Tolerance Quotes

“I do not believe, from what I have been told about this people, that there is anything barbarous or savage about them, except that we all call barbarous anything that is contrary to our own habits.”
― Michel de Montaigne, The Complete Essays

“A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends.”
― Henry Wallace

“All men are made one for another: either then teach them better or bear with them.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“Wide differences of opinion in matters of religious, political, and social belief must exist if conscience and intellect alike are not to be stunted, if there is to be room for healthy growth.”
― Theodore Roosevelt, The Man In The Arena: Speeches and Essays by Theodore Roosevelt

“I think that everything should be made available to everybody, and I mean LSD, cocaine, codeine, grass, opium, the works. Nothing on earth available to any man should be confiscated and made unlawful by other men in more seemingly powerful and advantageous positions.”
― Charles Bukowski

“Discord is the great ill of mankind; and tolerance is the only remedy for it.”
― Voltaire, Philosophical Dictionary

“This mindless tolerance, which places observable scientific facts, subject to proof, on the same level as unprovable supernatural fantasy, has played a major role in the resurgence of both anti-intellectualism and anti-rationalism.”
― Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason

“One race,
Many cultures,
One place.”
― Geoffrey M. Gluckman, Deadly Exchange

“We must not be frightened nor cajoled
into accepting evil as deliverance from evil.
We must go on struggling to be human,
though monsters of abstraction
police and threaten us.

Reclaim now, now renew the vision of
a human world where godliness
is possible and man
is neither gook nigger honkey wop nor kike

but man

permitted to be man.”
― Robert Hayden, Collected Poems

“If people but knew their own religion, how tolerant they would become, and how free from any grudge against the religion of others.”
― Hazrat Inayat Khan, The bowl of saki: Thoughts for daily contemplation from the sayings and teachings of Hazrat Inayat Khan

“The test of faith is whether I can make space for difference. Can I recognize God's image in someone who is not in my image, who language, faith, ideal, are different from mine? If I cannot, then I have made God in my image instead of allowing him to remake me in his.”
― Jonathan Sacks, The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations

“As fallible humans, we usually slip too far over one edge or the other - all wrath and judgment or all grace and love.”
― Eric Wilson, A Shred of Truth

“For me, religion is like a rhinoceros: I don't have one, and I'd really prefer not to be trampled by yours.”
― Silas Sparkhammer

“All I require of a religion is that it be tolerant of those who do not agree with it.”
― Roger Ebert, Life Itself

“A man must have a good deal of vanity who believes, and a good deal of boldness who affirms, that all the doctrines he holds are true, and all he rejects are false.”
― Benjamin Franklin, A Benjamin Franklin Reader: The Essential Writings of a Colonial Sage

“I'm not out to disturb anybody's faith. I happen to be happy and comfortable with a belief system that has a dual deity and operates on a lunar schedule. It suits my needs. If you happen to be happy and comfortable with a belief system that features a single masculine deity and operates on a solar schedule, fine. I don't give a fat damn. What matters is what you do, not who's name you do it in.”
― Mercedes Lackey, Burning Water

“The question has often been asked; Is Buddhism a religion or a philosophy? It does not matter what you call it. Buddhism remains what it is whatever label you may put on it. The label is immaterial. Even the label 'Buddhism' which we give to the teachings of the Buddha is of little importance. The name one gives is inessential.... In the same way Truth needs no label: it is neither Buddhist, Christian, Hindu nor Moslem. It is not the monopoly of anybody. Sectarian labels are a hindrance to the independent understanding of Truth, and they produce harmful prejudices in men's minds.”
― Walpola Rahula, What the Buddha Taught

“The West's post-Holocaust pledge that genocide would never again be tolerated proved to be hollow, and for all the fine sentiments inspired by the memory of Auschwitz, the problem remains that denouncing evil is a far cry from doing good.”
― Philip Gourevitch, We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families

“Always hear others out and remain open-minded; the day you think you know everything is the day you have the most yet to learn.”
― A.J. Darkholme, Rise of the Morningstar

“Wisdom is justified by all her children.
Luke 7:35”
― Anonymous, Holy Bible: New International Version

“What is tolerance? It is a necessary consequence of humanity. We are all fallible, let us then pardon each other's follies. This is the first principle of natural right.”
― Voltaire, Philosophical Dictionary

“As you walk, hop, hobble, or wheel
Meeting people of different kinds,
Remember that being handicapped
Is only a state of mind”
― Stephen Cosgrove, Fanny

“If you accept others as equals, you embrace them unconditionally, now and forever. But if you let them know that you tolerate them, you suggest in the same breath that they are actually an inconvenience, like a nagging pain or an unpleasant odour you are willing to disregard.”
― Arthur Japin, In Lucia's Eyes

“ALL ROADS LEAD TO ROME, BUT A LOT OF PEOPLE STILL THINK THERE IS ONLY ONE WAY TO GET THERE, THEIR OWN WAY, AND IF WE DIDN'T FOLLOW IT, WE WOULD ALL GET LOST.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“We are living in an era in which billions of people are grappling to promote communication, tolerance, and understanding over the more destructive forces of war, terrorism, and political chaos that have characterized the beginning of the 21st Century.”
― Aberjhani, Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry

“TOLERANCE DOES NOT MEAN TOLERATING NONSENSE.”
― Mouloud Benzadi

“A certain amount of creativity and rebellion must be tolerated - or welcomed, depending on your point of view - to maintain the process of regeneration. Every rule was once a creative act, breaking other rules.”
― Jordan B. Peterson, Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life

“Common man's patience will bring him more happiness than common man's power.”
― Amit Kalantri, Wealth of Words

“...what a surprise (we all know how tolerant the tolerant are)-...”
― Junot Díaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

“I have often noticed that these things, which obsess me, neither bother nor impress other people even slightly. I am horribly apt to approach some innocent at a gathering, and like the ancient mariner, fix him with a wild, glitt’ring eye and say, “Do you know that in the head of the caterpillar of the ordinary goat moth there are two hundred twenty-eight separate muscles?” The poor wretch flees. I am not making chatter; I mean to change his life.”
― Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek