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Peace

This page is for quotations on the theme of Peace, alphabetically listed by author.

Sourced

Listed alphabetically by author



  • Peace at home, peace in the world.
    • Mustafa Kemal Atatürk , as quoted in many sources including, Atatürk (1963) by Uluğ İğdemir, p. 200; and Small Nations and Great Powers: A Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict in the Caucasus (2000) by Svante E. Cornell, p. 287; this later became the motto of the Republic of Turkey.

  • There is no trust more sacred than the one the world holds with children. There is no duty more important than ensuring that their rights are respected, that their welfare is protected, that their lives are free from fear and want and that they grow up in peace.

  • If you keep your mind stayed on Jesus, he'll give you peace, that passes all understanding.
    • Archbishop LeRoy Bailey Jr, Senior Pastor of The First Cathedral from a sermon entitled "We Need GOD" (14 June 2007).

  • The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes from within the souls of men 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 first known that true peace which is within the souls of men.
    • Black Elk in The Sacred Pipe: Black Elk's Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux (1953).

  • Peace is a resistance to the terrible satisfactions of war.
    • Judith Butler, Interview in The Believer Magazine - Issue 2

  • Better than a thousand hollow words
    Is one word that brings peace.

    Better than a thousand hollow verses
    Is one verse that brings peace.

    Better than a hundred hollow lines
    Is one line of the law, bringing peace.

    • Gautama Buddha in "The Thousands" from the Dhammapada as translated by Thomas Byrom

  • No matter what someone else has done, it still matters how we treat people. It matters to our humanity that we treat offenders according to standards that we recognize as just. Justice is not revenge — it's deciding for a solution that is oriented towards peace, peace being the harder but more human way of reacting to injury. That is the very basis of the idea of rights.
    • Judith Butler, Interview in The Believer Magazine - Issue 2

  • What all men are really after is some form, or perhaps only some formula, of peace.
    • Joseph Conrad, in Under Western Eyes (1911)

  • There never was a good war, or a bad peace.
    • Benjamin Franklin, Letter to Josiah Quincy (1783)

  • Our work for peace must begin within the private world of each one of us. To build for man a world without fear, we must be without fear. To build a world of justice, we must be just. And how can we fight for liberty if we are not free in our own minds? How can we ask others to sacrifice if we are not ready to do so?... Only in true surrender to the interest of all can we reach that strength and independence, that unity of purpose, that equity of judgment which are necessary if we are to measure up to our duty to the future, as men of a generation to whom the chance was given to build in time a world of peace.
    • Dag Hammarskjöld, in UN Press Release SG/360 (22 December 1953)

  • The pursuit of peace and progress cannot end in a few years in either victory or defeat. The pursuit of peace and progress, with its trials and its errors, its successes and its setbacks, can never be relaxed and never abandoned.
    • Dag Hammarskjöld, in United Nations Bulletin Vol. XVI, No. 4 (15 February 1954)

  • The situation of the world is still like this. People completely identify with one side, one ideology. To understand the suffering and the fear of a citizen of the Soviet Union, we have to become one with him or her. To do so is dangerous — we will be suspected by both sides. But if we don't do it, if we align ourselves with one side or the other, we will lose our chance to work for peace. Reconciliation is to understand both sides, to go to one side and describe the suffering being endured by the other side, and then to go to the other side and describe the suffering being endured by the first side. Doing only that will be a great help for peace.
    • Thich Nhat Hanh, Being Peace, 1987 edition, Parallax Press, Berkeley, CA.

  • They shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.
    • Isaiah 2:4

  • Blessed are the peacemakers; for they shall be called the children of God.
    • Yeshua (Jesus Christ) Matthew 5:9

  • I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace.
    • Helen Keller, as quoted in Henry More: The Rational Theology of a Cambridge Plattonist (1962) by Aharon Lichtenstein

  • Peace is the essential prerequisite because without peace we will be unable to achieve the levels of cooperation, inclusiveness and social equity necessary to solve our global challenges, let alone empower the international institutions needed to regulate the challenges.

