Quotes and anectdotes from the wise to the foolish, and the courageous to the drunk

society

Aesthetic matters are fundamental for the harmonious development of both society and the individual. 29 quotes from Friedrich Schiller

All are agreed, that the increase of learning and good morals are great blessings to society. 2 wisdom & wit from Joseph Lancaster

As a remedy to life in society I would suggest the big city. Nowadays, it is the only desert within our means. 52 wisdom & wit from Albert Camus

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. 98 quotes from Mark Twain

Fascism is not in itself a new order of society. It is the future refusing to be born. 11 sayings from Aneurin Bevan

If you want to use a cliche you must take full responsibility for it yourself and not try to fob it off on anon., or on society. 3 quotes from Lewis Thomas

If you wish to appear agreeable in society, you must consent to be taught many things which you know already. 6 wisdom & wit from Johann Kaspar Lavater

In the society, where people are just parts in a larger machine, individuals are unable to develop fully. 29 other quotes from Friedrich Schiller

Society therefore is an ancient as the world. 78 other quotes from Voltaire

The family is the first essential cell of human society. 9 views from Pope John XXIII

The finest clothing made is a person's own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this. 98 quotes from Mark Twain

The forces in a capitalist society, if left unchecked, tend to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. 11 quotes from Jawaharlal Nehru

The key to organizing an alternative society is to organize people around what they can do, and more importantly, what they want to do. 3 more sayings from Abbie Hoffman

The society based on production is only productive, not creative. 52 wisdom & wit from Albert Camus

There is only one way left to escape the alienation of present day society: to retreat ahead of it. 2 quotes from Roland Barthes

To give aid to every poor man is far beyond the reach and power of every man. Care of the poor is incumbent on society as a whole. 18 quotes from Baruch Spinoza

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology. 9 more quotes from Carl Sagan

Genuine equality between the sexes can only be realized in the process of the socialist transformation of society as a whole. 12 other sayings from Mao Zedong

I can imagine no society which does not embody some method of arbitration. 7 quotes from Herbert Read

Music is always a commentary on society. 12 other quotes from Frank Zappa

Progress is measured by the degree of differentiation within a society. 7 more thoughts from Herbert Read

Society is like the air, necessary to breathe but insufficient to live on. 46 other wisdom & wit from George Santayana

The farther a society progresses, the more clearly the individual becomes the antithesis of the group. 7 quotes from Herbert Read

There can be hope only for a society which acts as one big family, not as many separate ones. 5 quotes from Anwar Sadat

We won't have a society if we destroy the environment. 18 quotes from Margaret Mead

What I do deny is that you can build any enduring society without some such mystical ethos. 7 quotes from Herbert Read

Banks are an almost irresistible attraction for that element of our society which seeks unearned money. 2 quotes from J. Edgar Hoover

Has there ever been a society which has died of dissent? Several have died of conformity in our lifetime. 6 wisdom & wit from Jacob Bronowski

I think the first duty of society is justice. 13 quotes from Alexander Hamilton

In a society which is structured the wrong way, piety has no effect. 17 views from Friedrich Durrenmatt

In these times you have to be an optimist to open your eyes when you awake in the morning. 24 quotes from Carl Sandburg

Nobility is a graceful ornament to the civil order. It is the Corinthian capital of polished society. 37 quotes from Edmund Burke

One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam. 41 quotes from Martin Luther King, Jr.

Society can overlook murder, adultery or swindling it never forgives preaching of a new gospel. 37 quotes from Edmund Burke

Society cares for the individual only so far as he is profitable. 12 wisdom & wit from Simone de Beauvoir

Society is like a stew. If you don't stir it up every once in a while then a layer of scum floats to the top. 10 views from Edward Abbey

Society is now one polished horde, formed of two mighty tries, the Bores and Bored. 36 wisdom & wit from Lord Byron

Society is the union of men and not the men themselves. 10 thoughts from Charles de Secondat

Solitude is better than the society of evil persons. 21 more views from Abu Bakr

The only society I like is rough and tough, and the tougher the better. There's where you get down to bedrock and meet human people. 2 views from Robert W. Service

