Quotes about south
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I. K. Gujral photo
Basava photo

“Basava (twelfth century AD), a Saivite saint of South India was a religious teacher, social reformer, and revolutionary who opposed image worship, rejected the Vedas, and the authority of the priests and instituted complete equality among his followers, even equality for women. He was the founder of the Lingayat sect.”

Basava (1134–1196) a 12th-century Hindu philosopher, statesman, Kannada Bhakti poet of Lingayatism

Indira Gandhi, the former Prime Minister of India, quoted in [Gandhi, Indira, Selected Thoughts of Indira Gandhi: A Book of Quotes, http://books.google.com/books?id=vJbcODokoHsC&pg=PA35, 1985, Mittal Publications, 35–, GGKEY:A2GGQ58B3WF, 35]

Voltaire photo

“William inherited very large possessions, part of which consisted of crown debts, due to the vice-admiral for sums he had advanced for the sea-service. No moneys were at that time less secure than those owing from the king. Penn was obliged to go, more than once, and "thee" and "thou" Charles and his ministers, to recover the debt; and at last, instead of specie, the government invested him with the right and sovereignty of a province of America, to the south of Maryland. Thus was a Quaker raised to sovereign power.
He set sail for his new dominions with two ships filled with Quakers, who followed his fortune. The country was then named by them Pennsylvania, from William Penn; and he founded Philadelphia, which is now a very flourishing city. His first care was to make an alliance with his American neighbors; and this is the only treaty between those people and the Christians that was not ratified by an oath, and that was never infringed. The new sovereign also enacted several wise and wholesome laws for his colony, which have remained invariably the same to this day. The chief is, to ill-treat no person on account of religion, and to consider as brethren all those who believe in one God. He had no sooner settled his government than several American merchants came and peopled this colony. The natives of the country, instead of flying into the woods, cultivated by degrees a friendship with the peaceable Quakers. They loved these new strangers as much as they disliked the other Christians, who had conquered and ravaged America. In a little time these savages, as they are called, delighted with their new neighbors, flocked in crowds to Penn, to offer themselves as his vassals. It was an uncommon thing to behold a sovereign "thee'd" and "thou'd" by his subjects, and addressed by them with their hats on; and no less singular for a government to be without one priest in it; a people without arms, either for offence or preservation; a body of citizens without any distinctions but those of public employments; and for neighbors to live together free from envy or jealousy. In a word, William Penn might, with reason, boast of having brought down upon earth the Golden Age, which in all probability, never had any real existence but in his dominions.”

Voltaire (1694–1778) French writer, historian, and philosopher

Variants:
No oaths, no seals, no official mummeries were used; the treaty was ratified on both sides with a yea, yea — the only one, says Voltaire, that the world has known, never sworn to and never broken.
As quoted in William Penn : An Historical Biography (1851) by William Hepworth Dixon
William Penn began by making a league with the Americans, his neighbors. It is the only one between those natives and the Christians which was never sworn to, and the only one that was never broken.
As quoted in American Pioneers (1905), by William Augustus Mowry and Blanche Swett Mowry, p. 80
It was the only treaty made by the settlers with the Indians that was never sworn to, and the only one that was never broken.
As quoted in A History of the American Peace Movement (2008) by Charles F. Howlett, and ‎Robbie Lieberman, p. 33
The History of the Quakers (1762)

Abraham Lincoln photo
William Faulkner photo
Fannie Flagg photo
Cressida Cowell photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Pablo Neruda photo

“Who writes your name in letters of smoke among the stars of the south?
Oh let me remember you as you were before you existed.”

¿Quién escribe tu nombre con letras de humo entre las estrellas del sur?
Ah déjame recordarte cómo eras entonces, cuando aún no existías.
"Every Day You Play" (Juegas Todos los Días), XIV, p. 35.
Source: Veinte Poemas de Amor y una Canción Desesperada (Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair) (1924)

Jean Webster photo
Thomas Wolfe photo
Joss Whedon photo
Sherrilyn Kenyon photo
Tom Robbins photo
Karen Marie Moning photo
Pat Conroy photo
Flannery O’Connor photo

“Anything that comes out of the South is going to be called grotesque by the northern reader, unless it is grotesque, in which case it is going to be called realistic.”

Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American novelist, short story writer

Source: Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose

David Sedaris photo
William Faulkner photo
Flannery O’Connor photo
Peter Lerangis photo
John Flanagan photo
A.A. Milne photo
Peter Lerangis photo
Jack Kerouac photo
Dick Gregory photo
Charlie Chaplin photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo

“The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963)
Context: But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not Amos an extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever flowing stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand; I cannot do otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before I make a butchery of my conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal..." So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice? In that dramatic scene on Calvary's hill three men were crucified. We must never forget that all three were crucified for the same crime — the crime of extremism. Two were extremists for immorality, and thus fell below their environment. The other, Jesus Christ, was an extremist for love, truth and goodness, and thereby rose above his environment. Perhaps the South, the nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

Haruki Murakami photo
Kathy Reichs photo
Calvin Coolidge photo
Maxwell D. Taylor photo
Robert Seymour Bridges photo
Joseph Conrad photo
Ernest Shackleton photo
Ross Perot photo
Harold Macmillan photo
Aleksandar Stamboliyski photo

“I am neither a Serb nor a Bulgarian, I am a South Slav.”

Aleksandar Stamboliyski (1879–1923) Bulgarian prime minister

Stavrianos, L. (1942) "The Balkan Federation Movement: A Neglected Aspect" in American Historical Review. Vol. 48.

Donald J. Trump photo
William Cullen Bryant photo

“The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he bore,
And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more.”

William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878) American romantic poet and journalist

Death of the Flowers http://www.bartleby.com/248/85.html (1832), st. 4, lines 23-24

Will Cuppy photo
Albert Lutuli photo
Ehud Olmert photo
James Connolly photo
Patrick Buchanan photo
Lyndon B. Johnson photo

“War breeds war. That is all it can do. War does nothing but devour valuable resources and destroy precious lives for the sole purpose of perpetuating itself. As Randolph Bourne wrote, “War is the health of the State.” War is a mechanism used by the ruling elites of the State to coerce and control the people, so it becomes essential that whenever one war is complete, another is instigated elsewhere so that the mechanism keeps running.
On the other hand, peace breeds prosperity. If War is indeed the “health of the State,” then Peace can be nothing less than the “health of the People.” Being at peace means valuable natural resources can be preserved and used at home where we need them most. Being at peace means young fathers and mothers can live and enjoy free trade, not only among themselves but with the world, instead of dying capriciously and unnecessarily, for political gain or to line the pockets of those who profit from their sacrifice.
History teaches us that the key elements to prosperity are freedom and peace. You don’t go to war with people you like, or with people you know, or with people with whom you are trading and doing business. Even after our fledgling republic was nearly torn asunder in civil war which literally pitted brother against brother and nearly destroyed the South, our reunited nation and all its people advanced and prospered after peace was restored.”

R. Lee Wrights (1958–2017) American gubernatorial candidate

" Why Peace? Why Not? http://www.libertyforall.net/?p=7277," Liberty For All (11 February 2012, retrieved 25 February 2012).
Republished http://original.antiwar.com/lee-wrights/2012/02/15/why-peace-why-not/ by Antiwar.com (16 February 2012).
2012

George Friedman photo

“[A]ny seagoing vessel—commercial or military, from the Persian Gulf to the South China Sea to the Caribbean—could be monitored by the United States Navy, who could choose to watch it, stop it, or sink it.”

George Friedman (1949) American businessman and political scientist

Source: The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century (2009), p. 44

Harry V. Jaffa photo
Andrew Johnson photo
David Attenborough photo
Harry V. Jaffa photo
Lyndon B. Johnson photo

“We have just lost the South for a generation.”

