Do not expect Plato's ideal republic; be satisfied with even the smallest step forward, and consider this no small achievement.
—Marcus Aurelius
The meeting of a customer and a clerk across the service counter in a store is as significant as two leaders of nations meeting over a conference table in search of peace. If peace and understanding is possible, it must occur in the moment that is present. It can occur only when relationship is real and unconditional. Relationship begins with thoughtless awareness, an openness that sees and hears with humility, and a consideration that has already forgiven all things that the mind might present as a barrier to unity.
—Booker Jones
No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.
—Stanislaus Jerzy Lee
For evil to succeed, all it needs is for good men to do nothing.
—Martin Luther King Jr.
What is sacred about all of our lives, even those of us who would never dream of using such a word for it, is that God speaks to us through what happens to us — even through such unpromising events as walking up the road to get the mail out of the mailbox, maybe, or seeing something in the news that brings you up short, or laughing yourself silly with a friend. If skeptics ask to be shown an instance of God speaking to them in their lives, I suggest that they pay closer attention to the next time when, for unaccountable reasons, they find tears in their eyes.
—Frederick Buechner
The more we take the welfare of others to heart and work for their benefit, the more benefit we derive for ourselves. This is a fact we can see. And the more selfish we remain and self-centered, the more selfish our way of life is, the lonelier we feel and the more miserable. This is also a fact we can see.
—14th Dalai Lama
Haven't you ever noticed how highways always get beautiful near the state capital?
—Shirley Ann Grau
America: a country where everything is done to prove life isn't tragic.
—Albert Camus
I look at the politics of this country as a game that is played on the people, this illusion of choice. It's interesting that the important things have been reduced in number: oil companies, communications, pharmaceuticals, insurance, banking, accounting, all these firms have been merged and reduced. The choices are very limited. But if you want a bagel, we've got twenty-six flavors. There are four hundred kinds of mustard in this country. These are the illusions of choice. I don't really think choice is here to any substantive degree.
—George Carlin
If I seem to take part in politics, it is only because politics encircles us today like the coil of a snake from which one cannot get out, no matter how much one tries. I wish therefore to wrestle with the snake.
—Mahatma Gandhi
We estimate the wisdom of nations by seeing what they did with their surplus capital.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson
The great nations have always acted like gangsters, and the small nations like prostitutes.
—Stanley Kubrick
In the era of imperialism, businessmen became politicians and were acclaimed as statesmen, while statesmen were taken seriously only if they talked the language of successful businessmen.
—Hannah Arendt
We first crush people to the earth, and then claim the right of trampling on them forever, because they are prostrate.
—Lydia Maria Child
We have, I fear, confused power with greatness.
—Stewart Udall