  • We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough to say "We must not wage war." It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but on the positive affirmation of peace. ... We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a cosmic melody that is far superior to the discords of war. Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the negative nuclear arms race which no one can win to a positive contest to harness man's creative genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all of the nations of the world. In short, we must shift the arms race into a "peace race". If we have the will and determination to mount such a peace offensive, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors of hope and transform our imminent cosmic elegy into a psalm of creative fulfillment.

  • Make love, not war.
    • Gershon Legman in his lecture Love and death (and schmutz): G. Legman's second thoughts held at University of Ohio in 1963. (According to Dudar, H. (1984, May 1))

  • All we are saying is give peace a chance.
    • John Lennon in "Give Peace A Chance"

  • Imagine all the people living life in peace. You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us, and the world will live as one.
    • John Lennon in "Imagine"

  • If you wish for peace, understand war.
    • Basil Liddell Hart, Strategy (1967)

  • What's so funny 'bout Peace, Love, and Understanding?
    • Nick Lowe, in "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding" (1974), which became a hit as sung by Elvis Costello.

  • Peace is not the absence of anything. Real peace is the presence of something beautiful. Both peace and the thirst for it have been in the heart of every human being in every century and every civilization.
    • Maharaji; Address to faculty, students and guests at Harvard University's Sanders Theater (August 2004)

  • To have peace and not war, the drift toward a war economy, as facilitated by the moves and the demands of the sophisticated conservatives, must be stopped; to have peace without slump, the tactics and policies of the practical right must be overcome. The political and economic power of both must be broken. The power of these giants of main drift is both economically and politically anchored; both unions and an independent labor party are needed to struggle effective.
    • C. Wright Mills in "The New Men of Power" (1948)

  • The American elite does not have any real image of peace — other than as an uneasy interlude existing precariously by virtue of the balance of mutual fright. The only seriously accepted plan for peace is the full loaded pistol. In short, war or a high state of war-preparedness is felt to be the normal and seemingly permanent condition of the United States.
    • C. Wright Mills in The Power Elite (1956)

  • Peace hath her victories
    No less renowned than war.
    • John Milton, "Sonnett: To the Lord General Cromwell" (1652)

  • There is no way to peace; peace is the way.
    • A. J. Muste, as quoted in The New York Times, (16 November 1967); this has come to sometimes be misattributed to Mahatma Gandhi.

  • If they want peace, nations should avoid the pin-pricks that precede cannon shots.
    • Napoleon I of France, to Alexander I of Russia at Tilsit (25 June 1807), as quoted in Libretto for the Republic of Liberia (1953) by Melvin Beaunorus Tolson

  • Do you know what I admire most in the world? The inability of force to organize anything. There are only two powers in this world, the sword and the spirit ... in the long run the sword is always beaten by the spirit.
    • In an 1808 conversation with Louis-Marcelin de Fontanes, quoted in Madame de Staël et Napoléon (1903) by Henri Guillemin, p. 185, as translated in Dictatorship and Political Police: The Technique of Control by Fear (1945) by Ernest Kohn Bramsted
    • Variant translations:
    • Fontanes, do you know what I admire most in the world ? It is the powerlessness of force to organize anything. There are only two powers in the world, the sword and the mind .... In the long run the sword is always vanquished by the mind.
      • As quoted in "French Literature" by William Koren, in Modern Language Notes, Vol. XX, No. 3, (March 1905), p.97
    • Do you know what astonished me most in the world? The inability of force to create anything. In the long run the sword is always beaten by the spirit.
      • As quoted in A Path With Heart: A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life (1993) by Jack Kornfield, p. 29

  • 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.
    • Eleanor Roosevelt, Voice of America broadcast (11 November 1951)

  • Sometimes there's truth in old cliches. There can be no real peace without justice. And without resistance there will be no justice.