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) American politician, 36th president of the United States (in office from 1963 to 1969)

I think we just delivered the South to the Republican Party for a long time to come. Very widely quoted as an aside to an aide, upon signing the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

For example, in a speech by Barack Obama at the LBJ Presidential Library https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/04/10/remarks-president-lbj-presidential-library-civil-rights-summit in 2014. But no report cites anyone who heard (or claims to have heard) LBJ say this, and the earliest attribution is 25 years after the fact. See "We have lost the South for a generation": What Lyndon Johnson said, or would have said if only he had said it https://capitalresearch.org/article/we-have-lost-the-south-for-a-generation-what-lyndon-johnson-said-or-would-have-said-if-only-he-had-said-it/.

Ref: en.wikiquote.org - Lyndon B. Johnson / Misattributed
1960s, Civil Rights Bill signing speech (1964)

L. Frank Baum photo

“There were only four witches in all the Land of Oz, and two of them, those who live in the North and the South, are good witches.”

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900)
Context: There were only four witches in all the Land of Oz, and two of them, those who live in the North and the South, are good witches. I know this is true, for I am one of them myself, and cannot be mistaken. Those who dwelt in the East and the West were, indeed, wicked witches; but now that you have killed one of them, there is but one Wicked Witch in all the Land of Oz — the one who lives in the West.

Ha-Joon Chang photo
Jeet Thayil photo

“I was born in the south of India but I've never lived there. I went to school in Bombay, and in Hong Kong and in New York. But the place I've lived in the most is Bombay, because I've been there at various stages of my life.”

Jeet Thayil (1959) Indian writer

On his being asked Where was he born?
Jeet Thayil on why 'Where are you from?' is a complicated question for all of us

“Small wonder that we find them flocking everywhere ahead or with or in the wake of Islamic armies. Sufis of the Chishtîyya silsila in particular excelled in going ahead of these armies and acting as eyes and ears of the Islamic establishment. The Hindus in places where these sufis settled, particularly in the South, failed to understand the true character of these saints till it was too late. The invasions of South India by the armies of Alãu’d-Dîn Khaljî and Muhammad bin Tughlaq can be placed in their proper perspective only when we survey the sufi network in the South. Many sufis were sent in all directions by Nizãmu’d-Dîn Awliyã, the Chistîyya luminary of Delhi; all of them actively participated in jihãds against the local population. Nizãmu’d-Dîn’s leading disciple, Nasîru’d-Dîn Chirãg-i-Dihlî, exhorted the sufis to serve the Islamic state. “The essence of sufism,” he versified, “is not an external garment. Gird up your loins to serve the Sultãn and be a sufi.” Nasîru’d-Dîn’s leading disciple, Syed Muhammad Husainî Banda Nawãz Gesûdarãz (1321-1422 A. D.), went to Gulbarga for helping the contemporary Bahmani sultan in consolidating Islamic power in the Deccan. Shykh Nizãmu’d-Dîn Awliyã’s dargãh in Delhi continued to be and remains till today the most important centre of Islamic fundamentalism in India. (…)”

Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist

Hindu Temples – What Happened to Them, Volume I (1990)

Paul Keating photo
Nguyen Khanh photo
Frederick Douglass photo
Maya Angelou photo
Eric Foner photo
Kancha Ilaiah photo
Noam Chomsky photo
Kurt Student photo
Pearl S.  Buck photo
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow photo
Adolf Hitler photo
Frederick Douglass photo

“It was once said by Abraham Lincoln that this Republic could not long endure half slave and half free; and the same may be said with even more truth of the black citizens of this country. They cannot remain half slave and half free. They must be one thing or the other. And this brings me to consider the alternative now presented between slavery and freedom in this country. From my outlook, I am free to affirm that I see nothing for the negro of the South but a condition of absolute freedom, or of absolute slavery. I see no half-way place for him. One or the other of these conditions is to solve the so-called negro problem. There are forces at work in both of these directions, and for the present that which aims at the re-enslavement of the negro seems to have the advantage. Let it be remembered that the labor of the negro is his only capital. Take this from him, and he dies from starvation. The present mode of obtaining his labor in the South gives the old master-class a complete mastery over him. I showed this in my last annual celebration address, and I need not go into it here. The payment of the negro by orders on stores, where the storekeeper controls price, quality, and quantity, and is subject to no competition, so that the negro must buy there and nowhere else–an arrangement by which the negro never has a dollar to lay by, and can be kept in debt to his employer, year in and year out–puts him completely at the mercy of the old master-class. He who could say to the negro, when a slave, you shall work for me or be whipped to death, can now say to him with equal emphasis, you shall work for me, or I will starve you to death… This is the plain, matter-of-fact, and unexaggerated condition of the plantation negro in the Southern States today.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

