“A civilized society is one which tolerates eccentricity to the point of doubtful sanity.”
Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet
“A civilized society is one which tolerates eccentricity to the point of doubtful sanity.”
Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet
“I have seen gross intolerance shown in support of tolerance.”
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English poet, literary critic and philosopher
Aung San Suu Kyi (1945) State Counsellor of Myanmar and Leader of the National League for Democracy
Opening Keynote Address at NGO Forum on Women, Beijing China (1995)
Context: This year is the International Year for Tolerance. The United Nations has recognized that "tolerance, human rights, democracy and peace are closely related. Without tolerance, the foundations form democracy and respect for human rights cannot be strengthened, and the achievement of peace will remain elusive." My own experience during the years I have been engaged in the democracy movement of Burma has convinced me of the need to emphasize the positive aspect of tolerance. It is not enough simply to "live and let live": genuine tolerance requires an active effort to try to understand the point of view of others; it implies broad-mindedness and vision, as well as confidence in one's own ability to meet new challenges without resorting to intransigence or violence. In societies where men are truly confident of their own worth women are not merely "tolerated", they are valued. Their opinions are listened to with respect, they are given their rightful place in shaping the society in which they live.
Joel Salatin (1957) American environmentalist
Source: Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal: War Stories from the Local Food Front
Garrison Keillor (1942) American radio host and writer
"Cowboy Librarians" (13 December 1997)
A Prairie Home Companion
Source: Dusty and Lefty: The Lives of the Cowboys
“Christians are hard to tolerate; I don’t know how Jesus does it”
Bono (1960) Irish rock musician, singer of U2
“Black literature is taught as sociology, as tolerance, not as a serious, rigorous art form.”
Toni Morrison (1931–2019) American writer
Sherry Argov (1977) American writer
Source: Why Men Love Bitches: From Doormat to Dreamgirl—A Woman's Guide to Holding Her Own in a Relationship
Kay Redfield Jamison (1946) American bipolar disorder researcher
Source: An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness
“All I require of a religion is that it be tolerant of those who do not agree with it.”
Roger Ebert (1942–2013) American film critic, author, journalist, and TV presenter
Source: Life Itself : A Memoir (2011), Ch. 55 : Go Gently
Context: Raised as a Roman Catholic, I internalized the social values of that faith and still hold most of them, even though its theology no longer persuades me. I have no quarrel with what anyone else subscribes to; everyone deals with these things in his own way, and I have no truths to impart. All I require of a religion is that it be tolerant of those who do not agree with it. I know a priest whose eyes twinkle when he says, “You go about God’s work in your way, and I’ll go about it in His.”
“There is an incessant influx of novelty into the world, and yet we tolerate incredible dullness.”
Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist
Stephen Fry (1957) English comedian, actor, writer, presenter, and activist
"Trefusis Blasphemes" radio broadcast, as published in Paperweight (1993)
1990s
Context: I am a lover of truth, a worshipper of freedom, a celebrant at the altar of language and purity and tolerance. That is my religion, and every day I am sorely, grossly, heinously and deeply offended, wounded, mortified and injured by a thousand different blasphemies against it. When the fundamental canons of truth, honesty, compassion and decency are hourly assaulted by fatuous bishops, pompous, illiberal and ignorant priests, politicians and prelates, sanctimonious censors, self-appointed moralists and busy-bodies, what recourse of ancient laws have I? None whatever. Nor would I ask for any. For unlike these blistering imbeciles my belief in my religion is strong and I know that lies will always fail and indecency and intolerance will always perish.
Dale Carnegie (1888–1955) American writer and lecturer
Source: How to Win Friends & Influence People
“When you make a world tolerable for yourself, you make a world tolerable for others.”
Anaïs Nin (1903–1977) writer of novels, short stories, and erotica
February 1954 The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 5 as quoted in Woman as Writer (1978) by Jeannette L. Webber and Joan Grumman, p. 38
Diary entries (1914 - 1974)
Context: The artist is the only one who knows that the world is a subjective creation, that there is a choice to be made, a selection of elements. It is a materialization, an incarnation of his inner world. Then he hopes to attract others into it. He hopes to impose his particular vision and share it with others. And when the second stage is not reached, the brave artist continues nevertheless. The few moments of communion with the world are worth the pain, for it is a world for others, an inheritance for others, a gift to others, in the end. When you make a world tolerable for yourself, you make a world tolerable for others.
