Echoes

Peace is not mere absence of war, but is a virtue that springs from force of character.

If you want peace, prepare for war.

There is no principle worth the name if it is not wholly good. I swear by non-violence because I know that it alone conduces to the highest good of mankind, not merely in the next world, but in this also. I object to violence because, when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary, the evil it does is permanent.

To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.

We must ever bear in mind that the great end in view is righteousness, justice as between man and man, nation and nation, the chance to lead our lives on a somewhat higher level, with a broader spirit of brotherly goodwill one for another. Peace is generally good in itself, but it is never the highest good unless it comes as the handmaid of righteousness; and it becomes a very evil thing if it serves merely as a mask for cowardice and sloth, or as an instrument to further the ends of despotism or anarchy. We despise and abhor the bully, the brawler, the oppressor, whether in private or public life, but we despise no less the coward and the voluptuary. No man is worth calling a man who will not fight rather than submit to infamy or see those that are dear to him suffer wrong. No nation deserves to exist if it permits itself to lose the stern and virile virtues; and this without regard to whether the loss is due to the growth of a heartless and all-absorbing commercialism, to prolonged indulgence in luxury and soft, effortless ease, or to the deification of a warped and twisted sentimentality.

There are many causes that I am prepared to die for but no causes that I am prepared to kill for.

Nonviolence is the first article of my faith. It is also the last article of my creed.

A crust eaten in peace is better than a banquet partaken in anxiety.

Hatred and anger are the greatest poison to the happiness of a good mind.

Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.

It isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it.

The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.

You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.

Resentment and complaint are appropriate neither for oneself or others.

Truth is sought not because it is truth but because it is good.

First keep the peace within yourself, then you can also bring peace to others.

How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it.

Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure.

There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance.

In peace, sons bury their fathers. In war, fathers bury their sons.

Our patience will achieve more than our force.

In war, numbers alone confer no advantage. Do not advance relying on sheer military power.

In our complex industrial civilization of today the peace of righteousness and justice, the only kind of peace worth having, is at least as necessary in the industrial world as it is among nations. There is at least as much need to curb the cruel greed and arrogance of part of the world of capital, to curb the cruel greed and violence of part of the world of labor, as to check a cruel and unhealthy militarism in international relationships.

History is only a record of crimes and misfortunes.

When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it?