Motivational Quotes

Humankind

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

- Shaw, George Bernard

Best Quotes about Humankind

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

As the archeology of our thought easily shows, man is an invention of recent date. And one perhaps nearing its end.

Foucault, Michel

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.

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.

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

Rogers, Will

Have you ever watched a crab on the shore crawling backward in search of the Atlantic Ocean, and missing? That's the way the mind of man operates.

Mencken, H. L.

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.

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

Gide, Andre

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

10.

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

Barry, Dave

11.

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

12.

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

13.

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

Nietzsche, Friedrich

14.

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

Twain, Mark

15.

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

Robert, Fulghum

16.

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

17.

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

Socrates

18.

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

19.

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

20.

Man is God's highest present development. He is the latest thing in God.

Butler, Samuel

21.

Man who is he? Too bad, to be the work of God: Too good for the work of chance!

Lessing, Doris

22.

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

23.

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

24.

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

Williams, Tennessee

25.

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

Reagan, Ronald

26.

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

27.

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

28.

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

Steinbeck, John

29.

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

Cervantes, Miguel De

30.

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

Fuller, Buckminster

31.

There is nothing on earth divine except humanity.

Landor, Walter Savage

32.

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

Sumner, Charles

33.

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

34.

Man is a useless passion.

Sartre, Jean-Paul

35.

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

36.

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

Calvino, Italo

37.

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

38.

We are all cells in the same body of humanity.

Pilgrim, Peace

39.

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

Einstein, Albert

40.

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

Adenauer, Konrad

41.

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

Da Vinci, Leonardo

42.

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

43.

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

Shaw, George Bernard

44.

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

Bacon, Francis

45.

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

46.

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

47.

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.

48.

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

Proverb, Turkish

49.

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

Nietzsche, Friedrich

50.

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