Motivational Quotes

Humankind

Man must realize his own unimportance before he can appreciate his importance.

- Baumgardy, R. M.

Best Quotes about Humankind

Human beings, for all their pretensions, have a remarkable propensity for lending themselves to classification somewhere within neatly labeled categories. Even the outrageous exceptions may be classified as outrageous exceptions!

Reichmann, W.J.

We are all cells in the same body of humanity.

Pilgrim, Peace

If man had created man, he would be ashamed of his performance.

Twain, Mark

Mankind is not a circle with a single center but an ellipse with two focal points of which facts are one and ideas the other.

Hugo, Victor

I wish I loved the Human Race; I wish I loved its silly face; I wish I liked the way it walks; I wish I liked the way it talks; And when I'm introduced to one I wish I thought What Jolly Fun!

Raleigh, Sir Walter

There is no doubt: the study of man is just beginning, at the same time that his end is in sight.

Canetti, Elias

The race of man, while sheep in credulity, are wolves for conformity.

Doren, Carl Van

Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil. [Genesis 3:5]

Bible

The human race was always interesting and we know by its past that it will always continue so, monotonously.

Twain, Mark

10.

Humans are amphibians -- half spirit and half animal. As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.

Lewis, C. S.

11.

But remember please, the Law by which we live, we are not built to comprehend a lie, we can neither love nor pity nor forgive. If you make a slip in handling us you die.

Kipling, Rudyard

12.

Mankind is made great or little by its own will.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

13.

The decay of decency in the modern age, the rebellion against law and good faith, the treatment of human beings as things, as the mere instruments of power and ambition, is without a doubt the consequence of the decay of the belief in man as something more than an animal animated by highly conditioned reflexes and chemical reactions. For, unless man is something more than that, he has no rights that anyone is bound to respect, and there are no limitations upon his conduct which he is bound to obey.

Lippmann, Walter

14.

It is well to remember that the entire population of the universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others.

Holmes, John Andrew

15.

Man is a being in search of meaning.

Plato

16.

Cruelty has a Human Heart, And jealousy a Human Face; Terror the Human Form Divine, And secrecy the Human Dress. The Human Dress is forged Iron, The Human Form a Fiery Forge, The Human Face a Furnace seal d, The Human Heart its hungry gorge.

Blake, William

17.

Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

King Jr. Martin Luther

18.

I am human and let nothing human be alien to me.

Terence

19.

Mark how fleeting and paltry is the estate of man--yesterday in embryo, tomorrow a mummy or ashes. So for the hairsbreadth of time assigned to thee, live rationally, and part with life cheerfully, as drops the ripe olive, extolling the season that bore it and the tree that matured it.

Antonius, Marcus

20.

In our civilization, men are afraid that they will not be men enough and women are afraid that they might be considered only women.

Reik, Theodor

21.

The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line.

Mencken, H. L.

22.

When all is done, human life is, at the greatest and the best, but like a froward child, that must be played with and humored a little to keep it quiet till it falls asleep, and then the care is over.

Temple, Sir William

23.

There are two distinctive classes of people today, those who have personal computers, and those who have several thousand extra dollars apiece.

Barry, Dave

24.

Our humanity is a poor thing, except for the divinity that stirs within us.

Bacon, Francis

25.

I sometimes think that God in creating man somewhat overestimated his ability.

Wilde, Oscar

26.

It is peculiar to mankind to transcend mankind.

Schlegel, Friedrich

27.

A human being is a single being. Unique and unrepeatable.

Caddy, Eileen

28.

There are realities we all share, regardless of our nationality, language, or individual tastes. As we need food, so do we need emotional nourishment: love, kindness, appreciation, and support from others. We need to understand our environment and our relationship to it. We need to fulfill certain inner hungers: the need for happiness, for peace of mind for wisdom.

Walters, J. Donald

29.

Man is a substance clad in shadows.

Sterling, John

30.

If the human race wishes to have a prolonged and indefinite period of material prosperity, they have only got to behave in a peaceful and helpful way toward one another

Churchill, Winston

31.

Man is a creature made at the end of the week's work when God was tired.

Twain, Mark

32.

In recognizing the humanity of our fellow beings, we pay ourselves the highest tribute.

Marshall, Thurgood

33.

Humanity is the virtue of a woman, generosity that of a man.

Smith, Adam

34.

The history of mankind is the history of ideas.

Mises, Ludwig Von

35.

I have found little that is good about human beings on the whole. In my experience most of them are trash, no matter whether they publicly subscribe to this or that ethical doctrine or to none at all. That is something that you cannot say aloud, or perhaps even think.

Freud, Sigmund

36.

The course of human history is determined, not by what happens in the skies, but by what takes place in our hearts.

Kent, Sir Arthur

37.

The age of chivalry has gone; the age of humanity has come.

Sumner, Charles

38.

A human being is part of the whole, called by us 'universe,' a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest -- a kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

Einstein, Albert

39.

Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on.

Churchill, Winston

40.

Man is not only a contributory creature, but a total creature; he does not only make one, but he is all; he is not a piece of the world, but the world itself; and next to the glory of God, the reason why there is a world.

Donne, John

41.

What constitutes a real, live human being is more of a mystery than ever these days, and men -- each one of whom is a valuable, unique experiment on the part of nature -- are shot down wholesale.

Hesse, Hermann

42.

People can be divided into two classes: those who go ahead and do something, and those who sit still and inquire,why wasn't it done the other way?

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

43.

We are, to put it mildly, in a mess, and there is a strong chance that we shall have exterminated ourselves by the end of the century. Our only consolation will have to be that, as a species, we have had an exciting term of office.

Morris, Desmond

44.

Man is head, chest and stomach. Each of these animals operates, more often than not, individually. I eat, I feel, I even, although rarely, think. This jungle crawls and teems, is hungry, roars, gets angry, devours itself, and its cacophonic concert does not even stop when you are asleep.

Daumal, Rene

45.

Man must realize his own unimportance before he can appreciate his importance.

Baumgardy, R. M.

46.

One has but to observe a community of beavers at work in a stream to understand the loss in his sagacity, balance, co-operation, competence, and purpose which Man has suffered since he rose up on his hind legs. He began to chatter and he developed Reason, Thought, and Imagination, qualities which would get the smartest group of rabbits or orioles in the world into inextricable trouble overnight.

Thurber, James

47.

The Goddamn human race deserves itself, and as far as I'm concerned it can have it.

Janeway, Elizabeth

48.

Man is more interesting than men. God made him and not them in his image. Each one is more precious than all.

Gide, Andre

49.

I am a member of the rabble in good standing.

Pegler, Westbrook

50.

Humanity I love you because when you're hard up you pawn your intelligence to buy a drink