Quotes and Sayings about Sympathy

"A crowd always thinks with its sympathy, never with its reason."
- William R. Alger
(Related: Sympathy, Reason)

"Sympathy is the first condition of criticism."
- Henri Frederic Amiel
(Related: Sympathy, Criticism, First)

"There's a certain amount of sympathy here for the Bush administration's problem, which is they would like to get rid of Saddam Hussein and they would like to have the Kurds autonomous."
- Les Aspin
(Related: Sympathy)

"The humanitarian lays stress almost solely upon breadth of knowledge and sympathy."
- Irving Babbitt
(Related: Sympathy, Knowledge, Stress)

"The true humanist maintains a just balance between sympathy and selection."
- Irving Babbitt
(Related: Sympathy, Balance)

"A person who has sympathy for mankind in the lump, faith in its future progress, and desire to serve the great cause of this progress, should be called not a humanist, but a humanitarian, and his creed may be designated as humanitarianism."
- Irving Babbitt
(Related: Faith, Sympathy, Progress, Cause, Desire, Future, Mankind, May)

"You will find that the woman who is really kind to dogs is always one who has failed to inspire sympathy in men."
- Max Beerbohm
(Related: Men, Sympathy, Dogs, Will, Woman)

"I would rather be kept alive in the efficient if cold altruism of a large hospital than expire in a gush of warm sympathy in a small one."
- Aneurin Bevan
(Related: Sympathy, Altruism)

"Criticism in the universities, I'll have to admit, has entered a phase where I am totally out of sympathy with 95% of what goes on. It's Stalinism without Stalin."
- Harold Bloom
(Related: Sympathy, Criticism)

"I learnt pity, sympathy, and what it was like to be at the other end of the stick. Such lessons can't be learnt in lecture halls."
- Lionel Blue
(Related: Sympathy, End, Pity)

"It is only after one is in trouble that one realizes how little sympathy and kindness there are in the world."
- Nellie Bly
(Related: Sympathy, Kindness, Trouble, World)

"It is by a wise economy of nature that those who suffer without change, and whom no one can help, become uninteresting. Yet so it may happen that those who need sympathy the most often attract it the least."
- F. H. Bradley
(Related: Nature, Change, Sympathy, Economy, Help, May)

"I have nothing but sympathy for the people who are forced to work with me. I'm better now at picking out those that want to play that game with me, and those that don't."
- Alton Brown
(Related: Work, Sympathy, People, Nothing, Now, Play, Want)

"Autumn wins you best by this its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay."
- Robert Browning
(Related: Sympathy, Autumn)

"I want the municipality to be a helping hand to the man with a desire of sympathy, to help the fallen when it is not in their power to help themselves."
- John Burns
(Related: Power, Sympathy, Desire, Help, Man, Want)

"Although I'm Australian, I find myself much more in sympathy with the Austrian version!"
- David Chalmers
(Related: Sympathy)

"The rule of friendship means there should be mutual sympathy between them, each supplying what the other lacks and trying to benefit the other, always using friendly and sincere words."
- Marcus Tullius Cicero
(Related: Friendship, Sympathy, Trying, Words)

"A creative element is surely present in all great systems, and it does not seem possible that all sympathy or fundamental attitudes of will can be entirely eliminated from any human philosophy."
- Morris Raphael Cohen
(Related: Sympathy, Philosophy, Present, Will)

"Sympathy constitutes friendship; but in love there is a sort of antipathy, or opposing passion. Each strives to be the other, and both together make up one whole."
- Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(Related: Love, Sympathy, Friendship, Passion)

"All sympathy not consistent with acknowledged virtue is but disguised selfishness."
- Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(Related: Sympathy, Virtue, Selfishness)

"Reasoned arguments and suggestions which make allowance for the full difficulties of the state of war that exists may help, and will always be listened to with respect and sympathy."
- Stafford Cripps
(Related: War, Sympathy, Arguments, Difficulties, Help, May, Respect, State, Will)

"We must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living."
- Davy Crockett
(Related: Sympathy, Act, Balance, Injustice, Living, Respect)

"Teetotallers lack the sympathy and generosity of men that drink."
- W. H. Davies
(Related: Men, Sympathy, Generosity)

"I believe that we must reach our brother, never toning down our fundamental oppositions, but meeting him when he asks to be met, with a reason for the faith that is in us, as well as with a loving sympathy for them as brothers."
- Dorothy Day
(Related: Faith, Brother, Sympathy, Brothers, Meeting, Reason)

"Two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy; who are as ignorant of each other's habits, thoughts, and feelings, as if they were dwellers in different zones, or inhabitants of different planets. The rich and the poor."
- Benjamin Disraeli
(Related: Sympathy, Feelings, Thoughts, Habits, Nations, Poor)

"IT is mere coincidence that Cooper was born in the year which produced The Power of Sympathy and that when he died Uncle Tom's Cabin was passing through its serial stage, and yet the limits of his life mark almost exactly the first great period of American fiction."
- Carl Clinton Van Doren
(Related: Life, Power, Sympathy, American, Fiction, First, Limits)

"Marriage must be a relation either of sympathy or of conquest."
- George Eliot
(Related: Marriage, Sympathy, Conquest)

"If men and women are to understand each other, to enter into each other's nature with mutual sympathy, and to become capable of genuine comradeship, the foundation must be laid in youth."
- Henry Ellis
(Related: Men, Nature, Women, Sympathy, Youth)

"Sympathy for victims is always counter-balanced by an equal and opposite feeling of resentment towards them."
- Ben Elton
(Related: Sympathy, Feeling, Resentment, Victims)

"Sympathy is something that shouldn't be bestowed upon the Yankees. Apparently it angers them."
- Bob Feller
(Related: Sympathy)

"The more sympathy you give, the less you need."
- Malcolm Forbes
(Related: Sympathy)

"September 11th was a moment when America had the sympathy of the world."
- Tom Ford
(Related: Sympathy, America, World)

"Our sympathy is cold to the relation of distant misery."
- Edward Gibbon
(Related: Sympathy, Misery)

"There should be a sympathy with freedom, a desire to give it scope, founded not upon visionary ideas, but upon the long experience of many generations within the shores of this happy isle, that in freedom you lay the firmest foundations both of loyalty and order."
- William E. Gladstone
(Related: Experience, Sympathy, Ideas, Desire, Freedom, Generations, Loyalty, Order)

"No one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy, the kindness and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure."
- Emma Goldman
(Related: Education, Sympathy, Soul, Wealth, Effort, Generosity, Kindness, Treasure)

"There's no greater way to gain an audience's sympathy than by being unfortunate."
- Seth Green
(Related: Sympathy, Being, Gain)

"Women ought to feel a peculiar sympathy in the colored man's wrong, for, like him, she has been accused of mental inferiority, and denied the privileges of a liberal education."
- Angelina Grimke
(Related: Education, Women, Sympathy, Inferiority, Liberal, Man, Wrong)

"I am the son of a small and far-away nation and the other laureates have all come from different countries from all over the world and we all were equally received here with signs of sympathy."
- Albert Szent Gyorgyi
(Related: Son, Sympathy, Countries, Nation, World)

"More negatives write than call. It's a cheap shot for me to go on the air with the critical letters or E-mail I get because the reaction of the listeners is always an instantaneous expression of sympathy for me and contempt for the poor critic."
- John Hall
(Related: Sympathy, Contempt, Expression, Letters, Poor)

"Autumn wins you best by this, its mute Appeal to sympathy for its decay."
- Robert Browning Hamilton
(Related: Sympathy, Autumn)

"Motherhood is at its best when the tender chords of sympathy have been touched."
- Paul Harris
(Related: Sympathy, Motherhood)

"Sympathy with nature is part of a good person's religion."
- Francis Herbert Hedge
(Related: Nature, Religion, Sympathy)

"It's hard for me to think of others because I'm not particularly in sympathy with the music of this century."
- Alan Hovhaness
(Related: Music, Sympathy)

"Captain Hale, alone, without sympathy or support, save that from above, on the near approach of death asked for a clergyman to attend him. It was refused. He then requested a Bible; that too was refused by his inhuman jailer."
- William Hull
(Related: Death, Sympathy, Bible, Support)

"I take people very seriously. People are all I take seriously, in fact. Therefore, I have nothing but sympathy for how people behave - and nothing but laughter to console them with."
- John Irving
(Related: Sympathy, People, Fact, Laughter, Nothing)

"Both tears and sweat are salty, but they render a different result. Tears will get you sympathy; sweat will get you change."
- Jesse Jackson
(Related: Change, Sympathy, Result, Tears, Will)

"The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community."
- William James
(Related: Sympathy, Community)

"It is in our faults and failings, not in our virtues, that we touch each other, and find sympathy. It is in our follies that we are one."
- Jerome K. Jerome
(Related: Sympathy, Faults)

"I have a theory because I was being beaten up a lot by people outside of school, it was almost like if I could make myself sick enough they'd take sympathy on me."
- Daniel Johns
(Related: Sympathy, People, Being, School, Theory)

"Children, even infants, are capable of sympathy. But only after adolescence are we capable of compassion."
- Louise J. Kaplan
(Related: Sympathy, Adolescence, Children, Compassion)

"California must be all American or all Chinese. We are resolved that it shall be American, and are prepared to make it so. May we not rely upon your sympathy and assistance?"
- Denis Kearney
(Related: Sympathy, American, May)

"Pity may represent little more than the impersonal concern which prompts the mailing of a check, but true sympathy is the personal concern which demands the giving of one's soul."
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
(Related: Sympathy, Soul, Concern, Giving, May, Pity)

