate to be on the right side of history.
Source: Quoted in Impeachment is Over, But Don’t Despair by Diallo Brooks, CounterPunch https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/02/07/impeachment-is-over-but-dont-despair/, (7 Feb 2020)

Andy Ngo photo

“In many ways, being at CHAZ was like being among jihadists. To each other, they showed a lot of care and camaraderie in the form of mutual aid, and compassion but opponents to their political agenda needed to be destroyed.”

Andy Ngo (1986) American conservative journalist and social‐media personality

Source: Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy (2021), p. 33

Jack Kemp photo

“Conservatives define compassion not by the number of people who receive some kind of government aid but rather by the number of people who no longer need it.”

Jack Kemp (1935–2009) American football player, quarterback, U.S. Congressman

citation needed

John B. Calhoun photo
Confucius photo
Gautama Buddha photo
Tenzin Gyatso photo
Rumi photo
William Leonard Pickard photo
Amit Ray photo
Gregory Palamas photo
Ini Edo photo
Thich Nhat Hanh photo

“Jesus a bath. Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Source: The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation (1999) Page 61

Alastair Reynolds photo
John Wesley photo
Sidney Poitier photo

“Compassion for other human beings has to extend to the society that’s been grinding the powerless under its heel. The more civilized the society becomes, the more humane it becomes; the more it can see its own humanity, the more it sees the ways in which its humanity has been behaving inhumanly. This injustice of the world inspires a rage so intense that to express it fully would require homicidal action; it’s self-destructive, destroy-the-world rage. Simply put, I’ve learned that I must find positive outlets for anger or it will destroy me. I have to try to find a way to channel that anger to the positive, and the highest positive is forgiveness.”

Sidney Poitier (1927) American-born Bahamian actor, film director, author, and diplomat

Variant: I’ve learned that I must find positive outlets for anger or it will destroy me. There is a certain anger; it reaches such intensity that to express it fully would require homicidal rage — self-destructive, destroy-the-world rage — and its flame burns because the world is so unjust. I have to try to find a way to channel that anger to the positive, and the highest positive is forgiveness.
Source: The Measure of a Man (2000)

Drake photo

“Houston women I wine-and-dine and take to the house
My moral compass is janky, it breaks in the South”

Drake (1986) Canadian rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer, and actor

"Is There More," Scorpion (2018)

Pema Chödron photo

“Emptiness is not what we thought. Neither is mindfulness or fear. Compassion—not what we thought. Love. Buddha nature. Courage.”

Pema Chödron (1936) American philosopher

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times (1997)

Pema Chödron photo

“Impermanence becomes vivid in the present moment; so do compassion and wonder and courage. And so does fear.”

Pema Chödron (1936) American philosopher

When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times (1997)

Dilgo Khyentse photo

“Devotion is the ring that allows the hook of the teacher’s compassion to pull you out of the mire of samsara.”

Dilgo Khyentse (1910–1991) Bhutanese Buddhist Lama

The Hundred Verses of Advice: Tibetan Buddhist Teachings on What Matters Most (2005); ISBN 1-59030-154-4

Om Swami photo
Kassym-Jomart Tokayev photo

“The month of Ramadan carries enduring moral values: humanity, compassion, mercy.”

Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (1953) Kazakh politician

Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (2022) cited in: " President Tokayev Congratulates People on Beginning of Ramadan https://astanatimes.com/2022/04/president-tokayev-congratulates-people-on-beginning-of-ramadan/" in The Astana Times, 2 April 2022.

Dave Leduc photo

“Once you reunite with your compassion and choose the vegan way of life, it’s almost impossible to go back.”

Dave Leduc (1991) Canadian Lethwei fighter (born 1991)

On veganism
Source: https://plantbasednews.org/culture/sport/world-champion-lethwei-fighter-dave-leduc-says-being-vegan-is-a-philosophy-not-a-diet
2nd February, 2021

Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo
Teal Swan photo