Motivational Quotes

Humankind

Man only likes to count his troubles, but he does not count his joys.

- Dostoevsky, Fyodor

Best Quotes about Humankind

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

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

Janeway, Elizabeth

There is nothing on earth divine except humanity.

Landor, Walter Savage

The world of men is dreaming, it has gone mad in its sleep, and a snake is strangling it, but it can't wake up.

Lawrence, D. H.

Human affairs are not serious, but they have to be taken seriously.

Murdoch, Iris

Man only likes to count his troubles, but he does not count his joys.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor

We ought to think that we are one of the leaves of a tree, and the tree is all humanity. We cannot live without the others, without the tree.

Casals, Pablo

Man is a substance clad in shadows.

Sterling, John

[Three classes of people]: Those who see. Those who see when they are shown. Those who do not see.

Da Vinci, Leonardo

10.

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

11.

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

12.

The history of mankind is the history of ideas.

Mises, Ludwig Von

13.

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

Twain, Mark

14.

The simplest single-celled organism oscillates to a number of different frequencies, at the atomic, molecular, sub-cellular, and cellular levels. Microscopic movies of these organisms are striking for the ceaseless, rhythmic pulsation that is revealed. In an organism as complex as a human being, the frequencies of oscillation and the interactions between those frequencies are multitudinous.

Leonard, George

15.

It is peculiar to mankind to transcend mankind.

Schlegel, Friedrich

16.

Man is a being in search of meaning.

Plato

17.

Mind and spirit together make up that which separates us from the rest of the animal world, that which enables a man to know the truth and that which enables him to die for the truth.

Hamilton, Edith

18.

Everyone is as God made him, and often a great deal worse.

Cervantes, Miguel De

19.

We cannot despair of humanity, since we ourselves are human beings.

Einstein, Albert

20.

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

21.

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

Canetti, Elias

22.

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

23.

Man... knows only when he is satisfied and when he suffers, and only his sufferings and his satisfactions instruct him concerning himself, teach him what to seek and what to avoid. For the rest, man is a confused creature; he knows not whence he comes or whither he goes, he knows little of the world, and above all, he knows little of himself.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

24.

Being reproached for giving to an unworthy person, Aristotle said, I did not give it to the man, but to humanity.

Johnson

25.

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

Smith, Adam

26.

Those who live in a world of human beings can only retrace their steps.

Sarraute, Nathalie

27.

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

28.

People can be divided into three classes, the few who make things happen, the many who watch things happen, and the overwhelming majority who have no idea what has happened.

29.

Let us ask ourselves; What kind of people do we think we are?

Reagan, Ronald

30.

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly.

Heinlein, Robert

31.

Mankind is made great or little by its own will.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

32.

One of the oldest human needs is having someone wonder where you are when you don't come home at night.

Mead, Margaret

33.

Be tolerant of the human race. Your whole family belongs to it -- and some of your spouse's family does too.

34.

The human race is a zone of living things that should be defined by tracing its confines.

Calvino, Italo

35.

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

Baumgardy, R. M.

36.

Our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal.

Kennedy, John F.

37.

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

Holmes, John Andrew

38.

Mankind are animals that makes bargains, no other animal does this.

Smith, Adam

39.

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

40.

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

41.

Man is a beautiful machine that works very badly.

Mencken, H. L.

42.

There are two kinds of men who never amount to much -- those who cannot do what they are told and those who can do nothing else.

Curtis, Cyrus H. K

43.

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

Bible

44.

To be human is to keep rattling the bars of the cage of existence hollering, What's it for?