"We were united not only by political respect for each other, but also by deep mutual sympathy as people."
- Helmut Kohl
(Related: Sympathy, People, Deep, Respect, United)

"Sympathy is charming, but it does not make up for pain."
- Lillie Langtry
(Related: Sympathy, Pain)

"Recognition of belligerency as an expression of sympathy is all very well."
- Henry Cabot Lodge
(Related: Sympathy, Expression)

"Badges mean nothing in themselves, but they mark a certain achievement and they are a link between the rich and the poor. For when one girl sees a badge on a sister Scout's arm, if that girl has won the same badge, it at once awakens an interest and sympathy between them."
- Juliette G. Low
(Related: Sister, Sympathy, Achievement, Interest, Nothing, Poor)

"When we are out of sympathy with the young, then I think our work in this world is over."
- George MacDonald
(Related: Work, Sympathy, World)

"I'm in total sympathy with Dick Smith's sentiments; I only wish there were grounds for saying we Australians would never tolerate such appalling treatment of refugees being carried out in our name."
- Hugh Mackay
(Related: Sympathy, Being, Name, Saying, Treatment)

"My guitar was loud as hell, and I had no sympathy for anybody else."
- Brownie McGhee
(Related: Sympathy, Guitar, Hell)

"They weren't impatient for the boys to turn into cartoons again. They awarded sympathy, gave compassion. Because deep down they had found parts of themselves in the characters. You said it George."
- Audrey Meadows
(Related: Sympathy, Boys, Cartoons, Compassion, Deep)

"You are 27 or 28 right? It is very tough to live at that age. When nothing is sure. I have sympathy with you."
- Haruki Murakami
(Related: Age, Sympathy, Nothing, Right)

"Women have no sympathy and my experience of women is almost as large as Europe."
- Florence Nightingale
(Related: Experience, Women, Sympathy, Europe)

"We do not learn by inference and deduction and the application of mathematics to philosophy, but by direct intercourse and sympathy."
- Richard M. Nixon
(Related: Sympathy, Mathematics, Philosophy)

"Men are often biased in their judgment on account of their sympathy and their interests."
- George William Norris
(Related: Men, Sympathy, Judgment)

"Actors who are lovers in real life are often incapable if playing the part of lovers to an audience. It is equally true that sympathy between actors who are not lovers may create a temporary emotion that is perfectly sincere."
- Ivor Novello
(Related: Life, Sympathy, Actors, Emotion, Lovers, May)

"You have to take strength from the people that love you and the people that love Barbara and the huge number of expressions of sympathy and compassion and support. That has been extremely moving."
- Ted Olson
(Related: Love, Sympathy, People, Strength, Compassion, Support)

"Staying married may have long-term benefits. You can elicit much more sympathy from friends over a bad marriage than you ever can from a good divorce."
- P. J. O'Rourke
(Related: Marriage, Sympathy, Benefits, Divorce, Friends, May)

"Sympathy is two hearts tugging at one load."
- Charles Henry Parkhurst
(Related: Sympathy)

"This sympathy is not translated into force against the British government because it is not like the anti- apartheid movement which had a high profile here and Mandela is a more engaging figure than Yasser Arafat."
- Tom Paulin
(Related: Government, Sympathy, Force)

"He bit his lip in a manner which immediately awakened my maternal sympathy, and I helped him bite it."
- S. J. Perelman
(Related: Sympathy)

"I didn't go to university. Didn't even finish A-levels. But I have sympathy for those who did."
- Terry Prachett
(Related: Sympathy, University)

"According to your sympathy, you will take pleasure in your own happiness or in the happiness of other people; but it is always your own happiness you seek."
- John Buchanan Robinson
(Related: Happiness, Sympathy, People, Pleasure, Will)

"It's no good being nice and young and naive. There's no good in that at all. You've got to do it all yourself, and you've gotta learn quick. And you can't look for sympathy either."
- Johnny Rotten
(Related: Sympathy, Being, Quick)

"Any relations in a social order will endure, if there is infused into them some of that spirit of human sympathy which qualifies life for immortality."
- George William Russell
(Related: Life, Sympathy, Immortality, Order, Spirit, Will)

"I have to have a character worth caring about. I tend not to start writing books about people I don't have a lot of sympathy for because I'm just going to be with them too long."
- Richard Russo
(Related: Sympathy, People, Character, Books, Caring, Worth, Writing)

"I joined the Party definitely in 1923 after having already been in sympathy with it before."
- Fritz Sauckel
(Related: Sympathy, Party)

"But what you could perhaps do with in these days is a word of most sincere sympathy. Your movement is carried internally by so strong a truth and necessity that victory in one form or another cannot elude you for long."
- Hjalmar Schacht
(Related: Truth, Sympathy, Victory, Necessity, Word)

