Quotes about mankind

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Draft of a letter to the Grand Lodge of Free Masons of the State of Maryland (8 November 1798) http://memory.loc.gov/mss/mgw/mgw4/113/0400/0495.jpg
1790s
Context: So far as I am acquainted with the principles & Doctrines of Free Masonry, I conceive it to be founded in benevolence and to be exercised only for the good of mankind. If it has been a Cloak to promote improper or nefarious objects, it is a melancholly proof that in unworthy hands, the best institutions may be made use of to promote the worst designs.

1900s, The Strenuous Life: Essays and Addresses (1900), The Strenuous Life
Context: We must see that there is civic honesty, civic cleanliness, civic good sense in our home administration of city, State, and nation. We must strive for honesty in office, for honesty toward the creditors of the nation and of the individual; for the widest freedom of individual initiative where possible, and for the wisest control of individual initiative where it is hostile to the welfare of the many. But because we set our own household in order we are not thereby excused from playing our part in the great affairs of the world. A man's first duty is to his own home, but he is not thereby excused from doing his duty to the State; for if he fails in this second duty it is under the penalty of ceasing to be a freeman. In the same way, while a nation's first duty is within its own borders, it is not thereby absolved from facing its duties in the world as a whole; and if it refuses to do so, it merely forfeits its right to struggle for a place among the peoples that shape the destiny of mankind.

Source: Gleanings from the Writings of Bahá'u'lláh, p. 250

Letter to Edward Newenham (20 October 1792) http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=WasFi32.xml&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=155&division=div1, these statements and one from a previous letter to Newenham seem to have become combined and altered into a misquotation of Washington's original statements to read:
Religious controversies are always productive of more acrimony and irreconcilable hatreds than those which spring from any other cause. I had hoped that liberal and enlightened thought would have reconciled the Christians so that their religious fights would not endanger the peace of Society.
As misquoted in The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back (2006) by Andrew Sullivan, p. 131
1790s

The Crisis No. XIII
1770s, The American Crisis (1776–1783)

"Fear, the Foundation of Religion"
1920s, Why I Am Not a Christian (1927)

Conversations with Eckermann (entry for 31 January 1827)

About Dadabhai, Narrow-majority’ and ‘Bow-and-agree’: Public Attitudes Towards the Elections of the First Asian MPs in Britain, Dadabhai Naoroji and Mancherjee Merwanjee Bhownaggree, 1885-1906

Source: An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789; 1823), Ch. 1 : Of the Principle of Utility

1790s, To the Hebrew Congregation in Newport, Rhode Island, 18 August 1790

Source: 1930s, Die verfluchten Hakenkreuzler. Etwas zum Nachdenken (1932)

From the book "Universal consciousness"

spirituality and wisdom

Original: (de) "Glaubt mir, des Menschen wahrster Wahn
wird ihm im Traume aufgetan:
all' Dichtkunst und Poeterei
ist nichts als Wahrtraumdeuterei."
Source: Quotes from his operas, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Hans Sachs, Act 3, Scene 2

Vol. II, Ch. V Aphorisms and Extracts, p. 77.
Memoirs and Correspondence (1900)

Source: First Manuscript – Wages of Labour, p. 6.
Source: Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844

Commonly attributed to Paine, even on memorials https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Thomas_Paine_Plaque_NY.jpg|, and justly describes his ideals, but found nowhere in his writings. It is actually is derived from a quote in Rights of Man: Part 2, "My country is the world, and my religion is to do good."
Misattributed

Source: The Brothers Karamazov

Virtual Meetings
Source: Virtual Mulaqat with Ahmadi Muslim Women from Kababir https://www.pressahmadiyya.com/press-releases/2021/06/ahmadi-muslim-women-from-kababir-have-honour-of-a-virtual-meeting-with-the-head-of-the-ahmadiyya-muslim-community/, 6 June 2021

As quoted in Words from the Wise : Over 6,000 of the Smartest Things Ever Said (2007) by Rosemarie Jarski, p. 312. From The Praise of Folly.

