Quotes on Empathy

I believe empathy is the most essential quality of civilization.

I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.

When two people relate to each other authentically and humanly, God is the electricity that surges between them.

Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.

Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice; Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

If we are to love our neighbors, before doing anything else we must see our neighbors. With our imagination as well as our eyes, that is to say like artists, we must see not just their faces but the life behind and within their faces. Here it is love that is the frame we see them in.

There are many respects in which America, if it can bring itself to act with the magnanimity and the empathy appropriate to its size and power, can be an intelligent example to the world.