"My mother listened to all the news from the camp during the strike. She said little, especially when my father or the men who worked for him were about I remember her instinctive and unhesitating sympathy for the miners."
- Agnes Smedley
(Related: Men, Mother, Father, Sympathy, News)

"It is the right of our people to organize to oppose any law and any part of the Constitution with which they are not in sympathy."
- Alfred E. Smith
(Related: Sympathy, People, Constitution, Law, Right)

"The novelist must look on humanity without partiality or prejudice. His sympathy, like that of the historian, must be unbounded, and untainted by sect or party."
- Goldwin Smith
(Related: Sympathy, Humanity, Party, Prejudice)

"I sometimes get that wonderful sympathy between me and the audience, telling me I've reached their hearts. And when I do, the thrill is mine."
- Kate Smith
(Related: Sympathy)

"If the terrorists have the sympathy of people, it's much harder to find them. So we need people on our side, and that leads us to be responsible leaders of the world, show some concern with the problems."
- George Soros
(Related: Sympathy, People, Concern, Leaders, Problems, World)

"The professional must learn to be moved and touched emotionally, yet at the same time stand back objectively: I've seen a lot of damage done by tea and sympathy."
- Anthony Storr
(Related: Time, Sympathy, Tea)

"Because I select my players from a feeling that comes to me when I am with them, a certain sympathy you might call it, or a vibration that exists between us that convinces me they are right."
- Erich von Stroheim
(Related: Sympathy, Feeling, Right)

"Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instruction."
- Anne Sullivan
(Related: Sympathy, Children, Guidance)

"I have sympathy for young people, for their growing pains, but I balk when these growing pains are pushed into the foreground, when you make these young people the only vehicles of life's wisdom."
- Wislawa Szymborska
(Related: Wisdom, Sympathy, People, Life)

"Many of the artists who have represented Negro life have seen only the comic, ludicrous side of it, and have lacked sympathy with and appreciation for the warm big heart that dwells within such a rough exterior."
- Henry Ossawa Tanner
(Related: Life, Sympathy, Heart, Appreciation, Artists)

"I think we lost a great deal of sympathy and support with the way in which the crisis was handled, most importantly I think when we appeared to be grasping for too much at one time instead of identifying our priorities in a much more responsible fashion."
- Billy Tauzin
(Related: Time, Sympathy, Crisis, Fashion, Priorities, Support)

"I can hardly express in words my deep feeling and sympathy for them, knowing as I do, the many serious handicaps and obstacles that will confront them in almost every walk of life."
- Major Taylor
(Related: Life, Sympathy, Deep, Feeling, Obstacles, Will, Words)

"It appears to be a law that you cannot have a deep sympathy with both man and nature."
- Henry David Thoreau
(Related: Nature, Sympathy, Deep, Law, Man)

"I have a lot of sympathy for young people because I realize how disturbed I was. How would I deal with life in the future? What would I do for a living?"
- Clyde Tombaugh
(Related: Life, Sympathy, People, Future, Living)

"I have the greatest sympathy with the growth of the socialist party. I think they understand the evils that surround us and hammer them into people's minds better than we Liberals."
- Charles E. Trevelyan
(Related: Sympathy, People, Growth, Liberals, Party)

"To desire and expect nothing for oneself and to have profound sympathy for others is genuine holiness."
- Ivan Turgenev
(Related: Sympathy, Desire, Holiness, Nothing)

"Deliberately seek opportunities for kindness, sympathy, and patience."
- Evelyn Underhill
(Related: Sympathy, Kindness, Patience)

"Since this war began our sympathy has gone out to all the suffering people who have been dragged into it. Further hundreds of millions have become involved since I spoke at Limerick fortnight ago."
- Eamon de Valera
(Related: War, Sympathy, People, Suffering)

"I belong to a nation which over the past centuries has experienced many hardships and reverses. The world reacted with silence or with mere sympathy when Polish frontiers were crossed by invading armies and the sovereign state had to succumb to brutal force."
- Lech Walesa
(Related: Sympathy, Force, Nation, Past, Silence, State, World)

"And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy walks to his own funeral drest in his shroud."
- Walt Whitman
(Related: Sympathy)

"There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathise with the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's sores the better."
- Oscar Wilde
(Related: Beauty, Life, Sympathy, Joy, Pain)

"If there was less sympathy in the world, there would be less trouble in the world."
- Oscar Wilde
(Related: Sympathy, Trouble, World)

"In externals we advance with lightening express speed, in modes of thought and sympathy we lumber on in stage-coach fashion."
- Frances E. Willard
(Related: Sympathy, Thought, Fashion)

"Interest does not tie nations together; it sometimes separates them. But sympathy and understanding does unite them."
- Woodrow Wilson
(Related: Sympathy, Interest, Nations, Understanding)