This compilation of philanthropy and uplifting quotes is random and certainly not anything for which I claim credit. It is from lists - long and short - that I've gathered and merged over time. I'd appreciate additions or corrections.
“There are two kinds of people in the world: the Givers and the Takers. The difference between the two is that the Takers eat well, and the Givers sleep well at night.” - Joy Mills
The Dead Sea is the dead sea, because it continually receives and never gives. - Source Unknown
"When you stop giving and offering something to the rest of the world, it's time to turn out the lights." - George Burns
"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." - Mahatma Gandhi
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed people can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”- Margaret Mead
“As the purse is emptied, the heart is filled.” - Victor Hugo
“The value of a man should be in what he gives and not in what he is able to receive.”- Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
“What you do for yourself is fleeting and dies with you. What you do for others has unending benefit and is eternal.”
- Jerold Panas (1928- )
One generation plants the trees...Another gets the shade. - Chinese Proverb
“You see things; and you say, ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were; and I say, ‘Why not?’”
- George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)
“Great beauty, great strength, and great riches are really and truly of no great use; a right heart exceeds all.”
- Benjamin Franklin
“The only ones among you who will be truly happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.”
- Albert Schweitzer
“Wealth is not to feed our egos, but to feed the hungry and to help people help themselves.” - Andrew Carnegie
“When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad. That’s my religion.” - Abraham Lincoln
"You take nothing with you that you gained-only what you gave away." - Attributed to St. Francis of Assissi
"And it’s only the giving that makes you what you are" - Jethro Tull
"And in the end, the love you take
Is equal to the love you make." - The Beatles
"Riches either serve or govern the possessor." - Horace
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it. Always.”
- Mahatma Ghandi
“Try not to become a person of success, but rather a person of value.” - Albert Einstein
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”- Margaret Mead
"When an American asks for the cooperation of his fellow citizens, it is seldom refused; and I have often seen it afforded spontaneously and with great good will." - Alexis de Tocqueville
"Life's most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?" - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
"Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest." - Mark Twain
"So live that you wouldn't be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip." - Will Rogers
"And I think to myself, what a wonderful world!" - Louis Armstrong
“What man really fears is not so much extinction but extinction with insignificance. Man wants to know that his life is somehow counted and if not for himself then at least in the larger scheme of things that it has left a trace, a trace that has meaning. In order for anything once alive to have meaning, its effects must remain alive in eternity some way.”
- Ernest Becker, “The Denial of Death”
“In the end, when I’m gone, I hope that I am remembered for what I have had once and have no more, rather than what I leave behind. I hope that I am remembered as a giver.” - Robert Pamplin, Jr.
"It is better to support schools than jails." - Mark Twain
"Every charitable act is a stepping stone toward Heaven.”- Henry Ward Beecher
A fundraiser stood at the heavenly gate.
His face was scarred and old.
He stood before the man of fate
For admission to the fold.
“What have you done,” St. Peter said,
“To earn admission here?”
“I’ve been a community college fundraiser
For many and many a year.”
With that the pearly gate swung open wide.
St. Peter rang the bell.
“Come in and choose your harp,” he said.
“You’ve had your share of hell.”
- Jerold Panas (at the Region X CRD conference, April 2000)
“In the quiet hours when we are alone and there is nobody to tell us what fine fellows we are, we come sometimes upon a moment in which we wonder, not how much money we are earning, nor how famous we have become, but what good we are doing." - A.A. Milne
“A person first starts to live when he can live outside himself, when he can have as much regard for his fellow man as he does himself. We are here to do good. It is the responsibility of every human being to aspire to do something worthwhile, to make this world a better place than the one he found. Life is a gift, and if we agree to accept it, we must contribute in return. When we fail to contribute, we fail to adequately answer why we are here.” - Albert Einstein
“But just as you excel in everything-in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us-see also that you excel in this grace of giving.” II Corinthians 8:7
If I can stop one heart from breaking,
I shall not live in vain.
If I can ease one life the aching,
Or cool one pain,
Or help one fainting robin unto his nest again,
I shall not live in vain.
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
"It is one of the most beautiful compensations of this life, that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
"A person's true wealth is the good he or she does in the world." - Mohammed
"I can never think of promoting my convenience at the expense of a friend's interest and inclination." George Washington
“The deep rewards of giving go to those who give out of a concern for others, and take pains to see that their giving is wisely done.” F. Emerson Andrews, American author (1902-1978)
“Riches either serve or govern the possessor.” - Horace
“The perfect amount to leave children is enough so they would feel they could do anything, but not so much that they could do nothing.” Warren Buffett
“People don't need to find reasons to justify their not giving. What they need to find is the inspiration to give. And those who don't, but could afford to, are missing out on one of wealth's greatest luxuries.” - Andrew Tobias
"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out where the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes up short again and again...who does actually try to do the deed; who with great enthusiasm spends himself in a worth cause; who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.
"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat." - Theodore Roosevelt
“I expect to pass through life but once. If, therefore, there can be any kindness I can show, or any good things I can do to any fellow human being, let me do it now, and not defer it or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.” - William Penn
"The happiest people are those who care more about others than they do about themselves." - Ted Turner
"You have not lived until you have done something for someone who can never repay you." - John Bunyan
"There is a loftier ambition than merely to stand high in the world. It is to stoop down and lift mankind a little higher."
- Henry Van Dyke
"We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give." - Winston Churchill
"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."
