Motivational Quotes

Humankind

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

Best Quotes about Humankind

If, presume not to God to scan; The proper study of Mankind is Man. Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state, a being darkly wise, and rudely great.

Pope, Alexander

I am a member of the rabble in good standing.

Pegler, Westbrook

Consider your breed; you were not made to live like beasts, but to follow virtue and knowledge.

Dante Alighieri

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

Always observe how ephemeral and worthless human things are. Pass then through this little space of time conformably to nature, and end thy journey in content, just as an olive falls off when it is ripe, blessing nature who produced it, and thanking the tree on which it grew.

Aurelius, Marcus

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

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

Twain, Mark

The history of mankind is the history of ideas.

Mises, Ludwig Von

If you think that every bad thing that has been done on the face of the earth has been done by man, you're right -- but so has every good thing.

10.

The best security for civilization is the dwelling, and upon properly appointed and becoming dwellings depends, more than anything else, the improvement of mankind.

Disraeli, Benjamin

11.

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

12.

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

13.

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

Bible

14.

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.

15.

Mankind is made great or little by its own will.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

16.

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

17.

God must love the common man, he made so many of them.

Lincoln, Abraham

18.

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

Wilde, Oscar

19.

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

Baumgardy, R. M.

20.

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.

21.

Man's only true happiness is to live in hope of something to be won by him. Reverence something to be worshipped by him, and love something to be cherished by him, forever.

Ruskin, John

22.

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

Sarraute, Nathalie

23.

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

Bacon, Francis

24.

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

Canetti, Elias

25.

If we consider the superiority of the human species, the size of its brain, its powers of thinking, language and organization, we can say this: were there the slightest possibility that another rival or superior species might appear, on earth or elsewhere, man would use every means at his disposal to destroy it.

Baudrillard, Jean

26.

To the eyes of a god, mankind must appear as a species of bacteria which multiply and become progressively virulent whenever they find themselves in a congenial culture, and whose activity diminishes until they disappear completely as soon as proper measures are taken to sterilize them.

Crowley, Aleister

27.

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

Reagan, Ronald

28.

I teach you the Superman. Man is something that should be overcome.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

29.

Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain.

Machiavelli, Niccolo

30.

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

Holmes, John Andrew

31.

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

Mead, Margaret

32.

Of all the ways of defining man, the worst is the one which makes him out to be a rational animal.

France, Anatole

33.

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

Twain, Mark

34.

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

35.

It's funny. All you have to do is say something nobody understands and they'll do practically anything you want them to.

Caulfield, Holden

36.

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

37.

We all live under the same sky, but we don't all have the same horizon.

Adenauer, Konrad

38.

I am not an Athenian, nor a Greek, but a citizen of the world.

Socrates

39.

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

Janeway, Elizabeth

40.

The real man is one who always finds excuses for others, but never excuses himself.

Beecher, Henry Ward

41.

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

Marshall, Thurgood

42.

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

43.

Though man is the only beast that can write, he has small reason to be proud of it. When he utters something that is wise it is nothing that the river horse does not know, and most of his creations are the result of accident.

Dahlberg, Edward

44.

Man is a useless passion.

Sartre, Jean-Paul

45.

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

Murdoch, Iris

46.

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

47.

Man is no longer an artist, he has become a work of art.

Nietzsche, Friedrich

48.

There is nothing on earth divine except humanity.

Landor, Walter Savage

49.

Considered logically this concept is not identical with the totality of sense impressions referred to; but it is an arbitrary creation of the human (or animal) mind.

Einstein, Albert

50.

How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain can experience itself anything less than a god.

Watts, Alan W.