Leo Tolstoy Quotes

We want to get rid of the militarist not simply because he hurts and kills, but because he is an intolerable thick-voiced blockhead who stands hectoring and blustering in our way of achievement.

We pacifists have not ceased to point to the grave danger of armaments and to insist on their curtailment.

We are advocates of the abolition of war, we do not want war; but war can only be abolished through war.

I am totally against the war but violence is part of mankind and it's going to happen, but as musicians I think we've got to step up and say 'come on'.

Peace is the alternative to war, and nonviolence should be seen as the antidote to violence, not simply as its opposite. Nonviolence is more concerned with saving life than with saving face.

If peace is equated simply with the absence of war, it can become abject pacifism that turns the world over to the most ruthless.

The best way to perpetuate poverty is spending on arms, and poverty itself is a form of violence. The wealthy industrialized countries have been too slow to recognize this. I hope that in this new century and new millennium, the world will learn that if you want peace, you must prepare for peace, plan for peace, work for it, and comply with its dictates. Lasting peace will never be achieved with the instruments of war.

I think an appeal to arms and to brute force is unbecoming the age in which we live. Would to God that the time had come when there should be no war, and that religion and peace should reign throughout the world.

A serious pacifist approach can't win wars against enemies whose only program is violence. That doesn't mean I think the US has fought terrorists so wisely most of the time since 9/11. But there are some enemies that need to be destroyed by force lest they destroy much much more.

The story of the human race is war. Except for brief and precarious interludes there has never been peace in the world; and long before history began murderous strife was universal and unending.

The experience of a lot of us women is that too much money is being spent on militarism and war. We need human security: food, education, health care for our children. We don't want to waste it on wars and militarism. That will be our focus: building a culture that moves away from militarism.

As far as I am concerned, war itself is immoral.

I think the most challenging thing for me in my life and in the Bible is that we worship Jesus as the Prince of Peace. And America is constantly at war.

We must begin to inculcate our children against militarism by educating them in the spirit of pacifism. Our schoolbooks glorify war and conceal it's horror. I would teach peace rather than war.

The very existence of armaments and great armies psychologically accustoms us to accept the philosophy of militarism. They inevitably increase fear and hate in the world.

I have seen war ... I hate war.

I abhor unjust war. I abhor injustice and bullying by the strong at the expense of the weak, whether among nations or individuals. I abhor violence and bloodshed. I believe that war should never be resorted to when, or so long as, it is honorably possible to avoid it. I respect all men and women who from high motives and with sanity and self-respect do all they can to avert war. I advocate preparation for war in order to avert war; and I should never advocate war unless it were the only alternative to dishonor.

Militarists say that to gain peace we must prepare for war. I think we get what we prepare for. If we want a world where peace is valued, we must teach ourselves to believe that peace is not a ‘utopian vision’ but a real responsibility that must be worked for each and every day in small and large ways. Any one of us can contribute to building a world where peace and justice prevail.

There can be no compromise with war; it cannot be reformed or controlled; cannot be disciplined into decency or codified into common sense; for war is the slaughter of human beings, temporarily regarded as enemies, on as large a scale as possible.

Force, punishment, and violence are patriarchy's answer to conflicts and social problems. Patriarchy finds its ultimate expression in war.

For it can never be that war shall preserve life, and peace destroy it.

The greatest threat to our world and its peace comes from those who want war, who prepare for it, and who, by holding out vague promises of future peace or by instilling fear of foreign aggression, try to make us accomplices to their plans.

Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime.

I am a peace man except when I wish to fight.

the world's chief war-monger