Isak Dinesen Quotes

There is no force more liberating than the knowledge that you are fighting for others.

To serve is beautiful, but only if it is done with joy and a whole heart and a free mind.

Nothing liberates our greatness like the desire to help, the desire to serve.

I have found that among its other benefits, giving liberates the soul of the giver.

You can only appreciate freedom when you find yourself in a position to fight for someone else's freedom and not worry about your own.

As we are set free by that love from our own pride and fear, our own greed and arrogance, so we are free in our turn to be agents of reconciliation and hope, or healing and love.

As long as people will shed the blood of innocent creatures there can be no peace, no liberty, no harmony between people. Slaughter and justice cannot dwell together.

The butcher with his bloody apron incites bloodshed, murder. Why not? From cutting the throat of a young calf to cutting the throats of our brothers and sisters is but a step. While we ourselves are living graves of murdered animals, how can we expect any ideal conditions on the earth?

It takes nothing away from a human to be kind to an animal.

I think service to others is the real key to winning our own personal freedom and the road to our own happiness, our own personal contentment and fulfillment.

This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people.

..the true test of spirituality [is] in the freedom to live among people compassionately....Prayer frees us to be controlled by God.

Oops! I always thought PETA stood for Please Eat This Animal.

To be generous, guiltless, and of a free disposition is to take those things for bird-bolts that you deem cannon-bullets.

Because I'm a civil rights activist, I am also an animal rights activist. Animals and humans suffer and die alike. Violence causes the same pain, the same spilling of blood, the same stench of death, the same arrogant, cruel and vicious taking of life. We shouldn't be a part of it.

If you shift your focus from oneself to others, and think more about others' well-being and welfare, it has an immediate liberating effect.

Some things have eternal value, and compassion is one of them. I hope we never lose that. Compassion for humans as well as animals.

How can I be kind? How can I find bird-relief in the nest-building of day-to-day? Necessity supplies no velvet wing with which to escape. I am indeed and mortally pierced with the seeds of love.

True freedom is to share All the chains our brothers wear, And, with heart and hand, to be Earnest to make others free!

If performed in the right spirit, there is no higher worship than the unpurchased service to another soul of whatever faith, belief, or social stratum. The Savior of the world said it simply, "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me" (Matt. 25:40).

I've been an animal rights activist and a vegan for 28 years. The entire time, I've asked myself: How do I best advance an animal rights agenda?

The greatest satisfaction is not the decoration. It is knowing that I am able to help someone who needs help.

A human’s love. I couldn’t wish anything better for him. Animals protect what they know. They protect what they are bound to, but humans…humans have a greater capacity for sacrifice for those who live in their hearts. (Aristotle)

When a man has pity on all living creatures then only is he noble.

If you want to serve the universe, the obvious place to begin is right where you are. That's where I began. I looked at every situation I came into and wondered, 'What can I do to be of service in this situation?' Sometimes there was nothing I could do, but often there was - a helping hand, a word of cheer, a pleasant smile. Then, after I had given a lot, a most wonderful spiritual receiving began - giving me more to give.