Earliest citation to Paine appears to be in "Freedom: A Journal of Anarchist Communism Vol. XXIV" https://books.google.com/books?id=ITYfh67DKncC&pg=RA11-PA33&lpg=RA11-PA33&dq=The+trade+of+governing+has+always+been+monopolized+by+the+most+ignorant+and+the+most+rascally+individuals+of+mankind.&source=bl&ots=8DHXw2Ix1C&sig=ACfU3U3Bk_9QoyDZh_LDcoEB83cEaDWTcQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjp3I6MqOXxAhW2KVkFHfEsDb0Q6AEwBXoECBEQAw#v=onepage&q=The%20trade%20of%20governing%20has%20always%20been%20monopolized%20by%20the%20most%20ignorant%20and%20the%20most%20rascally%20individuals%20of%20mankind.&f=false. Not found in any of his works.
Misattributed

1940s, The Bomb and Civilization http://personal.kent.edu/~rmuhamma/Philosophy/RBwritings/bombCivilization.htm (1945)

Robert Oppenheimer et al., Report of the General Advisory Committee, 1949

The Ethics Of Aristotle (Vol. I), Bk. 1, Chapter III

Source: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

Letter to A. Bronson (30 July 1838); a similar idea was later more famously expressed by Abraham Lincoln, "With malice towards none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right".

Source: The Prince

Source: Farewell Waltz

"Beyond the Black River" (1935)

Source: Manuscrito encontrado em Accra

"My Speech to the Graduates"
Side Effects (1980)
Variant: Mankind is facing a crossroad - one road leads to despair and utter hopelessness and the other to total extinction - I sincerely hope you graduates choose the right road
Source: Mere Anarchy

Source: A Confederacy of Dunces

Source: Firefight

Source: Complete Poems, 1904-1962

Source: Dune

Life and Human Nature.
Afterthoughts (1931)

Source: "Young Goodman Brown"
Context: "Lo, there ye stand, my children," said the figure, in a deep and solemn tone, almost sad with its despairing awfulness, as if his once angelic nature could yet mourn for our miserable race. "Depending upon one another's hearts, ye had still hoped that virtue were not all a dream. Now are ye undeceived. Evil is the nature of mankind. Evil must be your only happiness. Welcome again, my children, to the communion of your race."

Source: Bloodfever

1783, p. 519
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

Speech, quoted in The Times (February 15, 1923).
Other works
Variant: Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.

1840s, Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840), The Hero as Man of Letters

Source: Ender's Game

Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values

Source: Stranger in a Strange Land

Book of Dreams (1961) Foreword
As misquoted in Night and Day (1989) by Jack Maguire, p. 221; Maguire does not cite his source, so this widely quoted variant appears to be an erroneous paraphrase of this published statement. It is not a direct quote from some other statement by Kerouac.
Variant: All human beings are also dream beings. Dreaming ties all mankind together.

Source: The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1984), Part Five: Lightness and Weight

I Am A Dancer (1952)
Source: Blood Memory
Context: I feel that the essence of dance is the expression of mankind — the landscape of the human soul. I hope that every dance I do reveals something of myself or some wonderful thing a human being can be.

Source: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Volume I

Source: Jude the Obscure

Source: Born of Shadows

Walden (1854), p.18

Source: Shadowfever

Source: Radiance

Source: Prologue to Mr. Addison's Cato (1713), Line 1.

Source: The Lost Lunar Baedeker: Poems of Mina Loy

From a letter to Hermann Huth, Vice-President of the German Vegetarian Federation, 27 December 1930. Supposedly published in German magazine Vegetarische Warte, which existed from 1882 to 1935. Einstein Archive 46-756. Quoted in The Ultimate Quotable Einstein by Alice Calaprice (2011), [//books.google.it/books?id=G_iziBAPXtEC&pg=PA453 p. 453].
1930s
Context: Besides agreeing with the aims of vegetarianism for aesthetic and moral reasons, it is my view that a vegetarian manner of living by its purely physical effect on the human temperament would most beneficially influence the lot of mankind.

