Quotations about Community
In Grief or Happiness, in Strife or Labor,
There is no Man but sometime needs his Neighbor.
~Arthur Guiterman, "Of Neighborliness," A Poet's Proverbs, 1924
One is a member of a country, a profession, a civilization, a religion. One is not just a man. ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Wartime Writings 1939–1944, translated from the French by Norah Purcell
We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future. ~Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1940
Every individual has a place to fill in the world, and is important, in some respects, whether he chooses to be so or not. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne, 1836
Independence? That's middle class blasphemy. We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth. ~Bernard Shaw, Pygmalion, 1912 [Higgins
Each of us is a being in himself and a being in society, each of us needs to understand himself and understand others, take care of others and be taken care of himself. ~Haniel Long
A man is called selfish, not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbours'. ~Richard Whately
A machine has value only as it produces more than it consumes — so check your value to the community. ~Martin H. Fischer
If he is wise, the retired man will immediately try to interest himself in public duties. This, of course, embraces good work in his immediate neighborhood. When he places his accumulated experience and ability at the disposal of his fellow-man he serves himself at the same time. ~Andrew Carnegie
Basic to man's existence is a sense of indebtedness... to society... to God. What is emerging in our age is a strange inversion. Modern man believes that the world is indebted to him... His standard and preoccupation: What will I get out of life? Suppressed is the question: What will life, what will society get out of me? ~Abraham J. Heschel, "Essay on Youth," 1960
For, on this shrunken globe, men can no longer live as strangers. ~Adlai E. Stevenson, c.1961
I nod to a passing stranger, and the stranger nods back, and two human beings go off, feeling a little less anonymous. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
We are all benefactors and beneficiaries, since dependent upon each other. ~James Lendall Basford (1845–1915), Seven Seventy Seven Sensations, 1897
Harriet had long considered that one reason for the very slow advancement of civilization was that men had ever busied themselves with supernatural concerns, and in fearsome endeavors to make themselves secure for another world had neglected this. Man had tried to make peace with the skies instead of peace with his neighbor. ~Elbert Hubbard, "Harriet Martineau," Little Journeys to the Homes of Famous Women, 1897
What you discover in a democracy is that it is difficult to build a house when each nail has an opinion. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com
While the spirit of neighborliness was important on the frontier because neighbors were so few, it is even more important now because our neighbors are so many. ~Claudia Alta Taylor “Lady Bird” Johnson
The challenges we face are far too big to be solved by a few chosen people. It's all of our jobs to work for each other now. To believe in our own efficacy to help our communities. Not to solve the problems of the world, but to help the people around us in any and every way we can. That feels right to me. ~Jeb Dickerson, 2019
The fabric of our complex society is woven too tightly to permit any part of it to be damaged without damaging the whole. ~Joseph R. Biden, Jr., 1972
In the end, poverty, putridity and pestilence; work, wealth and worry; health, happiness and hell, all simmer down into village problems. ~Martin H. Fischer