Society Quotes
Top 35 Society
Quotes
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-friedman-milton.jpg)
No 1 (Best quote!)
Our society is what we make it.
- Milton and Rose Friedman, pictured right, Free To Choose
(1980)![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotesfrieros.jpg)
Other thinkers and leaders agree:
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-ruskin.jpg)
The strength and power of a country depends absolutely on the quantity of good men and women in it.
- John Ruskin (1819-1900), pictured right, the
English writer and philosopher.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-thatcher.jpg)
There is no such thing [as society]. There are individual men and women, and there are families and no
government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first.
- Margaret Thatcher (1925- ), pictured right,
British prime minister.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-mill.jpg)
A country is only as good as the people in it.
- John Stuart Mill
(1806-73), English philosopher, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-curie.jpg)
You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals.
- Marie Curie (1867-1934), Polish-born
French physicist, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-burke.jpg)
But Edmund Burke (1729-97), pictured
right, the Irish-born British Member of Parliament, comments:
To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely.
No 2![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-kennedy-jf.jpg)
Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.
- John F. Kennedy (1917–63), American president,
pictured right.
No 3![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-bradley.jpg)
The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants
and ethical infants.
- Omar Bradley (1893–1981), American general, pictured right.
Two other Americans agree:
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-maslow.jpg)
The good society is one in which virtue pays.
- Abraham Maslow
(1908-70), pictured right, psychologist.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-douglass.jpg)
The life of the nation is secure only while the nation is honest, truthful, and virtuous,
- Frederick Douglass (c1818–95),
civil rights campaigner, pictured right.
The Talmud, the Jewish holy book, also says:
By three things is the world sustained: by truth, by judgement, and by peace.
No 4![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-king-ml.jpg)
We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.
- Martin Luther King (1929–68), American civil
rights leader, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-russell.jpg)
The English philosopher, Bertrand
Russell (1872-1970), pictured right, agrees:
The only thing that will redeem mankind is co-operation.
No 5![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-thoreau.jpg)
Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention from serious things,
- Henry David Thoreau
(1817-62) American poet, philosopher, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-sayers.jpg)
The English writer, Dorothy L. Sayers (1893–1957), pictured right, is similarly critical of our
materialistic society:
A society in which consumption has to be artificially stimulated in order to keep production going is a society
founded on trash and waste, and such a society is a house built upon sand.
No 6![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-churchill.jpg)
The empires of the future are the empires of the mind.
- Winston Churchill (1874–19650, British prime
minister, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-keynes.jpg)
The English economist, John Maynard
Keynes (1883-1946), pictured right, agrees:
Ideas shape the course of history.
No 7![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-smith.jpg)
Civil government, so far as it is instituted for the security of property, is in reality instituted for the
defence of the rich against the poor.
(from the 1776 book The Wealth of Nations)
- Adam Smith (1723-90), pictured right,
Scottish philosopher.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-galbraith.jpg)
John Kenneth (J. K.) Galbraith (1908-2006), pictured right, in
his book, The Culture of Contentment (1992), agrees:
Nothing in the age of contentment ...so contributes to social tranquillity as some screams of anguish from the
very affluent.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-smith.jpg)
Adam Smith, pictured right, also says in
The Wealth of Nations (1776):
No society can be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable
No 8![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-orwell.jpg)
Big Brother is Watching You.
(Party slogan in the 1949 novel Nineteen
Eighty-Four)
- George Orwell (1903-50), pictured right, English writer.
No 9![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-kant.jpg)
Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made,
- Immanuel Kant (1724-1804)
German philosopher, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-golding.jpg)
William Golding, pictured right, in his book, Lord of the Flies (1954), also emphasizes the darker side of human
nature:
Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-shakespeare.jpg)
But Shakespeare's, pictured right, Miranda (in The Tempest) is far more optimistic:
How beautiful mankind is! O brave new world that hath such people in ’t!
No 10![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-bentley.jpg)
Ours is the age of substitutes: instead of language, we have jargon; instead of principles, slogans; and,
instead of genuine ideas, Bright Ideas.
- Eric Bentley (1916– ), English-born American writer, pictured right.
No 11![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-burke.jpg)
Society is indeed a contract…it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those
who are living, those who are dead, and those who are to be born,
- Edmund Burke
(1729–97),Irish-born British politician and philosopher, pictured right.
No 12![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-rogers-carl.jpg)
When I look at the world I'm pessimistic, but when I look at people I am optimistic.
- Carl Rogers (1902-87)
American psychologist, pictured right.
No 13![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-johnson.jpg)
Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
- Samuel Johnson (1709–84), English writer, pictured right.
