Biblio | Beyond Intractability

I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of nuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

If we divide reality into two camps the violent and the nonviolent and stand in one camp while attacking the other, the world will never have peace.

- Thich Nhat Hanh

I'm not really interested in persuading people, I don't want to and I try to make this point obvious. What I'd like to do is to help people persuade themselves.

- Noam Chomsky

Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed.

- Abraham Lincoln

Gandhi once declared that it was his wife who unwittingly taught him the effectiveness of nonviolence. Who better than women should know that battles can be won without resort to physical strength?

- Barbara Deming

I hope...that mankind will at length, as they call themselves reasonable creatures, have reason and sense enough to settle their differences without cutting throats; for in my opinion there never was a good war, or a bad peace.

- Benjamin Franklin

Any city, however small, is in fact divided into two, one the city of the poor, the other of the rich; these are at war with one another.

- Plato

When the water starts boiling it is foolish to turn off the heat.

- Nelson Mandela

The means by which we live have outdistanced the ends for which we live. Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.

- Steven King

War is, at first, the hope that one will be better off; next, the expectation that the other fellow will be worse off; then, the satisfaction that he isn't any better off; and, finally, the surprise at everyone's being worse off.

- Karl Kraus

Let all bear in mind that a society is judged not so much by the standards attained by its more affluent and privileged members as by the quality of life which it is able to assure for its weakest members.

- H.E. Javier Perez de Cuellar

Whenever I hear any one arguing for slavery I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.

- Abraham Lincoln

The miracle of the wicked is reinforced by the weakness of the virtuous.

- Winston Churchill

All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming it.

- Helen Keller

Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.

- Nelson Mandela