  • The best weapon against warmongers is a peaceful solution.
    • Leonid S. Sukhorukov, All About Everything (2005)

  • Recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world.
    • Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Preamble

  • From somewhere in the Mediterranean — this is The Voice of Peace
    • Station identification of Israeli humanist and peace activist Abie Nathan's pirate offshore radio Voice of Peace

  • Peace will come wherever it is sincerely invited.
    • Alice Walker in Living by the word: selected writings, 1973-1987, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 192, (1989)

  • To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace.
    • George Washington, First Annual Address to both Houses of Congress (8 January 1790)

  • Observe good faith and justice towards all Nations; cultivate peace and harmony with all.
    • George Washington, in his Farewell Address (17 September 1796)

Unsourced

  • I could not live in peace if I put the shadow of a wilful sin between myself and God.
    • George Eliot

  • I think that people want peace so much that one of these days government had better get out of their way and let them have it.
    • Dwight David Eisenhower

  • If you want to make peace, you don't talk to your friends. You talk to your enemies.
    • Moshe Dayan

  • Peace can only last where human rights are respected, and where individuals and nations are free.
    • Dalai Lama

  • Peace cannot be achieved through violence, it can only be attained through understanding.
    • Ralph Waldo Emerson

  • Peace Sells but Who's Buying?
    • Megadeth

  • Peace is more than the absence of war
    • Bonabes, Comte de Rougé

  • The harder we fight for peace the greater the danger that no stone will be left standing.
    • Leonid S. Sukhorukov

  • There are interests by the sacrifice of which peace is too dearly purchased. One should never be at peace to the shame of his own soul — to the violation of his integrity or of his allegiance to God.
    • Edwin Hubbell Chapin

  • We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing that we know about living.
    • General Omar Bradley

  • We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children.
    • Jimmy Carter

  • We must be prepared to make heroic sacrifices for the cause of peace that we make ungrudgingly for the cause of war. There is no task that is more important or closer to my heart.
    • Albert Einstein

  • The real and lasting victories are those of peace, and not of war.
    • Ralph Waldo Emerson

  • Whatever you do, you need courage. Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong. There are always difficulties arising that tempt you to believe your critics are right. To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires some of the same courage that a soldier needs. Peace has its victories, but it takes brave men and women to win them.
    • Ralph Waldo Emerson

  • In a universe where chaos reigns and irrationality prospers, peace would go against universal means and the human nature. To have peace mankind would no longer be mankind.
    • Kyle Flynn

  • We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessings of peace.
    • William Gladstone

  • I never advocated war except as a means of peace.
    • Ulysses S. Grant

  • If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work.
    • Thich Nhat Hanh

  • I think a pillow should be the peace symbol, not the dove. The pillow has more feathers than the dove, and it doesn't have a beak to peck you with.
    • Jack Handey

  • Even silence speaks
    • Hausa proverb

  • The goal toward which all history tends is peace, not peace through the medium of war, not peace through a process of universal intimidation, not peace through a program of mutual impoverishment, not peace by any means that leaves the world too weak or too frightened to go on fighting, but peace pure and simple based on that will to peace which has animated the overwhelming majority of mankind through countless ages. This will to peace does not arise out of a cowardly desire to preserve one's life and property, but out of conviction that the fullest development of the highest powers of men can be achieved only in a world of peace.
    • Robert Maynard Hutchins

  • Peace, above all things, is to be desired; but blood must sometimes be spilled to obtain it on equable and lasting terms.
    • Andrew Jackson

  • Peace does not rest in the charters and covenants alone. It lies in the hearts and minds of all people. So let us not rest all our hopes on parchment and on paper, let us strive to build peace, a desire for peace, a willingness to work for peace in the hearts and minds of all of our people. I believe that we can. I believe the problems of human destiny are not beyond the reach of human beings.
    • John F. Kennedy

  • One of the most persistent ambiguities that we face is that everybody talks about peace as a goal. However, it does not take sharpest-eyed sophistication to discern that while everbody talks about peace, peace has become practically nobody's business among the power-wielders. Many men cry Peace! Peace! but they refuse to do the things that make for peace.
    • Martin Luther King, Jr.

