“After long centuries, agrarian civilization is weakening. Is sufficient attention being devoted to the arrangement and improvement of the life of the country people, whose inferior and at times miserable economic situation provokes the flight to the unhappy crowded conditions of the city outskirts, where neither employment nor housing awaits them?” PeopleLongCountryCitiesAttentionSituationEconomicLandConditionsCenturyCivilizationImprovementUnhappyFlightEmploymentMiserableSufficientDevotedInferiorsProvokingArrangementsHousingCrowdedWeakening Author:Pope Paul VI
“The condition of mankind is, and always has been, so miserable and depraved that, if anyone were to say to the poet: "For God's sake stop singing and do something useful like putting on the kettle or fetching bandages," what just reason could he give for refusing?” IfsGivingHas BeensReasonConditionsMankindPoetSingingSakeMiserableDepravedKettlesBandages Author:W. H. Auden
“En un mot, l'homme conna|"t qu'il est mise rable: il est donc mise rable, puisqu'il l'est; mais il est bien grand, puisqu'il le conna|"t. In one word, man knows that he is miserable and therefore he is miserable because he knows it; but he is also worthy, because he knows his condition.” KnowsMenConditionsWorthyMiserableOne Word Author:Blaise Pascal
“There is speaking well, speaking easily, speaking justly and speaking seasonably: It is offending against the last, to speak of entertainments before the indigent; of sound limbs and health before the infirm; of houses and lands before one who has not so much as a dwelling; in a word, to speak of your prosperity before the miserable; this conversation is cruel, and the comparison which naturally arises in them betwixt their condition and yours is excruciating.” WellsLastsHouseSpeakSoundLandConditionsConversationProsperityEntertainmentAriseMiserableComparisonLimbsDwellingOffendingSpeaking Well Author:Jean de la Bruyere
“Religion prescribes to every miserable man the means of bettering his condition; nay, it shows him that the bearing of his afflictions as he ought to do, will naturally end in the removal of them.” MenMeanEndsShowsConditionsOughtSorrowMiserableAfflictionRemoval Book:The spectator Source: The spectator
“Under miserable conditions of life, any vision of the possibility of better things makes the present misery more intolerable, and spurs those who suffer to the most energetic struggles to improve their lot, and if these struggles only immediately result in sharper misery, the outcome is sheer desperation.” IfsSufferingResultsVisionStruggleConditionsPossibilityMiseryMiserableOutcomesSheerDesperationEnergeticSpurs Book:Anarchism: Top Crime Collections Source: Anarchism: Top Crime Collections
“He that hath a blind conscience which sees nothing, a dead conscience which feels nothing, and a dumb conscience which says nothing, is in as miserable a condition as a man can be on this side of hell.” MenFeelsSidesHellConditionsConscienceBlindMiserableDumb Author:Patrick Henry
“An indiscriminate distrust of human nature is the worst consequence of a miserable condition, whether brought about by innocence or guilt. And though want of suspicion more than want of sense, sometimes leads a man into harm; yet too much suspicion is as bad as too little sense.” MenWantHumansLittlesSometimesToo MuchWorstConditionsHuman NatureConsequenceGuiltHarmMiserableInnocenceSuspicionDistrust Book:Israel Potter: Works of Melville Source: Israel Potter: Works of Melville
“To be afraid is the miserable condition of a coward. To do wrong, or omit to do right from fear, is to superadd delinquency to cowardice.” ConditionsMiserableCowardCowardiceDelinquency Author:David Dudley Field II
“I come to present the strong claims of suffering humanity. I come to place before the Legislature of Massachusetts the condition of the miserable, the desolate, the outcast. I come as the advocate of helpless, forgotten, insane men and women; of beings sunk to a condition from which the unconcerned world would start with real horror.” MenWorldRealSufferingHumanityStrongConditionsHorrorMen And WomenClaimsForgottenInsaneMiserableHelplessLegislatureOutcastAsylumsMassachusettsDesolateUnconcerned Author:Dorothea Dix
“Like his admirer Samuel Beckett, Johnson locates his voices among conditions of such deprivation that even the most miserable memories are gilded by comparison: this paradox fuels equal parts of comedy and pathos. Never sentimental, at once corrosive and elegiac, House Mother Normal is a remarkable achievement.” MotherHouseVoiceMemoriesComedyConditionsEqualNormalAchievementMiserableFuelRemarkableComparisonParadoxSentimentalJohnsonDeprivationAdmirerPathosBeckettGilded Author:James Marcus
“To a child who dies, and to the parents of this child, will you speak, if religion consoles them, in praise of atheism? That one does not mistake: that, to my mind, does not prove anything against atheism and much against religion. "The heart of a heartless world, said Marx, the soul of soulless conditions." It is misery that makes religion, and it is why this one is miserable. Who would prohibit opium to a dying man? And what are we, out of oblivion or entertainment, anything else but dying?” IfsMenWorldMindHeartChildrenDoeSaidSoulDiesSpeakParentMistakeAtheismConditionsDyingProvePraiseMiseryEntertainmentMiserableOblivionHeartlessConsoleOpiumSoullessAgainst Religion Author:Andre Comte-Sponville