Benevolence does not consist in those who are prosperous pitying and helping those who are not. It consists in fellow feeling that puts you upon actually the same level with the fellow who suffers.
It is the interest of every man to live as much at his ease as he can; and if his emoluments are to be precisely the same, whether he does or does not perform some very laborious duty, it is certainly his interest, at least as interest is vulgarly understood, either to neglect it altogether, or, if he is subject to some authority which will not suffer him to do this, to perform it in as careless and slovenly a manner as that authority will permit.
Whether we like it or not, we have all been born into this world as part of one great human family. Rich or poor, educated or uneducated, belonging to one nation or another, to one religion or another, adhering to this ideology or that, ultimately each of is just a human being like everyone else. We all desire happiness and do not want suffering.
Suffering is how Life tells you that you are resisting or misperceiving what is real and true. It is the way Life suggests that you are not in harmony with what is.
We don't have a major problem right now in our country, and life is normal. Things like unemployment, which the youth are suffering from, and the rate of inflation - these are chronic conditions and we have to solve them.
Dear little Swallow,’ said the Prince, ‘you tell me of marvelous things, but more marvelous than anything is the suffering of men and of women. There is no Mystery so great as Misery.