Leon Trotsky Quotes

Sometimes you have to be cruel... in order to be even crueler.

Pity is treason

As human beings we're so cynical, so uncompassionate.

Compassion may be defined as the capacity to be attentive to the experience of others, to wish the best for others, and to sense what will truly serve others.

I've met a lot of people since I was around four years old, some really big ones along the way, and I don't think I've met anyone who's as generous of spirit as Quentin Tarantino.

Let no one underestimate the need of pity. We live in a stony universe whose hard, brilliant forces rage fiercely.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.

I'm really not that fierce.

Your own soul is nourished when you are kind; it is destroyed when you are cruel.

If you haven't got any charity in your heart, you have the worst kind of heart trouble.

The conqueror is regarded with awe; the wise man commands our respect; but it is only the benevolent man that wins our affection.

Kindness is the beginning of cruelty.

You can't look in the face of adoration and be cruel.

I do not like to be unkind.

I've always tried to walk a line between being incisive and acerbic, but not mean. Sometimes I'm going to tip over the line a little bit, but that's usually a line I try not to cross.

The truth doesn't have to do with cruelty, the truth has to do with mercy.

Many people think that virtue consists of severity towards others.

Where there is no human connection, there is no compassion. Without compassion, then community, commitment, loving-kindness, human understanding, and peace all shrivel. Individuals become isolated, the isolated turn cruel, and the tragic hovers in the forms of domestic and civil violence. Art and literature are antidotes to that.

We are not by nature cruel.

If there was less sympathy in the world, there would be less trouble in the world.

Well, there are all kind of hearts. There are bleeding hearts and there are hard hearts.

Men fight and lose the battle, and the thing they fought for comes about in spite of their defeat, and when it turns out to be not what they meant, other men have to fight for what they meant under another name.

I surrendered as much to Lincoln’s goodness as I did to Grant’s armies.

Alexander is as gentle after victory as he is terrible in the field.