"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle."
— Plato

"A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his 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."
— Albert Einstein

""One love, one heart, one destiny"
"
— Bob Marley

"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other. "
— Mother Teresa

"It is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners."
— Albert Camus

"Until he extends the circle of his compassion to all living things, man will not himself find peace."
— Albert Schweitzer

"I have no idea what's awaiting me, or what will happen when this all ends. For the moment I know this: there are sick people and they need curing."
— Albert Camus (The Stranger)

"Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"Only the development of compassion and understanding for others can bring us the tranquility and happiness we all seek."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"Be compassionate," Morrie whispered. And take responsibility for each other. If we only learned those lessons, this world would be so much better a place."

He took a breath, then added his mantra: "Love each other or die."
— Mitch Albom (Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life's Greatest Lesson)

"If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"A truly compassionate attitude toward others does not change even if they behave negatively or hurt you."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"Compassion is the basis of morality."
— Arthur Schopenhauer

"If everyone in the world sat quietly at the same time, closed their eyes and concentrated as hard as they could on peace and goodwill, all the killing and cruelty in the world would continue. And probably increase."
— George Carlin

"When we are motivated by compassion and wisdom, the results of our actions benefit everyone, not just our individual selves or some immediate convenience. When we are able to recognize and forgive ignorant actions of the past, we gain strength to constructively solve the problems of the present."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist."
— Hélder Câmara

"I have no country to fight for; my country is the earth; I am a citizen of the world. "
— Eugene Debs

"Doing nothing for others is the undoing of ourselves."
— Horace Mann

"For as long as man continues to be the ruthless destroyer of lower living beings, he will never know health or peace. For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seeds of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love."
— Pythagoras

"Your kids require you most of all to love them for who they are, not to spend your whole time trying to correct them."
— Bill Ayers

"Waking up is not a selfish pursuit of happiness, it is a revolutionary stance, from the inside out, for the benefit of all beings in existence."
— Noah Levine

"Compassion is the radicalism of our time."
— Dalai Lama XIV

"'You know what?' said Vimes aloud. 'This is going to be the world's first democratically killed dragon. One man, one stab.'
'Then you've got to stop them. You can't let them kill it!' said Lady Ramkin.
Vimes blinked at her.
'Pardon?' he said.
'It's wounded!'
'Lady, that was the intention, wasn't it? Anyway, it's only stunned,' said Vimes.
'I mean you can't let them kill it like this,' said Lady Ramkin insistently. 'Poor thing!'
'What do you want to do, then?' demanded Vimes, his temper unravelling. 'Give it a strengthening dose of tar oil and a nice comfy basket in front of the stove?'
'It's butchery!'
'Suits me fine!'
'But it's a dragon! It's just doing what a dragon does! It never would have come here if people had left it alone!'
Vimes thought: it was about to eat her, and she can still think like this. He hesitated. Perhaps that did give you the right to an opinion..."
— Terry Pratchett (Guards! Guards!)

"True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. "
— Martin Luther King Jr.

"How strange it is that people of honest feelings and sensibility, who would not take advantage of a man born without arms or legs or eyes--how such people think nothing of abusing a man born with low intelligence. It infuriated me to remember that not too long ago I--like this little boy--had foolishly played the clown (177)."
— Daniel Keyes (Flowers for Algernon)

"Every life deserves a certain amount of dignity, no matter how poor or damaged the shell that carries it. (from "All Over But the Shoutin'")"
— Rick Bragg

""Until he extends his circle of compassion to include all living things, man will not, himself, find peace."

"
— Albert Schweitzer (Animals, Nature and Albert Schweitzer)

"For pain must enter into its glorified life of memory before it can turn into compassion."
— George Eliot (Middlemarch)

"Compassion is the sometimes fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else's skin. It's the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too. "
— Frederick Buechner

"When we know ourselves to be connected to all others, acting compassionately is simply the natural thing to do. "
— Rachel Naomi Remen

"Be kind to people whether they deserve your kindness or not. If your kindness reaches the deserving good for you if your kindness reaches the undeserving take joy in your compassion."
— James Fadiman (Essential Sufism)

"Small is the number of them that see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts."
— Albert Einstein

"Humans have long since possessed the tools for crafting a better world. Where love, compassion, altruism and justice have failed, genetic manipulation will not succeed."
— Gina Maranto (QUEST FOR PERFECTION: The Drive to Breed Better Human Beings)

"Even if toxic people are right about what is "good," they are wrong if the approach is not healthy."
— John L. Lund (How to Hug a Porcupine: Dealing With Toxic & Difficult to Love Personalities)

"The nature of compassion isn't coming to terms with your own suffering and applying it to others: It's knowing that other folks around you suffer and, no matter what happens to you, no matter how lucky or unlucky you are, they keep suffering. And if you can do something about that, then you do it, and you do it without whining or waving your own fuckin' cross for the world to see. You do it because it's the right thing to do.
"
— John Connolly

"The most worth-while thing is to try to put happiness into the lives of others."
— Robert Baden-Powell

""As the pain that can be told is but half a pain, so the pity that questions has little healing in its touch. What Lily craved was the darkness made by enfolding arms, the silence which is not solitutde, but compassion holding its breath."

h/t to wordsmith.org"
— Edith Wharton (The House of Mirth)

"When morality comes up against profit, it is seldom that profit loses."
— Shirley Chisholm

"Years ago I recognized my kinship with all living things, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than
the meanest on the earth. I said then and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it; while there is a criminal element, I am of it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free."
— Eugene V. Debs

"Listening is an attitude of the heart, a genuine desire to be with another which both attracts and heals. (attr to J. Isham)"
— Sura Hart (Respectful Parents, Respectful Kids: 7 Keys to Turn Family Conflict into Cooperation)

"You can't make your kids do anything. All you can do is make them wish they had. And then, they will make you wish you hadn't made them wish they had. "
— Marshall B. Rosenberg

"Compassionate love may be strong. It sobs, it burns, then it wipes away its tears – and it does nothing."
— Alexander Herzen

"As the pain that can be told is but half a pain, so the pity that questions has little healing in its touch. What Lily craved was the darkness made by enfolding arms, the silence which is not solitude, but compassion holding its breath.
h/t wordsmith.org"
— Edith Wharton (The House of Mirth)

"Pardon all runners,
All speechless, alien winds,
All mad waters.

Pardon their impulses,
Their wild attitudes,
Their young flights, their reticence.

When a message has no clothes on
How can it be spoken."
— Thomas Merton

"Those whose hearts are drawn toward compassion
Will never be drawn into the dark and woeful world.
Evil deeds dreaded by the soul will not afflict
The compassionate who foster and protect all life."
— Tirukkural 25: 243-244