This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"When nations are able to inflict tens of millions of casualties in a matter of hours, peace has become a moral imperative." - Henry Kissinger, fully Henry Alfred Kissinger
"The determination of what constitutes right in war, is the most difficult problem of the right of nations and international law. It is very difficult even to form a conception of such a right, or to think of any law in this lawless state without falling into a contradiction." - Immanuel Kant
"There are times in the history of men and nations, when they stand so near the vale that separates mortals from the immortals, time from eternity, and men from their God, that they can almost hear the beatings, an feel the pulsations of the heart of the Infinite." - James A. Garfield
"Peace is not a relationship of nations. It is a condition of mind brought about by a serenity of soul. Peace is not merely the absence of war. It is also a state of mind. Lasting peace can come only to peaceful people." - Jawaharlal Nehru
"Superstition, in all times and among all nations, is the fear of a spirit whose passions are those of a man, whose acts are the acts of a man; who is present in some places, not in others; who makes some places holy and not others; who is kind to one person, unkind to another; who is pleased or angry according to the degree of attention you pay him, or praise you refuse him; who is hostile generally to human pleasure, but may be bribed by sacrifice of a part of that pleasure into permitting the rest. This, whatever form of faith it colors, is the essence of superstition." - John Ruskin
"Before the twelfth century the nations were too savage to be Christian, and after the fifteenth too carnal to be Christian." - John Ruskin
"The rules of ordinary international morality imply reciprocity. But barbarians will not reciprocate. They cannot be depended on for observing any rules. Their minds are not capable of so great an effort, nor their will sufficiently under the influence of distant motives. In the next place, nations which are still barbarous have not got beyond the period during which it is likely to be for their benefit that they should be conquered and held in subjection by foreigners." - John Stuart Mill
"Nations love dangers, and when there are none to be found create them to fill the want." - Joseph Joubert
"The most generous dreams of the past have not become immediate practical necessities: a word-wide cooperation of people, a more just distribution of al the goods of life; the use of knowledge and energy or the service of life, and the use of life itself for the extension of the human spirit to provinces where human values and purposes could not heretofore penetrate. If we awaken in time to overcome the automatisms and irrational compulsions that are now pushing nations toward destruction, we shall create a universal community." - Lewis Mumford
"Each of us should realize and should exhibit through our actions the following truth: Moral influence and ethical responsibility are more important and more forceful and more important and more forceful and more lasting than mere power. We are here to be moral forces in the universe, in the world of nations, in our communities and in our families." - Menachem Begin
"A journalist is a grumbler, a censurer, a giver of advice, a regent of sovereigns, a tutor of nations. Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets." - Napoleon Bonaparte, Napoleon I
"Diversity of worship has divided the human race into seventy-two nations. From among all their dogmas, I have selected one, Divine Love." - Omar Khayyám
"A thought by thought is piled, till some great truth is loosened, and the nations echo round, shaken to their roots, as do the mountains now." - Percy Bysshe Shelley
"Peace is not just the absence of war. It involves mutual respect and confidence between peoples and nations. It involves collaboration and binding agreements. Like a cathedral, peace must be constructed patiently and with unshakable faith." - Pope John Paul II, born Karol Józef Wojtyła, aka Saint John Paul the Great NULL
"The true and solid peace of nations consists not in equality of arms but in mutual trust alone." - Pope John XXIII, born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli NULL
"Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet. Then all things are at risk. The very hope of man. The thoughts of his heart, the religion of nations, the manners and morals of mankind are all at the mercy of a new generalization." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
"We estimate the wisdom of nations by seeing what they did with their surplus capital." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Great men, great nations, have not been boasters and buffoons, but perceivers of the terror of life, and have manned themselves to meet it." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
"It must be a peace without victory... Victory would mean peace forced upon the loser, a victor’s terms imposed upon the vanquished. It would be accepted in humiliation, under duress, at an intolerable sacrifice, and would leave a sting, a resentment, a bitter memory upon which terms of peace would rest, not permanently, but only as upon quicksand. Only a peace between equals can last. Only a peace the very principle of which is equality and common participation in a common benefit. The right state of mind, the right feeling between nations, is as necessary for a lasting peace as is the just." - Woodrow Wilson, fully Thomas Woodrow Wilson
"Settlements may be temporary, but the action of the nations in the interest of peace and justice must be permanent processes. We may not be able to set up permanent decisions." - Woodrow Wilson, fully Thomas Woodrow Wilson
"The equality of nations upon which peace must be founded if it is to last must be an equality of rights; the guarantees exchanged must neither recognize nor imply a difference between big nations and small, between those that are powerful and those that are weak." - Woodrow Wilson, fully Thomas Woodrow Wilson
"On a single winged word hath hung the destiny of nations." - Wendell Phillips
"By conversing with the mighty dead, we imbibe sentiment with knowledge. We become strongly attached to those who can no longer either hurt or serve us, except through the influence which they exert over the mind. We feel the presence of that power which gives immortality to human thoughts and actions, and catch the flame of enthusiasm from all nations and ages." - William Hazlitt
"Men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all the other alternatives." - Abba Eban, born Aubrey Solomon Meir Eban
"The lack of objectivity, as far as foreign nations are concerned, is notorious. From one day to another, another nation is made out to be utterly depraved and fiendish, while one’s own nation stands for everything that is good and noble. Every action of the enemy is judged by one standard — every action of oneself by another. Even good deeds by the enemy are considered a sign of particular devilishness, meant to deceive us and the world, while our bad deeds are necessary and justified by our noble goals which they serve." - Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
