Apathy is one of the characteristic responses of any living organism when it is subjected to stimuli too intense or too complicated to cope with. The cure for apathy is comprehension.
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970) American Novelist, Artist
The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.
—Plato (428 BCE–347 BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Mathematician, Educator
Every difficulty slurred over will be a ghost to disturb your repose later on.
—Frederic Chopin (1810–49) Polish-French Composer, Pianist
The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
The difference between our decadence and the Russians is that while theirs is brutal, ours is apathetic.
—James Thurber
America is a hurricane, and the only people who do not hear the sound are those fortunate if incredibly stupid and smug White Protestants who live in the center, in the serene eye of the big wind.
—Norman Mailer (1923–2007) American Novelist Essayist
The tyranny of a prince in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy.
—Montesquieu (1689–1755) French Political Philosopher, Jurist
A different world cannot be built by indifferent people.
—Peter Marshall
Laws can embody standards; governments can enforce laws—but the final task is not a task for government. It is a task for each and every one of us. Every time we turn our heads the other way when we see the law flouted—when we tolerate what we know to be wrong—when we close our eyes and ears to the corrupt because we are too busy, or too frightened—when we fail to speak up and speak out—we strike a blow against freedom and decency and justice.
—Robert F. Kennedy (1925–68) American Politician, Civil Rights Activist
Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn’t stop to enjoy it.
—William Feather (1889–1981) American Publisher, Author
Lukewarmness I account a sin, as great in love as in religion.
—Abraham Cowley (1618–67) English Poet, Essayist
I have protracted my work till most of those whom I wished to please have sunk into the grave, and success and miscarriage are empty sounds: I therefore dismiss it with frigid tranquillity, having little to fear or hope from censure or from praise.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
Some people confuse acceptance with apathy, but there’s all the difference in the world. Apathy fails to distinguish between what can and what cannot be helped; acceptance makes that distinction. Apathy paralyzes the will-to-action; acceptance frees it by relieving it of impossible burdens.
—Arthur Gordon
I don’t know, I don’t care, and it doesn’t make any difference!
—Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) American Novelist, Poet
The worst sin… is… to be indifferent.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Indifference is an excellent substitute for patience.
—Mason Cooley (1927–2002) American Aphorist
Men are accomplices to that which leaves them indifferent.
—George Steiner (1929–2020) American Critic, Scholar
They act as if they supposed that to be very sanguine about the general improvement of mankind is a virtue that relieves them from taking trouble about any improvement in particular.
—John Morley, 1st Viscount Morley of Blackburn (1838–1923) British Political Leader, Writer, Editor, Journalist
Bad people are less a problem than indifferent people.
—Gerhard Kocher (b.1939) Swiss Publicist, Aphorist
By far the most dangerous foe we have to fight is apathy – indifference from whatever cause, not from a lack of knowledge, but from carelessness, from absorption in other pursuits, from a contempt bred of self satisfaction.
—William Osler (1849–1919) Canadian Physician
God could cause us considerable embarrassment by revealing all the secrets of nature to us: we should not know what to do for sheer apathy and boredom.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Wherever there is degeneration and apathy, there also is sexual perversion, cold depravity, miscarriage, premature old age, grumbling youth, there is a decline in the arts, indifference to science, and injustice in all its forms.
—Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian Short-Story Writer
In communications, familiarity breeds apathy.
—William Bernbach (1911–82) American Advertising Executive
Willpower is the key to success. Successful people strive no matter what they feel by applying their will to overcome apathy, doubt or fear.
—Dan Millman (b.1946) American Children’s Books Writer, Sportsperson
I shall stay the way I am because I do not give a damn.
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American Humorist, Journalist
The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: That’s the essence of inhumanity.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
Indifference creates an artificial peace.
—Mason Cooley (1927–2002) American Aphorist
The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.
—Robert Maynard Hutchins (1899–1977) American Educator
A Frenchman is self-assured because he regards himself personally both in mind and body as irresistibly attractive to men and women. An Englishman is self-assured as being a citizen of the best-organized state in the world and therefore, as an Englishman, always knows what he should do and knows that all he does as an Englishman is undoubtedly correct. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and easily forgets himself and other people. A Russian is self-assured just because he knows nothing and does not want to know anything, since he does not believe that anything can be known. The German’s self-assurance is worst of all, stronger and more repulsive than any other, because he imagines that he knows the truth—science—which he himself has invented but which is for him the absolute truth.
—Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian Novelist
Things have dropped from me. I have outlived certain desires; I have lost friends, some by death… others through sheer inability to cross the street.
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English Novelist
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