The people I respect most behave as if they were immortal and as if society was eternal. 26 more quotes from E. M. Forster

The rights of democracy are not reserved for a select group within society, they are the rights of all the people. 2 more quotes from Olof Palme

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom. 16 quotes from Isaac Asimov

The world is governed more by appearance than realities so that it is fully as necessary to seem to know something as to know it. 12 sayings from Daniel Webster

We are trying to construct a more inclusive society. We are going to make a country in which no one is left out. 24 more views from Franklin D. Roosevelt

A junkie is someone who uses their body to tell society that something is wrong. 2 quotes from Stella Adler

American society is a sort of flat, fresh-water pond which absorbs silently, without reaction, anything which is thrown into it. 22 more thoughts from Henry Adams

Freedom in art, freedom in society, this is the double goal towards which all consistent and logical minds must strive. 73 other quotes from Victor Hugo

In every interview I have ever read or seen or taken part in, the final question in our future-oriented society is always, What next? 14 quotes from Jessica Savitch

Individual rights are the means of subordinating society to moral law. 24 quotes from Ayn Rand

Men of genius are often dull and inert in society as the blazing meteor, when it descends to earth, is only a stone. 26 other thoughts from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. 24 other thoughts from Ayn Rand

No good is ever done to society by the pictorial representation of its diseases. 45 other sayings from John Ruskin

Society cannot share a common communication system so long as it is split into warring factions. 14 quotes from Bertolt Brecht

Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best stage, is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one. 31 other thoughts from Thomas Paine

Solitude is as needful to the imagination as society is wholesome for the character. 24 views from James Russell Lowell

Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society. 31 more quotes from Thomas Paine

That sort of half sigh, which, accompanied by two or three slight nods of the head, is pity's small change in general society. 26 thoughts from Charles Dickens

The first sign of corruption in a society that is still alive is that the end justifies the means. 7 quotes from Georges Bernanos

The test of one's behavior pattern is their relationship to society, relationship to work and relationship to sex. 9 other views from Alfred Adler

The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children. 7 other views from Dietrich Bonhoeffer

The ultimate test of a moral society is the kind of world that it leaves to its children. 7 other quotes from Dietrich Bonhoeffer

There couldn't be a society of people who didn't dream. They'd be dead in two weeks. 9 other wisdom & wit from William S. Burroughs

There is one, and only one, thing in modern society more hideous than crime namely, repressive justice. 25 more quotes from Simone Weil

A civilized society is one which tolerates eccentricity to the point of doubtful sanity. 50 quotes from Robert Frost

A pure democracy is a society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the government in person. 27 quotes from James Madison

All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded the individual. 105 quotes from Albert Einstein

Badger hates Society, and invitations, and dinner, and all that sort of thing. 2 views from Kenneth Grahame

Do you know what we are those of us who count as pillars of society? We are society's tools, neither more nor less. 11 other wisdom & wit from Henrik Ibsen

If society fits you comfortably enough, you call it freedom. 50 quotes from Robert Frost

Most of the change we think we see in life is due to truths being in and out of favor. 50 views from Robert Frost

Sex is the mysticism of materialism and the only possible religion in a materialistic society. 8 quotes from Malcolm Muggeridge

Society attacks early, when the individual is helpless. 7 more wisdom & wit from B. F. Skinner

The best things and best people rise out of their separateness I'm against a homogenized society because I want the cream to rise. 50 views from Robert Frost

The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that man may become robots. 16 more quotes from Erich Fromm

The pillars of truth and the pillars of freedom - they are the pillars of society. 11 wisdom & wit from Henrik Ibsen

The spirit of truth and the spirit of freedom - these are the pillars of society. 11 other wisdom & wit from Henrik Ibsen

The worst enemy of truth and freedom in our society is the compact majority. 11 sayings from Henrik Ibsen

Tolerance is the price we pay for living in a free, pluralistic society. 5 wisdom & wit from Robert Casey

Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age? 16 sayings from Erich Fromm

A great man is different from an eminent one in that he is ready to be the servant of the society. 6 other wisdom & wit from B. R. Ambedkar

