Quotes from Reinhold Niebuhr
There are historic situations in which refusal to defend the inheritance of a civilization, however imperfect, against tyranny and aggression may result in consequences even worse than war.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
If we survive danger, it steels our courage more than anything else.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
All men are naturally included to obscure the morally ambiguous element in their political cause by investing it with religious sanctity.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
Whether the man is an atheist or a Christian, I would judge him by his fruits, and I have therefore many agnostic friends.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
All men who live with any degree of serenity live by some assurance of grace.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
The chief source of man's inhumanity to man seems to be the tribal limits of his sense of obligation to other men.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
It is the evil in man that makes democracy necessary, and man's belief in justice that makes democracy possible.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
Man is endowed by nature with organic relations to his fellow men; and natural impulse prompts him to consider the needs of others even when they compete with his own.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
Men have never been individually self-sufficient.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
Original sin is that thing about man which makes him capable of conceiving of his own perfection and incapable of achieving it.
- Reinhold Niebuhr
What is so funny about us is precisely that we take ourselves too seriously. Laughter is the same and healthy response to the innocent foibles of men; and even to some which are not innocent.
- Reinhold Niebuhr