Bethany

“We need to see people other than ourselves in order to empathize. If we don't live around others we do ourselves and our society damage because our ability to relate becomes impaired. It's easy to demonize, or simply dismiss, people you don't know or see...It's nearly impossible to commiserate with the unseen and unknown.”
― Charles Blow

“Tommy had felt alone in a crowd before, even inferior to everyone in a crowd, but now he felt, well, different. It wasn't just the clothes and the make up, it was the humanity. He wasn't part of it. Heightened senses or not, he felt like he had his nose pressed against the window, looking in. The problem was, it was the window of a donut shop.”
― Christopher Moore, You Suck

“Resting on what's considered great has always been a recipe for decline. I remember touring Rome with a guide who pointed out one marvelous achievement after another of the first Roman emperor, Augustus. Augustus was said to have inherited a city of brick and left a city of marble, with twelve entrances on twelve hills. He built nearly a thousand glorious new structures - bridges, buildings, monuments, and aqueducts. As we marveled at the remnants of Augustus's grand designs, our guide exclaimed with pride that this era marked the pinnacle of Rome's greatness.
What came next?' I asked.
After an awkward silence, the guide said, 'Slow ruin.”
― Robert K. Cooper

“God said, "Thou shalt not kill" - does the theft of a little money make it quite all right for us to do so? If it's said that this commandment applies only to illegal killing, what's to prevent human beings from similarly agreeing among themselves to legalize certain types of rape, adultery, or perjury? Considering that God has forbidden us even to kill ourselves, can we really believe that purely human arrangements for the regulation of mutual slaughter are enough, without any divine authority, to exempt executioners from the sixth commandment? Isn't that like saying that this particular commandment has no more validity than human laws allow it? - in which case the principle can be extended indefinitely, until in all spheres of life human beings decide just how far God's commandments may conveniently be observed.”
― Thomas More