A liberal education is at the heart of a civil society, and at the heart of a liberal education is the act of teaching. 2 wisdom & wit from A. Bartlett Giamatti

A work of art has no importance whatever to society. It is only important to the individual. 9 wisdom & wit from Vladimir Nabokov

Cockroaches and socialites are the only things that can stay up all night and eat anything. 2 views from Herb Caen

Freedom in capitalist society always remains about the same as it was in ancient Greek republics: Freedom for slave owners. 14 views from Vladimir Lenin

I do earnestly wish to see the distinction of sex confounded in society, unless where love animates the behaviour. 6 wisdom & wit from Mary Wollstonecraft

Men and women must be educated, in a great degree, by the opinions and manners of the society they live in. 6 views from Mary Wollstonecraft

Society exists for the benefit of its members, not the members for the benefit of society. 20 wisdom & wit from Herbert Spencer

Society is composed of two great classes those who have more dinners than appetite, and those who have more appetite than dinners. 11 thoughts from Nicolas Chamfort

Society is not a disease, it is a disaster. What a stupid miracle that one can live in it. 18 quotes from Emile M. Cioran

The art of the parenthesis is one of the greatest secrets of eloquence in Society. 11 wisdom & wit from Nicolas Chamfort

The great hope of society is in individual character. 11 thoughts from William Ellery Channing

The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice, it is conformity. 6 more quotes from Rollo May

Travel and society polish one, but a rolling stone gathers no moss, and a little moss is a good thing on a man. 17 views from John Burroughs

Truth is certainly a branch of morality and a very important one to society. 70 wisdom & wit from Thomas Jefferson

All literary men are Red Sox fans - to be a Yankee fan in a literate society is to endanger your life. 9 quotes from John Cheever

Capital is reckless of the health or length of life of the laborer, unless under compulsion from society. 21 more quotes from Karl Marx

Civilized society is perpetually menaced with disintegration through this primary hostility of men towards one another. 26 quotes from Sigmund Freud

Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another. 52 thoughts from Gilbert K. Chesterton

Exclusiveness in a garden is a mistake as great as it is in society. 3 sayings from Alfred Austin

If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. 46 quotes from John F. Kennedy

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him. 46 quotes from John F. Kennedy

In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality. 21 views from Karl Marx

In every society some men are born to rule, and some to advise. 135 quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. 9 other views from Jiddu Krishnamurti

It's no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. 9 views from Jiddu Krishnamurti

Nature makes only dumb animals. We owe the fools to society. 53 quotes from Honore de Balzac

Princes and governments are far more dangerous than other elements within society. 23 views from Niccolo Machiavelli

Society bristles with enigmas which look hard to solve. It is a perfect maze of intrigue. 53 other wisdom & wit from Honore de Balzac

Society does not consist of individuals but expresses the sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand. 21 quotes from Karl Marx

Society is always taken by surprise at any new example of common sense. 135 other wisdom & wit from Ralph Waldo Emerson

Society is one vast conspiracy for carving one into the kind of statue likes, and then placing it in the most convenient niche it has. 2 quotes from Randolph Bourne

Suicide, moreover, was at the time in vogue in Paris: what more suitable key to the mystery of life for a skeptical society? 53 more sayings from Honore de Balzac

The emphasis on the birth of Christ tends to polarize our pluralistic society and create legal and ethnic belligerence. 4 quotes from John Clayton

The enemy of society is middle class and the enemy of life is middle age. 15 views from Orson Welles

The fundamental defect of fathers, in our competitive society, is that they want their children to be a credit to them. 45 thoughts from Bertrand Russell

The individual is not accountable to society for his actions in so far as these concern the interests of no person but himself. 11 quotes from John Stuart Mill

The most dangerous creation of any society is the man who has nothing to lose. 24 more thoughts from James A. Baldwin

The value of a dollar is social, as it is created by society. 135 other thoughts from Ralph Waldo Emerson

Unfortunately, our affluent society has also been an effluent society. 16 wisdom & wit from Hubert H. Humphrey

A nation is a society united by a delusion about its ancestry and by common hatred of its neighbours. 10 other sayings from William Ralph Inge

