The freedom now desired by many is not freedom to do and dare but freedom from care and worry. (James Truslow Adams, American Statesman)

Compassion is the basis of morality. (Arthur Schopenhauer, German philosopher, 1788-1860)

When an individual fear or apathy would cause us to pass by the unfortunate, then life is of no account. (Haniel Long)

Do not fear your enemies. The worst they can do is kill you. Do not fear friends. At worst, they may betray you. Fear those who do not care; they neither kill nor betray, but betrayal and murder exists because of their silent consent. (Bruno Jasienski “Yasensky”)

Apathy is the glove into which evil slips its hand. (Bodie Thoene, Munich Signature)

Where ignorance is our master, there is no possibility of real peace. (The Dalai Lama)

Compassion is sometimes the fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else's skin. It is the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too. (Frederick Buechner, American author b.1926)

In the alchemy of man's soul almost all noble attributes- courage, honor, love, hope, faith, duty, loyalty, and so on - can be transmuted into ruthlessness. Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us. Compassion is the antitoxin of the soul: where there is compassion, even the most poisonous impulses remain relatively harmless. (Eric Hoffer)

Each of us in our own way can try to spread compassion into people’s hearts. Western civilizations these days place great importance on filling the human 'brain' with knowledge, but no one seems to care about filling the human 'heart' with compassion. This is what the real role of religion is. (Dalai Lama)

The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another. (Herman Melville)

In compassion lies the world's true strength. (Buddha)

Every time you make a choice that expresses respect for life, you bring a little more love in your body, into your family, into our society, and into a world that is calling out for this blessing. (John Robbins)

More and more people are beginning to feel that there must be another way of thinking, perceiving, and acting. And perhaps the beginning of another way of looking at the world is to re-evaluate all of our beliefs. It is, after all, our beliefs that determine what we are, experience, and expect. When we are willing to take a new look at our own beliefs, we then have an opportunity to begin rediscovering who and what we are and to redetermine our true purpose on Earth. (Gerald Jampolsky & Diane Cirincione)

On this shrunken globe, men can no longer live as strangers. (Adlai E. Stevenson, 1900-1965 American Lawyer Politician)

Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe. (Herbert George Wells, 1866-1946)

How you treat a stranger determines how you treat the ones you love. At first you can't see the connection. After all, how many doors have you slammed in the face of some maddeningly pious Jehovah's Witness, or screamed into the phone at some gentle grandpa trying to raise money for the local fire department? Or, best example of all, how many times have you cussed out a homeless panhandler bugging you for spare change without contemplating the ragged family he may have squirreled away behind some nearby dumpster? Most of us are too busy to care.

In the self-centered savvy of our synthetic 21st century American lives, we are taught not to realize that how we treat our enemies — or in our haste, those we would categorize as superfluous to our hectic agendas — has a direct and debilitating impact on those who we say are important to us. Our parochial perspectives teach others in our family how to be cruel. We are taught that some people are less deserving than others, that our way of life depends on recognizing and perpetuating these distinctions, and that's the way most of us live. What happens when those distinctions become blurred? If we hate others on the basis of propaganda lies, how do we decide who we'll love and know the reasons are true? (John Kaminski) - www.johnkaminski.com

You cannot go forth and require people to believe as you believe when they have not had the same group of experiences as you have had. Each must have his/her right to take steps as he/she is ready. When this is acknowledged and one’s hands are held forth to help brothers and sisters instead of pushing them, then you shall find that which you call terror decreasing. Divine is not subservient to divine, but is equal in all aspects. If you would just hold each other’s welfare in your hearts, the energy of the planet would be so great it would erase the energies of terror, of taking one’s life – or many lives – in order to prove one’s beliefs. That philosophy could not grow if the rest of your planet would hold forth their hands to one another in unity, in mutual understanding and respect.

