Motivational Quotes

Humankind

Man is a being in search of meaning.

- Plato

Best Quotes about Humankind

I would suggest that barbarism be considered as a permanent and universal human characteristic which becomes more or less pronounced according to the play of circumstances.

Weil, Simone

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.

Man is harder than iron, stronger than stone and more fragile than a rose.

Proverb, Turkish

As far as many statistical series that are related to activities of mankind are concerned, the date that divides human history into two equal parts is well within living memory. The world of today is as different from the world I was born in as that world was from Julius Caesar s. I was born in the middle of human history, to date, roughly. Almost as much has happened since I was born as happened before.

Boulding, Kenneth Ewart

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

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

We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims.

Fuller, Buckminster

We say nothing essential about the cathedral when we speak of its stones. We say nothing essential about Man when we seek to define him by the qualities of men.

Saint-Exupery, Antoine De

Man is a beautiful machine that works very badly.

Mencken, H. L.

10.

An effective human being is a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.

Rolf, Ida P.

11.

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

Mead, Margaret

12.

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

13.

It's great to be great, but it's greater to be human.

Rogers, Will

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.

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

16.

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

Doren, Carl Van

17.

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

Nietzsche, Friedrich

18.

No man really knows about other human beings. The best he can do is to suppose that they are like himself.

Steinbeck, John

19.

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

Reagan, Ronald

20.

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

Cummings, E.E. (Edward. E.)

21.

Out of timber so crooked as that from which man is made nothing entirely straight can be carved.

Kant, Immanuel

22.

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

Bacon, Francis

23.

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

Sarraute, Nathalie

24.

The true grandeur of humanity is in moral elevation, sustained, enlightened and decorated by the intellect of man.

Sumner, Charles

25.

Human beings are the only animals of which I am thoroughly and cravenly afraid.

Shaw, George Bernard

26.

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.

27.

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.

28.

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

Dante Alighieri

29.

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

Twain, Mark

30.

I am a member of the rabble in good standing.

Pegler, Westbrook

31.

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

Da Vinci, Leonardo

32.

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

Smith, Adam

33.

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

34.

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.

35.

Man, became man through work, who stepped out of the animal kingdom as transformer of the natural into the artificial, who became therefore the magician, man the creator of social reality, will always stay the great magician, will always be Prometheus bringing fire from heaven to earth, will always be Orpheus enthralling nature with his music. Not until humanity itself dies will art die.

Fischer, Ernst

36.

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

Baumgardy, R. M.

37.

We're all of us guinea pigs in the laboratory of God. Humanity is just a work in progress.

Williams, Tennessee

38.

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

Socrates

39.

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

Nietzsche, Friedrich

40.

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

Einstein, Albert

41.

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

42.

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

43.

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

44.

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

45.

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.

46.

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

Dostoevsky, Fyodor

47.

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

48.

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

49.

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.

50.

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