We also write to heighten our own awareness of life. We write to lure and enchant and console others. We write to serenade our lovers. We write to taste life twice, in the moment, and in retrospection. We write, like Proust, to render all of it eternal, and to persuade ourselves that it is eternal. We write to be able to transcend our life, to reach beyond it. We write to teach ourselves to speak with others, to record the journey into the labyrinth. We write to expand our world when we feel strangled, or constricted, or lonely. We write as the birds sing, as the primitives dance their rituals. If you do not breathe through writing, if you do not cry out in writing, or sing in writing, then don't write, because our culture has no use for it. When I don't write, I feel my world shrinking. I feel I am in a prison. I feel I lose my fire and my color. It should be a necessity, as the sea needs to heave, and I call it breathing.
“Neurosis is the inability to tolerate ambiguity”
Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis
“We're raising children who have little tolerance for disappointment”
Brené Brown (1965) US writer and professor
Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826) 3rd President of the United States of America
1800s, First Inaugural Address (1801)
Source: The Inaugural Speeches and Messages of Thomas Jefferson, Esq.: Late President of the United States: Together with the Inaugural Speech of James Madison, Esq. ...
Leslie Stephen (1832–1904) British author, literary critic, and first editor of the Dictionary of National Biography
The Nineteenth Century, vol. 13 (1883) p. 665
“We should not permit tolerance to degenerate into indifference.”
Margaret Chase Smith (1897–1995) Member of the United States Senate from Maine
from an undated speech on Civil Rights; as cited in Hope and Fear in Margaret Chase Smith’s America, Gregory P. Gallant, Lexington Books (2014), p. 309 : ISBN 0739179861
Firuz Shah Tughlaq (1309–1388) Tughluq sultan
Delhi and Environs , Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. Elliot and Dowson. Vol. III, p. 380-81
Quotes from the Futuhat-i-Firuz Shahi
Kathleen M. Eisenhardt American economist
Source: "Control: Organizational and economic approaches," 1985, p. 135
Gerard Batten (1954) British politician
Islamic fundamentalism is incompatible with freedom and Western liberal democracy https://web.archive.org/web/20070927174923/http://www.tfa.net/pdfs/60610.pdf (2006) <br class="br">2006
Aron Ra (1962) Aron Ra is an atheist activist and the host of the Ra-Men Podcast
"4th Foundational Falsehood of Creationism" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80nhqGfN6t8, Youtube (December 25, 2007) <br class="br">Youtube, Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism
Jacques Ozanam (1640–1718) French mathematician
Preface
A Mathematical Dictionary: Or; A Compendious Explication of All Mathematical Terms, 1702
Jeremy Clarkson (1960) English broadcaster, journalist and writer
Source: For Crying Out Loud! The World According to Clarkson Volume Three (2008), p. 17
Donald Barthelme (1931–1989) American writer, editor, and professor
“I was paraphrasing what Mark Schorer said about Sinclair Lewis,” Bruce replied.
“The Joker’s Greatest Triumph”.
Come Back, Dr. Caligari (1964)
Theodore Sturgeon book Venus Plus X
Section 43 (pp. 131-132)
Venus Plus X (1960)
Antonin Scalia (1936–2016) former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
Board of Ed. of Kiryas Joel v. Grumet (1994) (dissenting) (citations and some internal quotation marks omitted).
1990s
Francis Pharcellus Church Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus (1897)
Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Speech https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1938/oct/05/policy-of-his-majestys-government#column_365 in the House of Commons (5 October 1938) against the Munich Agreement <br class="br">The 1930s
Robert Hunter (author) (1874–1942) American sociologist, author, golf course architect
Description of Nicholas in Tolstoy's "The Light Shines in Darkness."
Source: Why We Fail as Christians (1919), p. 43
John Brunner book The Sheep Look Up
January “SNOW JOB”
The Sheep Look Up (1972)
Aga Khan IV (1936) 49th and current Imam of Nizari Ismailism
Remarks by His Highness the Aga Khan at Évora University, Évora, Portugal (12 February 2006)]
“We need tolerant men. We must all give in a little.”
William Mulock (1843–1944) Canadian politician, judge, academic administrator
[Criticism Written Without Knowledge, The Newmarket Era, Newmarket, Ontario, 1, 31 July 1941, http://news.ourontario.ca/newmarket/115804/page/2]
Leo Strauss (1899–1973) Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism
Source: Natural Right and History (1953), p. 6
Anthony Kennedy (1936) Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=505&invol=833 (29 June 1992) (joint opinion coauthored with Justices Souter and O’Connor).