No 14![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-orwell.jpg)
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others,
(from the 1945 novel Animal Farm)
- George Orwell (1903-50), pictured right, English writer.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-spinoza.jpg)
Benedict (or Baruch)
Spinoza (1632-77), pictured right, the Dutch philosopher, points out the impossibility of equality
because of differing effort and ability:
He who seeks equality between unequals seeks an absurdity
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-friedman-milton.jpg)
Milton and Rose Friedman (pictured right and below) also
comment in Free To Choose (1980)
A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will
get a high degree of both
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotesfrieros.jpg)
No 15![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-teresa.jpg)
The greatest disease today...is the feeling of being unwanted, uncared for and deserted by everybody,
- Mother Teresa (1910-97),
Albanian nun,, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-buddha.jpg)
Gautama Buddha (563-483 BC), pictured
right, founder of Buddhism, agrees:
A generous heart, kind service, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity.
No 16![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-gladstone.jpg)
Selfishness is the greatest curse of the human race.
- William Gladstone (1809-1898) British prime
minister, pictured right.
No 17![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-aristotle.jpg)
Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.
- Aristotle (384-322 BC) Greek
philosopher, pictured right.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-king-ml.jpg)
Martin Luther King (1929–68), the American
civil rights leader, pictured right.says something similar:
A riot is at bottom the language of the unheard
No 18![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-marx.jpg)
From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.
- Karl Marx (1818–83), German
philosopher, pictured right.
No 19![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-shakespeare.jpg)
Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
(Marcellus in Hamlet)
- William Shakespeare (1564-1616),
English playwright, pictured right.
The Duke of Albany in Shakespeare's King Lear also comments on the world's
immorality:
Humanity must perforce prey on itself like monsters
of the deep.
- William
Shakespeare (1564-1616), English playwright, pictured right
No 20![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-hobbes.jpg)
The life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short,
(from the 1651 book Leviathan)
- Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679),
pictured right, English philosopher.
![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-thoreau.jpg)
Henry David Thoreau
(1817-62) the American writer and philosopher, pictured right, says similarly:
The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
No 21![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-eisenhower.jpg)
Freedom has its life in the hearts, the actions, the spirit of men and so it must be daily earned and refreshed
- else like a flower cut from its life-giving roots, it will wither and die,
- Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969), American
president , pictured right.
Eisenhower also comments:
A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.
No 22![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-kennedy-jf.jpg)
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.
- John F. Kennedy (1917-63), American president,
pictured right.
No 23![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quoteswalp.jpg)
This world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel.
- Horace Walpole (1717-97), English writer and politician, pictured right.
No 24![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-roosevelt-fd.jpg)
We may make mistakes, but they must never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of
moral principle,
- Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945), American
president, pictured right.
No 25![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-roosevelt-ted.jpg)
We have duties to others and duties to ourselves; and we can shirk neither.
- Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), American
president 1901-9, pictured right.
No 26![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-du-bois.jpg)
Herein lies the tragedy of the age...that men know so little of men.
- William E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963), African American civil rights campaigner and writer,
pictured right.
No 27![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-piaget.jpg)
The common wealth of all civilizations is the education of the child.
- Jean Piaget (1896-1980) Swiss
educational psychologist, pictured right.
No 28![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-king-ml.jpg)
A great nation is a compassionate nation.
- Martin Luther King (1929-68), pictured right,
American civil rights leader.
No 29![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-confucius.jpg)
When the heart is right, the personal life is cultivated. When personal lives are cultivated, families become
harmonious. When families are harmonious, government becomes orderly. And when government is orderly, there will be
peace in the world,
- Confucius (551-479 BC), Chinese
philosopher, pictured right
No 30![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-niebuhr.jpg)
We can no longer buy the highest satisfactions of the individual life at the expense of social injustice,
- Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1901),
American theologian, pictured right.
No 31![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-rousseau.jpg)
Liberté, equalité, fraternité (Liberty, equality, fraternity).
- Jean-Jacques
Rousseau (1712-78), Swiss philosopher, pictured right.
No 32![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-owen-robert.jpg)
Man is the creature of circumstances.
- Robert Owen (1771-1858), Welsh
businessman, pictured right.
No 33![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-schweitzer.jpg)
The disastrous feature of our civilization is that it is far more developed materially than spiritually,
- Albert Schweitzer (1875-1965), German
philosopher and doctor, pictured right.
No 34![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-fromm.jpg)
The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots.
- Erich Fromm (1900-80), German-born
American psychologist and philosopher, pictured right
No 35![Society Quotes Society Quotes](images/quotes-bezos.jpg)
In the end we are our choices.
- Jeff Bezos (1964- ), founder and boss of Amazon
(pictured right)
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