Quotes about Humanity

shall pass this way but once; any good, therefore, that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.

Love the earth and sun and animals, Despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, Stand up for the stupid and crazy, Devote your income and labor to others... And your very flesh shall be a great poem.

Why should I wish to see God better than this day? I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then, In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass; I find letters from God dropped in the street, and every one is signed by God's name, And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.

Of Equality--as if it harm'd me, giving others the same chances and rights as myself--as if it were not indispensable to my own rights that others possess the same.

I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash'd babe, and am not contained between my hat and my boots

To be in any form, what is that? (round and round we go, all of us, and ever come back thither,) If nothing lay more develop'd the quahung in it's callous shell were enough. Mine is no callous shell. I have instant conductors all over me whether I pass or stop, they seize every object and lead it harmlessly through me. I merely stir, press, feel with my fingers, and I am happy, to touch my person to someone else's is about as much as I can stand.

And I know that the hand of God is the elderhand of my own, And I know that the spirit of God is the eldest brother of my own, And that all the men ever born are also my brothers… and the women my sisters and lovers

I do not snivel that snivel the world over, That months are vacuums and the ground but wallow and filth, That life is a suck and a sell, and nothing remains at the end but threadbare crape and tears.

What is a man anyhow? what am I? what are you?

He sees eternity in men and women, he does not see men and women as dreams or dots.

The chief trait of any given poet is always the spirit he brings to the observation of Humanity and Nature—the mood out of which he contemplates his subjects.

This is no book; Who touches this, touches a man; (Is it night? Are we here alone?) It is I you hold, and who holds you; I spring from the pages into your arms...