Such then is the human state, that to wish greatness for one’s country is to wish harm to one’s neighbors.
—Voltaire, 1764Quotes
“Abroad,” that large home of ruined reputations.
—George Eliot, 1866There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first moment, before a word is spoken.
—Fyodor Dostoevsky, 1866Nationalism is an infantile disease, the measles of mankind.
—Albert Einstein, 1929Do not do unto others as you would that they should do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.
—George Bernard Shaw, 1903To think ill of mankind, and not wish ill to them, is perhaps the highest wisdom and virtue.
—William Hazlitt, 1823We have really everything in common with America nowadays, except, of course, language.
—Oscar Wilde, 1887France has neither winter, summer, nor morals—apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country.
—Mark Twain, 1879Intolerance is evidence of impotence.
—Aleister Crowley, c. 1925This is not a clash between civilizations. It is a clash about civilization.
—Tony Blair, 2006All men naturally hate each other. We have used concupiscence as best we can to make it serve the common good, but this is mere sham and a false image of charity, for essentially it is just hate.
—Blaise Pascal, c. 1655Other nations use “force”; we Britons alone use “might.”
—Evelyn Waugh, 1938