Speech http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-nations-problem/

Mark Burns (televangelist) photo

“As a young man starting my church in Greenville, South Carolina, I overstated several details of my biography because I was worried I wouldn't be taken seriously as a new pastor. This was wrong, I wasn't truthful then and I have to take full responsibility for my actions”

Mark Burns (televangelist) (1979) Christian pastor and founder of the NOW Television Network

Statement released in response to allegations that he had falsified his professional accomplishments http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/03/politics/mark-burns-donald-trump-interview/index.html

Mahinda Rajapaksa photo

“It is a revolution against a dictator [referring to Rajapaksa]. This should be a lesson for all South Asian countries. This verdict has opened up a free space through which the democratic values and reforms can be pushed in. People really wanted a change and wished to end the authoritarian rule of Rajapaksa.”

Mahinda Rajapaksa (1945) Prime Minister of Sri Lanka

Kushal Perera, a political analyst and writer on Mahinda Rajapaksa loosing to Maithripala Sirisena in 2015, quoted on The Indian Express (January 9, 2015), "Maithripala Sirisena sworn-in as Sri Lanka’s new President" http://indianexpress.com/article/world/neighbours/maithripala-sirisena-sworn-in-as-sri-lankas-new-president/
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Robert T. Kiyosaki photo
Wisława Szymborska photo

“I lost a few goddesses while moving south to north
and also some gods while moving east to west.”

Wisława Szymborska (1923–2012) Polish writer

"A Speech at the Lost-and-Found".
Poems New and Collected (1998), Could Have (1972)

Thae Yong-ho photo
George Horne photo
Miriam Makeba photo
Charles Sumner photo

“The Senator from South Carolina has read many books of chivalry, and believes himself a chivalrous knight, with sentiments of honor and courage. Of course he has chosen a mistress to whom he has made his vows, and who, though ugly to others, is always lovely to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight I mean the harlot, Slavery. For her, his tongue is always profuse in words.”

Charles Sumner (1811–1874) American abolitionist and politician

"The Crime against Kansas," speech in the Senate (May 18, 1856). The claims made against Senator Andrew Butler of South Carolina so angered Butler's cousin, Democrat Representative Preston Brooks, that Brooks assaulted Sumner with a cane in the Senate chamber a few weeks later

Sarojini Naidu photo
Stephen Baxter photo
Aurangzeb photo

“By looting, the temples of the South and hunting out buried treasures, Mir Jumla amassed a vast fortune. The huge Hindu idols of copper were brought away in large numbers to be melted and cast into cannon…..”

Aurangzeb (1618–1707) Sixth Mughal Emperor

1661. Koch Bihar (Bengal) , Fathiyya-i-Ibriyya cited by Sarkar, Jadu Nath, History of Aurangzeb, quoted in Goel, S.R. Hindu temples What Happened to them https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.62677/page/n171
Quotes from late medieval histories

Clement Attlee photo
Clement Attlee photo

“In regard to…action in the South Atlantic, we all desire to join in the tribute paid to the gallantry of our sailors. It is one of the almost inevitable conditions of sea warfare that so much of the fighting is done between adversaries of very different strengths, and the way in which our ships, despite their smaller gun-power, tackled and stuck to this very powerful enemy vessel and forced her to take refuge, is worthy of the highest traditions of the British Navy.”

Clement Attlee (1883–1967) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1939/dec/14/the-war#S5CV0355P0_19391214_HOC_265 in the House of Commons (14 December 1939) after the Battle of the River Plate where the German cruiser Admiral Graf Spee was forced to harbour by the Royal Navy
Leader of the Opposition

George William Curtis photo