I urge of you, do not let your collective, which you call your United Nations, fall by the wayside. For it is, indeed, as all nations come together and work for harmony throughout your planet, that your planet will bloom and it truly will be the Garden of Eden. For this you have the capacity, each one of you, each divine facet walking upon the face of the planet Emerauld [Earth]. You have this capacity. You have this potential. The rest of the cycle is up to you. Do you choose to repeat Atlantis and its demise, or do you choose to bring forth harmony and flourish to be the perfection you were given to be? We cannot choose for you, for it is only you who can make your choice… Scrutinize your leaders who would speak for you, that they might choose their words well, and may leader come together with leader in dignity and unity. This is our desire for you. Indeed, this is our plea. But yours, my brethen, is the choice to be made. That is the mystery. And your choice shall determine how your cycle shall end. (El Morya through Tuieta) - (Source: Sedona Journal of Emergence - Feb 2004) - www.sedonajournal.com

Ignorance loves to denounce what it does not understand. (Unknown)

The most violent element in society is ignorance. (Emma Goldman, 1869-1940)

The belief that one’s own view of reality is the only reality is the most dangerous of all delusions. (Paul Watzlawick)

There is one principle that can keep a man in everlasting ignorance. That is contempt prior to investigation. (Herbert Spencer, 1820-1903 British Philosopher)

Ignorance and inconsideration are the two great causes of the ruin of mankind. (John Tillotson, 1630-1694 British Theologian - Archbishop of Canterbury)

Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be constructed. (Unesco - United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization)

Indeed, what folly to kill one another for interests often imaginary, and always for the pleasure of the hierarchy who do not think themselves even obliged to those who sacrifice their lives for them! (Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, 1689-1762 British Society Figure Letter Writer)

Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest violence. (Hebrew Proverb)

If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to treat everything as if it were a nail. (Abraham Maslow)

We cannot possibly let ourselves get frozen into regarding everyone we do not know as an absolute stranger. (Albert Schweitzer, 1875-1965 German Born Medical Missionary Theologian Musician and Philosopher)

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. (Harper Lee, 1926 American Author)

Folks never understand the folks they hate. (James Russell Lowell, 1819-1891 American Poet Critic Editor)

Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only be attained through understanding. (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Understanding is a two-way street. (Eleanor Roosevelt, 1884-1962 American First Lady Columnist Lecturer Humanitarian)

You have on your planet a great diversity of spiritual development within individuals. Not all ones have gone through all the steps of soul growth as have others. Therefore, that which is understood and desired by some cannot be comprehended by others. (El Morya through Tuieta) (Source: Sedona Journal of Emergence February 2004) - www.sedonajournal.com

Unless they are immediate victims, the majority of mankind behaves as if war was an act of God which could not be prevented; or they behave as if war elsewhere was none of their business. It would be a bitter cosmic joke if we destroy ourselves due to atrophy of the imagination. (Martha Gellhorn, 1908 American Journalist Author)

A blind man knows he cannot see, and is glad to be led, though it be by a dog; but he that is blind in his understanding, which is the worst blindness of all, believes he sees as the best, and scorns a guide. (Samuel Butler, 1612-1680 British Poet Satirist)

There is nothing harder than the softness of indifference. (Juan Montalvo)

Everyone has a responsibility to not only tolerate another person's point of view, but also to accept it eagerly as a challenge to your own understanding. And express those challenges in terms of serving other people. (Arlo Guthrie, American Artist)

One must care about a world one will not see. (Bertrand Russell, 1872-1970 British Philosopher Mathematician Essayist)

It is time in the West to defend not so much human rights as human obligations. (Alexander Solzhenitsyn, 1918 Russian Novelist)

Provision for others is a fundamental responsibility of human life. (Woodrow T. Wilson, 1856-1924 Twenty-eighth President of the USA)

To be a man is to be responsible. It is to feel shame at the sight of what seems to be unmerited misery. It is to take pride in a victory won by one's comrades. It is to feel, when setting one's stone, that one is contributing to the building of the world. (Antoine De Saint-Exupery, 1900-1944 French Aviator Writer)

The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you don't know anything about. (Wayne Dyer, 1940 American Psychotherapist Author Lecturer)

Ignorance is jealousy’s twin sister. (Dean Fraser)

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace; where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; and where there is sadness, joy. (Saint Augustine)

We who claim to love peace and justice must always be careful that we do not use our righteousness to provoke the violent, and in this way bring about the conflict for which we, too, like other men, are hungering in secret, and with suppressed barbarity. (Thomas Merton)

Reason guides our attempt to understand the world about us. Both reason and compassion guide our efforts to apply that knowledge ethically, to understand other people, and have ethical relationships with other people. (Molleen Matsumura)

It means a great deal to those who are oppressed to know that they are not alone. And never let anyone tell you that what you are doing is insignificant. (Bishop Desmond Tutu)