quotations about charity
Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Strength to Love
The man who is full of charity sees, through the eyes of the heart, the Image of the Lord in his brother.
SAINT PACHOMIUS
On Charity
The existence of poverty is the proof of an unjust and ill-organised society, and our public charities are but the first tardy awakening in the conscience of a robber.
SRI AUROBINDO
Thoughts and Aphorisms
Charity . . . is the opium of the privileged.
CHINUA ACHEBE
Anthills of the Savannah
Charity, by which God and neighbor are loved, is the most perfect friendship.
THOMAS AQUINAS
Quaestiones disputatae: De caritate
I as little fear that God will damn a man that has charity, as I hope that the priests can save one who has not.
ALEXANDER POPE
"Thoughts on Various Subjects"
Some men mistake generosity for charity: these flatter themselves that they are giving gratuitously, whilst they are merely rewarding secret services offered their vanity.
NORMAN MACDONALD
Maxims and Moral Reflections
The living need charity more than the dead.
GEORGE ARNOLD
The Jolly Old Pedagogue
You're a few years overdue.
I spent them waiting here for you.
Now your charity's refused,
I can name a penance for abuse.
THE GET UP KIDS
"Overdue", On a Wire
But, in all things, regardless of whether we make the same choices or not, we are to treat each other with dignity and respect, both of which are evidences of charity in our hearts and lives.
SHERI L. DEW
If Life Were Easy, It Wouldn't Be Hard
Charity is the root of all good works.
ST. AUGUSTINE
Sermons
He who hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none.
LANCELOT ANDREWES
The Private Devotions of Lancelot Andrewes
In a word, charity and faith make one as essence and form do, for the essence of faith is charity, and the form of charity is faith ; from which it is evident that faith without charity is like form without essence, which is not anything, and that charity without faith is like essence without form, which is also not anything.
JOHN FAULKNER POTTS
The Swedenborg Concordance
Behold I do not give lectures or a little charity, when I give I give myself.
WALT WHITMAN
Leaves of Grass
We are obligated to be more scrupulous in fulfilling the commandment of charity than any other positive commandment because charity is the sign of a righteous man.
MAIMONIDES
A Maimonides Reader
When faith and hope fail, as they do sometimes, we must try charity, which is love in action.
DINAH CRAIK
Christian's Mistake
If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charitable expenditure excludes them.
C.S. LEWIS
Mere Christianity
Aside from higher considerations, charity often operates as a vastly wise and prudent principle--a great safeguard to its possessor. Men have committed murder for jealousy's sake, and anger's sake, and hatred's sake, and selfishness' sake, and spiritual pride's sake; but no man that ever I heard of, ever committed a diabolical murder for sweet charity's sake. Mere self-interest, then, if no better motive can be enlisted, should, especially with high-tempered men, prompt all beings to charity and philanthropy.
HERMAN MELVILLE
Bartleby
Charity is a virtue of the heart, and not of the hands.
JOSEPH ADDISON
The Guardian, Sep. 21, 1713
Charity is really self-interest masquerading under the form of altruism.
ANTHONY DE MELLO
Awareness