Advertising reflects the mores of society, but it does not influence them. 11 other sayings from David Ogilvy

Before a group can enter the open society, it must first close ranks. 8 quotes from Stokely Carmichael

Cruelty is the law pervading all nature and society and we can't get out of it if we would. 14 more quotes from Thomas Hardy

Drugs are merely the most obvious form of addiction in our society. Drug addiction is one of the things that undermines traditional values. 20 sayings from Christopher Lasch

Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers. 21 more sayings from Mignon McLaughlin

In our society, daily experience teaches the individual to want and need a never-ending supply of new toys and drugs. 20 wisdom & wit from Christopher Lasch

Individual commitment to a group effort - that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work. 16 sayings from Vince Lombardi

Law represents the effort of man to organize society governments, the efforts of selfishness to overthrow liberty. 58 more thoughts from Henry Ward Beecher

No society can surely be flourishing and happy, of which the far greater part of the members are poor and miserable. 9 thoughts from Adam Smith

People who work together will win, whether it be against complex football defenses, or the problems of modern society. 16 quotes from Vince Lombardi

Society has always seemed to demand a little more from human beings than it will get in practice. 47 views from George Orwell

Society honors its living conformists and its dead troublemakers. 21 quotes from Mignon McLaughlin

The model of ownership, in a society organized round mass consumption, is addiction. 20 other sayings from Christopher Lasch

The most unpardonable sin in society is independence of thought. 10 other quotes from Emma Goldman

The most violent element in society is ignorance. 10 quotes from Emma Goldman

A society that gets rid of all its troublemakers goes downhill. 14 views from Robert A. Heinlein

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life. 14 sayings from Robert A. Heinlein

Art is the close scrutiny of reality and therefore I put on the stage only those things that I know happen in our society. 3 more thoughts from Edward Bond

As in geology, so in social institutions, we may discover the causes of all past changes in the present invariable order of society. 117 other quotes from Henry David Thoreau

Do not waste your time on Social Questions. What is the matter with the poor is Poverty what is the matter with the rich is Uselessness. 115 quotes from George Bernard Shaw

Good humor is one of the best articles of dress one can wear in society. 8 other quotes from William Makepeace Thackeray

I am now quite cured of seeking pleasure in society, be it country or town. A sensible man ought to find sufficient company in himself. 6 other quotes from Emily Bronte

I had three chairs in my house one for solitude, two for friendship, three for society. 117 thoughts from Henry David Thoreau

In my afternoon walk I would fain forget all my morning occupations and my obligations to society. 117 quotes from Henry David Thoreau

It is impossible, in our condition of Society, not to be sometimes a Snob. 8 other thoughts from William Makepeace Thackeray

It is not a fragrant world. 8 sayings from Raymond Chandler

Religion enabled society to organise itself to debate goodness, just as Greek drama had once done. 3 quotes from Edward Bond

Television is just one more facet of that considerable segment of our society that never had any standard but the soft buck. 8 wisdom & wit from Raymond Chandler

The chief product of an automated society is a widespread and deepening sense of boredom. 4 sayings from C. Northcote Parkinson

The health of a democratic society may be measured by the quality of functions performed by private citizens. 19 quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville

The human mind is a dramatic structure in itself and our society is absolutely saturated with drama. 3 views from Edward Bond

The Internet: transforming society and shaping the future through chat. 27 other wisdom & wit from Dave Barry

There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other. 31 thoughts from Eric Hoffer

What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on? 117 more wisdom & wit from Henry David Thoreau

What's done to children, they will do to society. 3 quotes from Karl A. Menninger

As society advances the standard of poverty rises. 2 more quotes from Theodore Parker

I believe we can continue the Great Society while we fight in Vietnam. 24 more views from Lyndon B. Johnson

If people did not compliment one another there would be little society. 10 quotes from Luc de Clapiers

Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both. 2 more wisdom & wit from C. Wright Mills

Our individual lives cannot, generally, be works of art unless the social order is also. 5 wisdom & wit from Charles Horton Cooley

Racism is taught in our society, it is not automatic. It is learned behavior toward persons with dissimilar physical characteristics. 3 quotes from Alex Haley