75
The Zürau Aphorisms (1917 - 1918)

"Credo" (1991); also in Greetings, Carbon-Based Bipeds! : Collected Essays, 1934-1998 (1999), p. 360
1990s

Source: Devil May Cry

Source: 1920s, The Future of an Illusion (1927), Ch. 10

Blood Meridian (1985)
Source: Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West
Context: And the answer, said the judge. If God meant to interfere in the degeneracy of mankind would he not have done so by now? Wolves cull themselves, man. What other creature could? And is the race of man not more predacious yet? The way of the world is to bloom and to flower and die but in the affairs of men there is no waning and the noon of his expression signals the onset of night. His spirit is exhausted at the peak of its achievement. His meridian is at once his darkening and the evening of his day. He loves games? Let him play for stakes. This you see here, these ruins wondered at by tribes of savages, do you not think that this will be again? Aye. And again. With other people, with other sons.

Source: Vampire Mine

Modern version: No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
Meditation 17. This was the source for the title of Ernest Hemingway's novel.
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions (1624)
Source: Meditation XVII - Meditation 17
Context: No man is an Iland, intire of it selfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Mannor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.

Dave Barry Turns 40 (1990)

1961, UN speech
Context: Mankind must put an end to war — or war will put an end to mankind.
So let us here resolve that Dag Hammarskjold did not live, or die, in vain. Let us call a truce to terror. Let us invoke the blessings of peace. And as we build an international capacity to keep peace, let us join in dismantling the national capacity to wage war.
Context: We meet in an hour of grief and challenge. Dag Hammarskjold is dead. But the United Nations lives. His tragedy is deep in our hearts, but the task for which he died is at the top of our agenda. A noble servant of peace is gone. But the quest for peace lies before us.
The problem is not the death of one man — the problem is the life of this organization. It will either grow to meet the challenges of our age, or it will be gone with the wind, without influence, without force, without respect. Were we to let it die, to enfeeble its vigor, to cripple its powers, we would condemn our future. For in the development of this organization rests the only true alternative to war — and war appeals no longer as a rational alternative. Unconditional war can no longer lead to unconditional victory. It can no longer serve to settle disputes. It can no longer concern the great powers alone. For a nuclear disaster, spread by wind and water and fear, could well engulf the great and the small, the rich and the poor, the committed and the uncommitted alike. Mankind must put an end to war — or war will put an end to mankind.
So let us here resolve that Dag Hammarskjold did not live, or die, in vain. Let us call a truce to terror. Let us invoke the blessings of peace. And as we build an international capacity to keep peace, let us join in dismantling the national capacity to wage war.

Source: Succubus Shadows

Ich glaube an Spinozas Gott, der sich in der gesetzlichen Harmonie des Seienden offenbart, nicht an einen Gott, der sich mit Schicksalen und Handlungen der Menschen abgibt.
24 April 1929 in response to the telegrammed question of New York's Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein: "Do you believe in God? Stop. Answer paid 50 words." Einstein replied in only 27 (German) words. The New York Times 25 April 1929 http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F10B1EFC3E54167A93C7AB178FD85F4D8285F9
Similarly, in a letter to Maurice Solovine, he wrote: "I can understand your aversion to the use of the term 'religion' to describe an emotional and psychological attitude which shows itself most clearly in Spinoza... I have not found a better expression than 'religious' for the trust in the rational nature of reality that is, at least to a certain extent, accessible to human reason."
As quoted in Einstein : Science and Religion http://www.einsteinandreligion.com/spinoza.html by Arnold V. Lesikar
1920s

When asked by Viereck if he considered himself to be a German or a Jew. A version with slightly different wording is quoted in Einstein: His Life and Universe http://books.google.com/books?id=dJMpQagbz_gC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA386#v=onepage&q&f=false by Walter Isaacson (2007), p. 386
1920s, Viereck interview (1929)
Variant: Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.
Context: It is quite possible to be both. I look upon myself as a man. Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.

Actually said by Giuseppe Baretti, February 13, 1766. The Samuel Johnson Sound Bite Page http://www.samueljohnson.com/apocryph.html#19, retrieved 24 October 2018
Misattributed

Source: Childhood's End

Source: How to Kill a Rock Star

Source: Dragonflight

Source: Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Christian Community

Source: The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Source: Democracy in America

Source: The Hero With a Thousand Faces

Source: On Liberty (1859), Ch. II: Of the Liberty of Thought and Discussion

Source: Martin Eden

Source: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

Source: Paradise Lost