"The policy of excessive protectionism is like a habit-forming drug. Nations once indulging in it go on from excess to excess; and the appetite increases. But the end of unrestrained indulgence is disaster. Economic nationalism and protectionism spell disaster for the world as well as for the nation...Men will fight before they starve. Uneconomic trade barriers forge the thunderbolts of war." - Francis Bowes Sayre
"We must present democracy as a force holding within itself the seeds of unlimited progress by the human race. By our actions we should make it clear that such a democracy is a means to a better way of life, together with a better understanding among nations. Tyranny inevitably must retire before the tremendous moral strength of the gospel of freedom and self-respect for the individual, but we have to recognize that these democratic principles do not flourish on empty stomachs, and that people turn to false promises of dictators because they are hopeless and anything promises something better than the miserable existence that they endure. However, material assistance alone is not sufficient. The most important thing for the world today in my opinion is a spiritual regeneration which would reestablish a feeling of good faith among men generally. Discouraged people are in sore need of the inspiration of great principles. Such leadership can be the rallying point against intolerance, against distrust, against that fatal insecurity that leads to war. It is to be hoped that the democratic nations can provide the necessary leadership." - George Marshall, fully George Catlett Marshall, Jr.
"Every master of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of heaven on a Country. As nations can not be rewarded or punished in the next world they must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes & effects providence punishes national sins, by national calamities." - George Mason
"For the sake of humanity, it is devoutly to be wished that the manly employment of agriculture, and the humanizing benefit of commerce, would supersede the waste of war and the rage of conquest; that the swords might be turned into ploughshares, the spears into pruning-hooks, and, as the Scriptures express it, "the nations learn war no more."" - George Washington
"There are only two great economic systems in operation in the world today. If Capitalism in the spirit of Christian love can solve the problem of distribution and bring unemployment to an end, it will find itself spreading and recapturing the nations it has lost to its rival. But if Capitalism is permeated with selfishness it will gradually give way to Communism, Technocracy or some other form of Socialism." - Glenn Clark
"Education has now become the chief problem of the world, its one holy cause. The nations that see this will survive, and those that fail to do so will slowly perish. There must be re-education of the will and of the heart as well as of the intellect, and the ideals of service must supplant those of selfishness and greed." - Granville Stanley Hall
"Swords, Lances, arrows, machine guns, and even high explosives have had far less power over the fates of nations than the typhus louse, the plague flea, and the yellow-fever mosquito. Civilizations have retreated from the plasmodium of malaria, and armies have crumbled into rabbles under the onslaught of cholera spirilla, or of dysentery and typhoid bacilli. Huge areas have bee devastated by the trypanosome that travels on the wings of the tsetse fly, and generations have been harassed by the syphilis of a courtier. War and conquest and that herd existence which is an accompaniment of what we call civilization have merely set the stage for these more powerful agents of human tragedy." - Hans Zinnser
"The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes within the souls of people when they realize their relationship, their oneness, with the universe and all its powers, and when they realize that at the center of the universe dwells Wakan-Tanka , and that this center is really everywhere, it is within each of us. This is the real peace, and the others are but reflections of this. The second peace is that which is made between two individuals, and the third is that which is made between two nations. But above all you should understand that there can never be peace between nations until there is known that true peace, which, as I have often said, is within the souls of men." - Nicholas Black Elk, formally Heȟáka Sápa
"But it is well to remember that we are dealing with nations every one of which has a direct individual interest to serve, and there is grave danger in an unshared idealism. " - Henry Cabot Lodge
"To cherish peace and friendly intercourse with all nations having correspondent dispositions; to maintain sincere neutrality toward belligerent nations; to prefer in all cases amicable discussion and reasonable accommodation of differences to a decision of them by an appeal to arms; to exclude foreign intrigues and foreign partialities, so degrading to all countries and so baneful to free ones; to foster a spirit of independence too just to invade the rights of others, too proud to surrender our own, too liberal to indulge unworthy prejudices ourselves and too elevated not to look down upon them in others; to hold the union of the States as the basis of their peace and happiness; to support the Constitution, which is the cement of the Union, as well in its limitations as in its authorities; to respect the rights and authorities reserved to the States and to the people as equally incorporated with and essential to the success of the general system; to avoid the slightest interference with the right of conscience or the functions of religion, so wisely exempted from civil jurisdiction; to preserve in their full energy the other salutary provisions in behalf of private and personal rights, and of the freedom of the press; to observe economy in public expenditures; to liberate the public resources by an honorable discharge of the public debts; to keep within the requisite limits a standing military force, always remembering that an armed and trained militia is the firmest bulwark of republics — that without standing armies their liberty can never be in danger, nor with large ones safe; to promote by authorized means improvements friendly to agriculture, to manufactures, and to external as well as internal commerce; to favor in like manner the advancement of science and the diffusion of information as the best aliment to true liberty; to carry on the benevolent plans which have been so meritoriously applied to the conversion of our aboriginal neighbors from the degradation and wretchedness of savage life to a participation of the improvements of which the human mind and manners are susceptible in a civilized state — as far as sentiments and intentions such as these can aid the fulfillment of my duty, they will be a resource which can not fail me." - James Madison
"Among all nations there should be vast temples raised where people might worship Silence and listen to it, for it is the voice of God." - Jerome K. Jerome, fully Jerome Klapka Jerome
"The most serious and universal problem is the growing chasm between the richest and poorest people on earth. Citizens of the ten wealthiest countries are now seventy-five times richer than those who live in the ten poorest ones, and the separation is increasing every year, not only between nations but also within them." - Jimmy Carter, fully James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr.