- Helen Keller
"There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life-happiness, freedom, and peace of mind-are always attained by giving them to someone else." - Peyton Conway March
"A bit of fragrance always clings to the hand that gives roses." - - Chinese proverb
"Over and over again, the courts have said there is nothing sinister in so arranging one's affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everybody does so, rich and poor, and all do right, for nobody owes any duty to pay more tax than the law demands. Taxes are enforced exactions, not voluntary contributions." - Judge Learned Hand
"To place your name by gift or bequest in the keeping of an active educational institution is to...make a permanent contribution to the welfare of humanity." - Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933)
"It takes a noble man to plant a seed for a tree that will some day give shade to people he may never meet." Or another version: "People have made at least a start at understanding the meaning of life when they plant shade trees under which they know full well they will never sit." - David Elton Trueblood
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose." - Jim Elliott
"To give away money is an easy matter and in any man's power. But to decide to whom to give it, and how large, and when, and for what purpose and how, is neither in every man's power nor an easy matter." - Aristotle
"In a world filled with violence, hatred, and suspicion, giving is an expression of faith, trust, and concern." - Douglas Lawson
"What is the use of living, if it not be to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone?" - Sir Winston Churchill
"It is by spending ONESELF that one becomes rich." - Sarah Bernhardt
"Profit is what we have left after we make a donation to a worthwhile cause." - Marilyn Vos Savant
"Philanthropy is the rent we pay for the joy and privilege we have for our space on this earth." - Jerold Panas
"Giving pays the highest interest rate, and has the longest term, of any investment available." - Jeffrey K. Wilson
"Money is like manure; it's not worth a thing unless it's spread around encouraging young things to grow." - from "The Matchmaker" by Thornton Wilder.
"If to be venerated for benevolence, if to be admired for talents, if to be esteemed for patriotism, if to be beloved for philanthropy, can gratify the human mind, you must have the pleasing consolation to know that you have not lived in vain."- George Washington in a letter to Benjamin Franklin in 1789
"No person has ever been honored for what he received. Honor is our reward when we give." - Calvin Coolidge, 1872-1933
A person's true wealth is the good he or she does in the world. - Mohammed
Surplus wealth is a sacred trust which its possessor is bound to administer in his lifetime for the good of the community.
- Andrew Carnegie
"In the quiet hours when we are alone and there is nobody to tell us what fine fellows we are, we come sometimes upon a moment in which we wonder, not how much money we are earning, nor how famous we have become, but what good we are doing." - A.A. Milne
"One man gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty." - Proverbs 11:24
"Whatever you spend is gone. What you keep, someone else gets. What you give is yours forever." - Dr. Wil Rose
"The service we render to others is really the rent we pay for our room on this earth. It is obvious that man is himself a traveler; that the purpose of this world is not 'to have and to hold' but 'to give and serve.'" - Sir Wilfred T. Grinfell
"You can easily judge the character of others by how they treat those who can do nothing for them or to them."
- Malcolm Forbes
"The best use of life is to invest it in something which will outlast life." - William James
“It’s not how much we give, but how much love we put into giving.” - Mother Theresa
“Giving liberates the soul of the giver.” - Maya Angelou
“You may give gifts without caring, but you can’t care without giving.” - Frank A. Clark
“We are not cisterns made for hoarding; we are channels made for sharing.” - Billy Graham
“Real and lasting generosity requires that a person do more than make up his mind to give. He must also make up his heart.” - William Arthur Ward
“Use life to provide something that outlasts it.” - B.C. Forbes
“Don’t tell me where your priorities are. Show me where you spend your money and I’ll tell you what they are.”
- James W. Frick
“True giving knows no season.” - Florence E. King
“The man who takes and never gives, may last for years but never lives.”- Unknown
“In times of great need, we are all rich enough to be philanthropists.” - Unknown
“The most enthusiastic givers in life are the real lovers of life. They experience the soul-joy that comes from responding with the heart rather than the head.” - Helen Steiner Rice
“May God forbid that we should present our gifts and withhold ourselves.” - Unknown
“How can we expect our children to know and experience the joy of giving unless we teach them that the greater pleasure in life lies in the act of giving rather than receiving?” - J.C. Penny
“What I gave, I have;
What I spent, I had;
What I left, I lost by not giving it.” - Epitaph of Christopher Chapman
“True sacrifice is the giving up of one thing for the sake of another of higher value.” - H.C. Wilson
“Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can.” - John Wesley
“There's a destiny that makes us brothers,
None goes his way alone;
What we send into the lives of others,
Comes back into our own.” - Aldous Huxley 1864-1963 English Novelist and Poet
"Charitable planning is the process of doing better by doing good." - Douglas K. Freeman
“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts."- Sir Winston Churchill to Ronnie Spector backstage at the Brooklyn Fox
“What you give to charity in health is like gold. What you give in sickness is silver, and what you give in death is lead.”- Nathan Strauss
“If you have too much, you have someone else’s.”- author unknown
“Not what we say about our blessings, but how we use them, is the true measure of our thanksgiving.” - W. T. Purkiser
"Here's the test to find whether your mission on earth is finished: If you are alive, it isn't." - Richard Bach
“Life is not tried, it is merely survived, if you’re standing outside the fire." - Garth Brooks and Jenny Yates
“Philanthropy is the mystical mingling of a joyful giver, an artful asker and a grateful recipient.” - Douglas M. Lawson
“…every intelligent act of generosity, every project that helps others lead better lives, is also an act of hope….Each small act of kindness, from one human being to another, brings us closer to each other and to the kind of world we hope to leave our children.” - W.B. “Bill” Boyd, President, Rotary International 2006-2007
"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take but by the moments that take our breath away." - Dr. Bob Morehead
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