Albert Schweitzer

“We are gripped by God’s will of love, and must help carry out that will in this world, in small things as in great things, in saving as in pardoning. To be glad instruments of God’s love in this imperfect world is the service to which we are called.”

“One truth stands firm. All that happens in world history rests on something spiritual. If the spiritual is strong, it creates world history. If it is weak, it suffers world history.”

“By ethical conduct toward all creatures, we enter into a spiritual relationship with the universe.”

“As we know life in ourselves we want to understand life in the universe in order to enter into harmony with it.”

“Every patient carries her or his own doctor inside.”

“The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.”

“It isn't for the moment you are struck that you need courage, but for the long uphill climb back to sanity and faith and security. Anne Morrow Lindbergh”

“As we acquire knowledge, things do not become more comprehensible, but more mysterious.”

“Man has the lost the capacity to foresee and to forestall. He will end up destroying the earth.”

“The ethics of reverence for life makes no distinction between higher and lower, more precious and less precious lives. It has good reasons for this omission. For what are we doing, when we establish hard and fast gradations in value between living organisms, but judging them in relation to ourselves, by whether they seem to stand closer to us or farther from us. This is a wholly subjective standard. How can we know what importance other living organisms have in themselves and in terms of the universe?”

“I do not believe that we can put into anyone ideas which are not in himalready. As a rule there is in everyone all sorts of good ideas, readylike tinder. But much of this tinder catches fire, or catches itsuccessfully, only when it meets some flame or spark from the outside,from some other person. Often, too, our own light goes out, and isrekindled by some experience we go through with a fellow man. Thus wehave each of us cause to think with deep gratitude of those who havelighted the flame within us. If we had before us those who have thusbeen a blessing to us, and could tell them how it came about, they wouldbe amazed to learn what passed over from their life to ours.”

“Das Glück ist das einzige, das sich verdoppelt, wenn man es teilt.”

“Los años arrugan la piel, pero renunciar al entusiasmo arruga el alma.”

“To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you. Train yourself never to put off the word or action for the expression of gratitude.”

“The doctor of the future will be oneself.”

“He comes to us as One unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside,He came to those men who knew Him not. He speaks to us the same words: "Follow thou me!" and sets us to the tasks which He has to fulfill for our time. He commands. And to those who obey Him, whether they be wise or simple, He will reveal himself in the toils, the conflicts, the sufferings which they shall pass through in His fellowship, and, as an ineffable mystery, they shall learn in their own experience Who He is.”

“As we understand life in ourselves, we want to understand life in the universe. in order to enter into harmony with it.”

“The quiet conscience is an invention of the devil”

“The tragedy in a man’s life is what dies inside of him while he lives.”

“For animals that are overworked, underfed, and cruelly treated; for all wistful creatures in captivity that beat their wings against bars; for any that are hunted or lost or deserted or frightened or hungry; for all that must be put to death...and for those who deal with them we ask a heart of compassion and gentle hands and kindly words.”

“But merely accepting authoritarian truth, even if that truth has some virtue, does not bring skepticism to an end. To blindly accept a truth one has never reflected upon retards the advance of reason. Our world rots in deceit. . . . Just as a tree bears the same fruit year after year and at the same time fruit that is new each year, so must all permanently valuable ideas be continually created anew in thought. But our age pretends to make a sterile tree bear fruit by tying fruits of truth onto its branches.”

“Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory.”

“The purpose of human life is to serve and to show compassion and the will to help others.”

“When I look back upon my early days I am stirred by the thought of the number of people whom I have to thank for what they gave me or for what they were to me. At the same time I am haunted by an oppressive consciousness of the little gratitude I really showed them while I was young. How many of them have said farewell to life without having made clear to them what it meant to me to receive from them so much kindness or so much care! Many a time have I, with a feeling of shame, said quietly to myself over a grave the words which my mouth ought to have spoken to the departed, while he was still in the flesh.”

“We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace.”

“What really matters is that we should all of us realize that we are guilty of inhumanity. The horror of this realization should shakes us out of our lethargy so that we can direct our hopes and our intentions to the coming of an era in which war will have no place.”

“Everyone must work to live, but the purpose of life is to serve and to show compassion and the will to help others. Only then have we ourselves become true human beings.”

“Man can no longer live for himself alone. We must realize that all life is valuable and that we are united to all life. From this knowledge comes our spiritual relationship with the universe.”

“Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me.”

“We are all so much together, but we are all dying of loneliness.”

“You must give time to your fellow men -- even if it's a little thing, do something for others -- something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it. --”

“Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.”

“Man must cease attributing his problems to his environment, and learn again to exercise his will - his personal responsibility in the realm of faith and morals.”

“Това е съдбата на всяка истина - да бъде обект на присмех, когато за пръв път е изказана. Някога се е смятало за смешно да се предположи, че чернокожите са наистина човешки същества и че би трябвало да се третират като такива. Това, което някога е било смешно, сега е неопровержима истина. Днес се смята за преувеличение да се прокламира постоянно уважение към всяка форма на живот като сериозно изискване на рационалната етика. Но идва времето, когато хората ще бъдат удивени, че човешката раса е съществувала толкова дълго преди да осъзнае, че неразумното посягане на живота е несъвместимо с истинския морал. Моралът в своята абсолютна форма обхваща отговорността към всичко живо.”

“A man does not have to be an angel to be a saint.”

“Seek always to do some good, somewhere... Even if it's a little thing, so something for those that need help, something for which you get no pay but the privilege of doing it.”

“Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate. ”

“The greatest discovery of any generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering the attitudes of their minds.”

“He who does not reflect his life back to God in gratitude does not know himself.”

“True philosophy must start from the most immediate and comprehensive fact of consciousness: 'I am life that wants to live, in the midst of life that wants to live”

“In the hopes of reaching the moon men fail to see the flowers that blossom at their feet.”

“The fundamental rights of [humanity] are, first: the right of habitation; second, the right to move freely; third, the right to the soil and subsoil, and to the use of it; fourth, the right of freedom of labor and of exchange; fifth, the right to justice; sixth, the right to live within a natural national organization; and seventh, the right to education.”

“Soldiers' graves are the greatest preachers of peace.”

“No one can give a definition of the soul. But we know what it feels like. The soul is the sense of something higher than ourselves, something that stirs in us thoughts, hopes, and aspirations which go out to the world of goodness, truth and beauty. The soul is a burning desire to breathe in this world of light and never to lose it--to remain children of light.”

“As soon as man does not take his existence for granted, but beholds it as something unfathomably mysterious, thought begins.”

“Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. This is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil.”

“Die Liebe stirbt meistens and den kleinen Fehlern, die man am Anfang so entzückend findet.”

“The only thing of importance, when we depart, will be the traces of love we have left behind.”

“I don't know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve.”

“The the question whether I am a pessimist or an optimist, I answer that my knowledge is pessimistic, but my willing and hope are optimistic.”