"I find out of long experience that I admire all nations and hate all governments." - John Steinbeck, fully John Ernst Steinbeck
"The world has had enough of the curse of hatred and selfishness, of destruction and war. It has had enough of the wrongful use of material power. For the healing of the nations there must be good will and charity, confidence and peace. The time has come for a more practical use of moral power, and more reliance upon the principle that right makes its own might. Our authority among the nations must be represented by justice and mercy. It is necessary not only to have faith, but to make sacrifices for our faith. The spiritual forces of the world make all its final determinations. It is with these voices that America should speak. Whenever they declare a righteous purpose there need be no doubt that they will be heard. America has taken her place in the world as a Republic--free, independent, powerful. The best service that can be rendered to humanity is the assurance that this place will be maintained." - Calvin Coolidge, fully John Calvin Coolidge, Jr.
"The United Nations was not set up to be a reformatory. It was assumed that you would be good before you got in and not that being in would make you good." - John Foster Dulles
"We cannot expect that all nations will adopt like systems, for conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth. " - John F. Kennedy, fully John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy
"A constitution that is made for all nations is made for none." - Joseph de Maistre, fully Joseph-Marie, comte de Maistre
"These days I see America identified more and more with material things, less and less with spiritual standards. These days I see America acting abroad as an arrogant, selfish, greedy nation interested only in guns and dollars, not in people and their hopes and aspirations. We need a faith that dedicates us to something bigger and more important than ourselves or our possessions. Only if we have that faith will we be able to guide the destiny of nations in this the most critical period of world history." - William O. Douglas, fully Judge William Orville Douglas
"Have you not reason then to be ashamed and to forbear this filthy novelty, so basely grounded, so foolishly received and so grossly mistaken in the right use thereof. In your abuse thereof sinning against God harming yourselves both in person and goods, and raking also thereby the marks and notes of vanity upon you by the custom thereof making yourselves to be wondered at by all foreign civil nations and by all strangers that come among you to be scorned and held in contempt; a custom loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the black stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless." - King James I of England
"If the United Nations does not attempt to chart a course for the world's people in the first decades of the new millennium, who will?" - Kofi Annan, fully Kofi Atta Annan
"In the 21st century, I believe the mission of the United Nations will be defined by a new, more profound awareness of the sanctity and dignity of every human life, regardless of race or religion." - Kofi Annan, fully Kofi Atta Annan
"Malaise is a consequence of the depersonalization and permanent insecurity of modern life. Yet it has never been felt among people so strongly as in the past few decades. The inchoate protest, the sense of disenchantment, and the vague complaints and forebodings that are already perceptible in late nineteenth century art and literature have been diffused into general consciousness. There they function as a kind of vulgarized romanticism, a Weltschmerz in perpetuum, a sickly sense of disturbance that is subterranean but explosive. The intermittent and unexpected acts of violence on the part of the individual and the similar acts of violence to which whole nations can be brought are indices of this underground torment. Vaguely sensing that something has gone astray in modern life but also strongly convinced that he lacks the power to right whatever is wrong (even if it were possible to discover what is wrong), the individual lives in a sort of eternal adolescent uneasiness." - Leo Lowenthal and Norbert Guterman
"The choice, however, is as clear now for nations as it was once for the individual: peace or extinction." - Lester Pearson, fully Lester Bowles "Mike" Pearson
"Thus the sum of things is ever being renewed, and mortals live dependent one upon another. Some nations increase, others diminish, and in a short space the generations of living creatures are changed and like runners pass on the torch of life." - Lucretius, fully Titus Lucretius Carus NULL