Bernard Cornwell (1944) British writer
Colonel Hector McCandless, on the Tippo Sultan, p. 300
Sharpe (Novel Series), Sharpe's Tiger (1997)
Abdel Fattah el-Sisi (1954) Current President of Egypt
Remarks by el-Sisi during celebrating the night of El-Kadr on 25 July 2014 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6d_ln9MQHk. <br class="br">2014
Zabel Yesayan (1878–1943) Armenian writer
"Pagavan E : Zabel Yesayan'ın Barış Çağrısını Duyabilmek"] ["Enough! : Being Able to Hear Zabel Yesayan's Call for Peace"] by Melissa Bilal, in Kültür ve Siyasette Feminist Yaklaşımlar [Feminist Approaches in Culture and Politics], Issue 7 (March 2009)
Thomas Young (scientist) (1773–1829) English polymath
Preface
A Course of Lectures on Natural Philosophy and the Mechanical Arts (1807)
Jennifer Beals (1963) American actress and a former teen model
Interview on AfterEllen.com (3 June 2010) http://archive.is/20130628093754/http://www.afterellen.com/people/2010/6/jennifer-beals-interview?page=0,1
Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) African American boxer, philanthropist and activist
When asked how he felt about the suspects in the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks sharing his Islamic faith <br class="br">As quoted in "Bush: 'Justice Will Be Done'" at CNN (20 September 2001) http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/09/20/gen.america.under.attack/
Dinesh D'Souza (1961) Indian-American political commentator, filmmaker, author
Source: Books, What's So Great About America (2003), Ch. 6: America the Beautiful
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888–1975) Indian philosopher and statesman who was the first Vice President and the second President of India
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States
2000s, 2004, Speech to United Nations General Assembly (September 2004)
Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist
History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (1996)
Hillary Clinton (1947) American politician, senator, Secretary of State, First Lady
Presidential campaign (April 12, 2015 – 2016), (July 28, 2016)
“I really don't have a problem with gay marriage… because I'm tolerant and rational.”
David Cross (1964) American comedian, writer and actor
The Last Laugh 2005
Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution
Nikola" here is St. Nickolas' Day, as quoted in Autopsy for an Empire (1998) by Dmitri Volkogonov, p. 74.
Attributions
Ilana Mercer South African writer
"No Wonder the Pols Think Businessman Trump’s Crazy; He Understands Scarcity," http://www.unz.com/imercer/no-wonder-the-pols-think-businessman-trumps-crazy-he-understands-scarcity/ The Unz Review, December 11, 2015. <br class="br">2010s, 2015
Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist
History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (1996)
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America
Source: 1962, Cuban Missile Crisis speech
Adam Smith (1723–1790) Scottish moral philosopher and political economist
Source: (1776), Book II, Chapter I, p. 313 (see opportunity cost).
George Moore (novelist) (1852–1933) Irish novelist, short-story writer, poet, art critic, memoirist and dramatist
Source: Confessions of a Young Man http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12278/12278-h/12278-h.htm (1886), Ch. 16.
David Horowitz (1939) Neoconservative activist, writer
[David, Horowitz, http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/horowitz.html, "Lebanon is not Innocent", jewishworldreview.com, July 24, 2006, 2010-01-04]
2006
Thomas Pynchon book Gravity's Rainbow
Gravity's Rainbow (1973)
Baba Hari Dass (1923–2018) master yogi, author, builder, commentator of Indian spiritual tradition
165
Silence Speaks, from the chalkboard of Baba Hari Dass, 1977
John Gray (1948) British philosopher
In the Puppet Theatre: Dark mirrors, Hidden Angels and an Algorithmic Prayer-Wheel (p. 99)
The Soul of the Marionette: A Short Enquiry into Human Freedom (2015)
Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist
What happens to Western values if no one stands up against Islam? http://nypost.com/2015/01/11/what-happens-to-western-values-if-no-one-stands-up-against-islam/, New York Post (January 11, 2015). <br class="br">New York Post
Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist
History of Heroic Hindu Resistance to Early Muslim Invaders (1984; 2001)
Mark Satin (1946) American political theorist, author, and newsletter publisher
I am afraid to go on and say what I don't like about socialism. ...
Pages 93–94. It's the spring of 1965. Satin had dropped out of college to become a volunteer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Holly Springs, Mississippi. The meeting above had been called by SNCC to explore SNCC workers' views.
Confessions of a Young Exile (1976)
James Bovard (1956) American journalist
From The Bush Betrayal (Palgrave, 2004) http://www.jimbovard.com/Epigram%20page%20Bush%20Betrayal.htm
Alfred Rosenberg (1893–1946) German architect and politician
"The Russian-Jewish Revolution", Auf Gut Deutsch magazine, February 1919. Quoted in Roderick Stackelberg, Sally A. Winkle, The Nazi Germany Sourcebook: An Anthology of Texts. Routledge, 2013 (p.50). Also in Barbara Miller Lane and Leila J. Rupp, Nazi Ideology Before 1933: A Documentation. University of Texas Press, 2014 (p.12).
Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor
Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995)
Shah Waliullah Dehlawi (1703–1762) Indian muslim scholar
To Taj Muhammad Khan Baluch Translated from the Urdu version of K.A. Nizami, Shãh Walîullah Dehlvî ke Siyãsî Maktûbãt, Second Edition, Delhi, 1969, pp. 150-51.
From his letters
Dorothy Thompson (1893–1961) American journalist and radio broadcaster
Source: "Let the Record Speak" 1939, p. 136 (newspaper column: “Write it Down,” February 18, 1938)
Nayef Al-Rodhan (1959) philosopher, neuroscientist, geostrategist, and author
Source: The Role of Education in Global Security (2007), p.105
Arthur Scargill (1938) British trade unionist
Interview (12 May 1983), quoted in Paul Routledge, "Tories likened to Nazis", The Times (13 May 1983), p. 1
Laisenia Qarase (1941) Prime Minister of Fiji
Additional remarks about the proposed Reconciliation and Unity Commission, Response to continuing opposition to the Reconciliation, Tolerance, and Unity Bill, 30 July 2005
C. N. R. Rao (1934) Indian chemist
[R. A. Mashelkar, Solid State Chemistry: Selected Papers of C N R Rao, http://books.google.com/books?id=8ZSfo_HUk7oC&pg=PA4, 28 February 1995, World Scientific, 978-981-279-589-2, 4]
George Wallace (1919–1998) 45th Governor of Alabama
First gubernatorial campaign (14 February 1958), quoted in George Wallace: American Populist (1995) by Stephen Lesher
1950s
Ram Gopal (1925) Indian author and historian
The sufis were working not only as the spies of Islamic imperialism but also as deceivers of gullible Hindu masses.
Quoted from S.R. Goel, (1994) Heroic Hindu resistance to Muslim invaders, 636 AD to 1206 AD.
Indian Resistance to Early Muslim Invaders Upto 1206 A.D.
Kingsley Amis book Take a Girl Like You
Source: Take a Girl Like You (1960), Ch. 17
Sita Ram Goel (1921–2003) Indian activist
Hindu Temples – What Happened to Them, Volume II (1993)
Pope Alexander VI (1431–1503) pope of the Catholic Church 1492-1503
Report of the Ferrarese ambassador, Beltrando Costabili to Ercole I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, February 1, 1502. Archives of Modena: As quoted in History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages (1900), Ferdinand Gregorovius, George Bell & Sons, London, Volume 7, Part 2 (1497-1503), p. 486. http://books.google.com/books?id=kW1OAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA486&dq=%22often+told+him+that+Rome+is+a+free+city%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=PQRlUeiiBIPA9QT4s4H4CA&ved=0CC4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=%22often%20told%20him%20that%20Rome%20is%20a%20free%20city%22&f=false See also L. Pastor, History of the Popes, vol.6, p. 12. http://books.google.com/books?id=hk1DAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA112&dq=%22told+him+that+Rome+is+a+free+city%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ojZlUeS7Dob49QTTn4HQBw&ved=0CEUQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=%22told%20him%20that%20Rome%20is%20a%20free%20city%22&f=false. (Commonweal writes: “Whatever his faults, the Pope appears to have been of a forgiving and clement disposition, pardoning foes when he had them in his power, and becoming reconciled with those who had bitterly opposed him. With Savonarola — pulpit methods, by the way, were scarcely as novel and extraordinary then as our author (Peter de Roo) thinks — Alexander VI dealt on the whole rather patiently, more so, indeed, than our author, who is hardly fair to the friar.” -- Commonweal (1924), Commonweal Publishing Company, volume 1, p. 185. https://www.google.com/search?tbm=bks&hl=en&q=Whatever+his+faults%2C+the+Pope+appears+to+have+been+of+a+forgiving+and+clement+disposition&btnG=#hl=en&tbm=bks&sclient=psy-ab&q=%22Whatever+his+faults%2C+the+Pope+appears+to+have+been+of+a+forgiving+and+clement+disposition%22&oq=%22Whatever+his+faults%2C+the+Pope+appears+to+have+been+of+a+forgiving+and+clement+disposition%22&gs_l=serp.3...1287.1287.1.1562.1.1.0.0.0.0.79.79.1.1.0...0.0...1c.1.8.psy-ab.VnzmdIrn1SQ&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_qf.&bvm=bv.44990110,d.eWU&fp=5b7686e7449457e7&biw=1294&bih=770)
Isaac Bonewits (1949–2010) Neopagan leader, author, and neo-druid priest
Understanding the Religious Reich (1990; 2005) http://www.neopagan.net/ReligiousReich.html.