The imaginations which people have of one another are the solid facts of society. 5 views from Charles Horton Cooley

The reason why men enter into society is the preservation of their property. 15 sayings from John Locke

The regeneration of society is the regeneration of society by individual education. 26 more thoughts from Jean de la Bruyere

The wise person often shuns society for fear of being bored. 26 other thoughts from Jean de la Bruyere

To conclude that women are unfitted to the task of our historic society seems to me the equivalent of closing male eyes to female facts. 24 quotes from Lyndon B. Johnson

We have the opportunity to move not only toward the rich society and the powerful society, but upward to the Great Society. 24 other sayings from Lyndon B. Johnson

A society made up of individuals who were all capable of original thought would probably be unendurable. 60 wisdom & wit from H. L. Mencken

Comedy, we may say, is society protecting itself - with a smile. 9 quotes from J. B. Priestley

I can't say that I've changed anybody's life, ever, and that's the real work of the world, if you want a better society. 8 wisdom & wit from Charles Kuralt

In a free society the state does not administer the affairs of men. It administers justice among men who conduct their own affairs. 8 other quotes from Walter Lippmann

Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions. 63 sayings from Samuel Johnson

Modern society, based as it is on the division of labor, can be preserved only under conditions of lasting peace. 10 quotes from Ludwig von Mises

No emancipation without that of society. 26 thoughts from Theodor Adorno

Not only is the self entwined in society it owes society its existence in the most literal sense. 26 quotes from Theodor Adorno

Society lives by faith, and develops by science. 24 views from Henri Frederic Amiel

Technological society has succeeded in multiplying the opportunities for pleasure, but it has great difficulty in generating joy. 7 more thoughts from Pope Paul VI

There are a great many men valued in society who have nothing to recommend them but serviceable vices. 90 more thoughts from Francois de La Rochefoucauld

You can find your way across this country using burger joints the way a navigator uses stars. 8 more quotes from Charles Kuralt

A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both. 33 quotes from Dwight D. Eisenhower

Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society. 18 other quotes from John Adams

Arguments are extremely vulgar, for everyone in good society holds exactly the same opinion. 100 wisdom & wit from Oscar Wilde

Be able to be alone. Lose not the advantage of solitude, and the society of thyself. 8 quotes from Thomas Browne

Because power corrupts, society's demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases. 18 more views from John Adams

Civilization is unbearable, but it is less unbearable at the top. 6 thoughts from Timothy Leary

I suppose society is wonderfully delightful. To be in it is merely a bore. But to be out of it is simply a tragedy. 100 wisdom & wit from Oscar Wilde

If one could only teach the English how to talk, and the Irish how to listen, society here would be quite civilized. 100 wisdom & wit from Oscar Wilde

Justice must always question itself, just as society can exist only by means of the work it does on itself and on its institutions. 2 views from Michel Foucault

Measures must always in a progressive society be held superior to men, who are after all imperfect instruments, working for their fulfilment. 100 quotes from Mahatma Gandhi

Patriotism is an ephemeral motive that scarcely ever outlasts the particular threat to society that aroused it. 16 sayings from Denis Diderot

Society can exist only on the basis that there is some amount of polished lying and that no one says exactly what he thinks. 4 thoughts from Lin Yutang

Society exists only as a mental concept in the real world there are only individuals. 100 sayings from Oscar Wilde

The first principle of a free society is an untrammeled flow of words in an open forum. 24 sayings from Adlai E. Stevenson

The function of the press in society is to inform, but its role in society is to make money. 4 quotes from A. J. Liebling

The happiness of society is the end of government. 18 more quotes from John Adams

The progress of society is mainly the improvement in the condition of the workingmen of the world. 6 quotes from Rutherford B. Hayes

There is more to life than increasing its speed. 100 quotes from Mahatma Gandhi

To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society. 36 wisdom & wit from Theodore Roosevelt

War is the supreme drama of a completely mechanized society. 8 wisdom & wit from Lewis Mumford

We seek to create a united Democratic and non-racial society. 2 wisdom & wit from Oliver Tambo

You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty. 100 more sayings from Mahatma Gandhi