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Quotes

Be a good animal, true to your animal instincts.

—D.H. Lawrence, 1911

The elephant, although a gross beast, is yet the most decent and most sensible of any other upon earth. Although he never changes his female, and hath so tender a love for her whom he hath chosen, yet he never couples with her but at the end of every three years, and then only for the space of five days.

—St. Francis de Sales, 1609

Man is no man, but a wolf, to a stranger.

—Plautus, c. 200 BC

We call them dumb animals, and so they are, for they cannot tell us how they feel, but they do not suffer less because they have no words.

—Anna Sewell, 1877

Man is the only animal that can remain on friendly terms with the victims he intends to eat until he eats them.

—Samuel Butler, c. 1890

Man and animals are really the conduit of food, the sepulcher of animals, and resting place of the dead, one causing the death of the other, making themselves the covering for the corruption of other dead bodies.

—Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1500

Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve and from which he cannot escape.

—Erich Fromm, 1947

Animals are in possession of themselves; their soul is in possession of their body. But they have no right to their life, because they do not will it. 

—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, 1821

Man is merely a more perfect animal than the rest. He reasons better.

—Napoleon Bonaparte, 1816

Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends.

—Alexander Pope, 1709

An ape will be an ape, though clad in purple.

—Erasmus, 1511

Alas! We are ridiculous animals.

—Horace Walpole, 1777

Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It’s what separates us from the animals—except the weasel.

—The Simpsons, 1993