  • One day we must come to see that peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but that it is a means by which we arrive at that goal. We must pursue peaceful ends through peaceful means.
    • Martin Luther King, Jr.

  • If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace.
    • John Lennon

  • If you stop calling him your opponent, then perhaps he can join you as a partner.
    • Tristan J. Loo

  • The environment is very important in the aspects of peace because when we destroy our resources, they become scarce and we fight over that.
    • Wangari Maathai

  • Peace sells... But who's buying?
    • Megadeth

  • Peace demands the most heroic labor and the most difficult sacrifice. It demands greater heroism than war. It demands greater fidelity to the truth and a much more perfect purity of conscience.
    • Thomas Merton

  • We cannot have peace if we are only concerned with peace. War is not an accident. It is the logical outcome of a certain way of life. If we want to attack war, we have to attack that way of life.
    • A.J. Muste

  • Peace is not merely an absence of war. It is also a state of mind. Lasting peace can come only to peaceful people.
    • Jawaharlal Nehru

  • Peace cannot suddenly descend from the heavens. It can only come when the root causes of the trouble are removed."
    • Jawaharlal Nehru

  • This is the way of peace: overcome evil with good, and falsehood with truth, and hatred with love.
    • "Peace Pilgrim" Mildred Lisette Norman

  • When you find peace within yourself, you become the kind of person who can live at peace with others.
    • "Peace Pilgrim" Mildred Lisette Norman

  • One little person, giving all of her time to peace, makes news. Many people, giving some of their time, can make history.
    • "Peace Pilgrim" Mildred Lisette Norman

  • Pacifists are objectively pro-fascist.
    • George Orwell

  • As people are not eaten, butchering them is of no use.
    • Arndt Pekurinen

  • Five great enemies of peace inhabit with us—avarice, ambition, envy, anger and pride; if these were to be banished, we should infallibly enjoy perpetual peace.
    • Petrarch

  • The structure of world peace cannot be the work of one man or one party or one nation. It must be a peace which rests on the cooperative effort of the whole world.
    • Franklin Delano Roosevelt

  • It's odd how those who dismiss the peace movement as utopian, don't hesitate to proffer the most absurdly dreamy reasons for going to war: to stamp out terrorism, install democracy, eliminate fascism, and most entertainingly, to "rid the world of evil-doers.
    • Arundhati Roy

  • Cooperation + Tolerance = Peace
    • Adi Da Samraj

  • Until he extends the circle of compassion to all living things, man will not himself find peace.
    • Albert Schweitzer

  • Truth is [justice’s] handmaid, freedom is its child, peace is its companion, safety walks in its steps, victory follows in its train...
    • Sydney Smith

  • All roads lead to Rome, but some roads to peace lead straight to Pompeii.
    • Leonid S. Sukhorukov

  • Peace has to be created, in order to be maintained. It is the product of Faith, Strength, Energy, Will, Sympathy, Justice, Imagination, and the triumph of principle. It will never be achieved by passivity and quietism.
    • Dorothy Thompson

  • Peace is not the absence of conflict but the presence of creative alternatives for responding to conflict — alternatives to passive or aggressive responses, alternatives to violence.
    • Dorothy Thompson

  • Anyone can love peace, but Jesus didn't say, "Blessed are the peace-lovers." He says peacemakers. He is referring to a life vocation, not a hobby on the sidelines of life.
    • Jim Wallis

  • Most people think of peace as a state of Nothing Bad Happening, or Nothing Much Happening. Yet if peace is to overtake us and make ust he gift of serenity and well-being, it will have to be the state of Something Good Happening.
    • E. B. White

  • Violence will give you violence and Peace will give you peace. Choose what you want.
    • By:- R K Srivastava
 
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