Prejudice is the sole author of infamies: how many acts are so qualified by an opinion forged out of naught but prejudice!
—Marquis de Sade (1740–1814) French Political leader, Revolutionary, Novelist, Poet, Critic
Yes great people are always subject to persecution and always getting into straits.
—Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) German Poet, Dramatist
Passion and prejudice govern the world, only under the name of reason.
—John Wesley (1703–91) British Methodist Religious Leader, Preacher, Theologian
Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest violence.
—Hebrew Proverb
So few men are really worth knowing, that it seems a shameful waste to let an anthropoid prejudice stand in the way of free association with one who is.
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
What is tolerance?—it is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other’s folly—that is the first law of nature.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
If you want to make beautiful music, you must play the black and the white notes together.
—Richard Nixon (1913–94) American Head of State, Lawyer
The mind of a bigot is like the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour upon it, the closer it contracts.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician, Essayist
Prejudice is a great time saver. You can form opinions without having to get the facts.
—E. B. White (1985–99) American Essayist, Humorist
You are all fundamentalists with a top dressing of science. That is why you are the stupidest of conservatives and reactionists in politics and the most bigoted of obstructionists in science itself. When it comes to getting a move on you are all of the same opinion: stop it, flog it, hang it, dynamite it, stamp it out.
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish Playwright
If you judge people, you have no time to love them.
—Mother Teresa (1910–97) Roman Catholic Missionary, Nun
Prejudices are the props of civilization.
—Andre Gide (1869–1951) French Novelist
Ignorance is stubborn and prejudice is hard.
—Adlai Stevenson (1900–65) American Diplomat, Politician, Orator
We call a man a bigot or a slave of dogma because he is a thinker who has thought thoroughly and to a definite end.
—G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) English Journalist, Novelist, Essayist, Poet
Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
People with a culture of poverty suffer much less from repression than we of the middle class suffer and indeed, if I may make the suggestion with due qualification, they often have a hell of a lot more fun than we have.
—Brian Friel (1929–2015) Irish Dramatist, Short Story Writer
He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that.
—John Stuart Mill (1806–73) English Philosopher, Economist
We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
The one and only formative power given to man Is thought. By his thinking he not only makes character, but body and affairs, for “as he thinketh within himself, so is he.” Prejudice is a mist, which in our journey through the world often dims the brightest and obscures the best of all the good and glorious objects that meet us on our way.
—Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury (1621–83) British Statesman
The bird that would soar above the plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings.
—Kate Chopin (1850–1904) American Novelist, Short-Story Writer
The test of courage comes when we are in the minority. The test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority.
—Ralph Washington Sockman (1889–1970) American United Methodist Pastor
Sometimes we feel the loss of a prejudice as a loss of vigor.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
Ignorance is less remote from the truth than prejudice.
—Denis Diderot (1713–84) French Philosopher, Writer
Our prejudices are our mistresses; reason is at best our wife, very often heard indeed, but seldom minded.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
None are too wise to be mistaken, but few are so wisely just as to acknowledge and correct their mistakes, and especially the mistakes of prejudice.
—Isaac Barrow
Destroy it. There may be a redistribution of the land, but the natural inequality of men soon re-creates an inequality of possessions and privileges, and raises to power a new minority with essentially the same instincts as the old.
—William C. Durant (1861–1947) American Industrialist
Every one is forward to complain of the prejudices that mislead other men and parties, as if he were free, and had none of his own. What now is the cure? No other but this, that every man should let alone others’ prejudices and examine his own.
—John Locke (1632–1704) English Philosopher, Physician
Small is the number of people who see with their eyes and think with their minds.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
The prejudices of ignorance are more easily removed than the prejudices of interest; the first are all blindly adopted, the second willfully preferred.
—George Bancroft (1800–91) American Historian, Politician
We do not want the men of another color for our brothers-in-law, but we do want them for our brothers.
—Booker T. Washington (1856–1915) African-American Educationist
Bigotry tries to keep truth safe in its hand; with a grip that kills it.
—Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali Poet, Polymath
We can never be sure that the opinion we are endeavoring to stifle is a false opinion; and even if we were sure, stifling it would be an evil still.
—John Stuart Mill (1806–73) English Philosopher, Economist
Some prejudices are to the mind what the atmosphere is to the body; we cannot feel without the one, nor breathe without the other.
—George Greville, 2nd Earl of Warwick (1746–1816) British Nobleman, Politician
The confirmed prejudices of a thoughtful life, are as hard to change as the confirmed habits of an indolent life: and as some must trifle away age, because they trifled away youth, others must labor on in a maze of error, because they have wandered there too long to find their way out.
—Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (1678–1751) English Politician, Philosopher
Our prejudices are our robbers, they rob us valuable things in life.
—Unknown
The greatest and noblest pleasure which men can have in this world is to discover new truths; and the next is to shake off old prejudices.
—Frederick II of Prussia (1712–86) Prussian Monarch
When we believe ourselves in possession of the only truth, we are likely to be indifferent to common everyday truths.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
Prejudice not being funded on reason cannot be removed by argument.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
That which corrodes the souls of the persecuted is the monstrous inner agreement with the prevailing prejudice against them.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
The history of persecution is a history of endeavors to cheat nature, to make water run uphill, to twist a rope of sand. It makes no difference whether the actors be many or one, a tyrant or a mob.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Prejudices are the chains forged by ignorance to keep men apart.
—Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington (1789–1849) Irish Novelist, Writer
All colors will agree in the dark.
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher
How it infuriates a bigot, when he is forced to drag out his dark convictions!
—Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946) American-British Essayist, Bibliophile
Prejudice assumes the garb of reason, but the cheat is too thin.
—Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw) (1818–85) American Humorist, Author, Lecturer
Persecution is a tribute the great must always pay for preeminence.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Prejudices are what rule the vulgar crowd.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher, Author
Judgements prevent us from seeing the good that lies beyond appearances.
—Wayne Dyer (b.1940) American Motivational Writer, Author, Motivational Speaker
The discovery of truth is prevented more effectively, not by the false appearance things present and which mislead into error, not directly by weakness of the reasoning powers, but by preconceived opinion, by prejudice.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German Philosopher
To lay aside all prejudices, is to lay aside all principles.—He who is destitute of principles is governed by whims.
—Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743–1819) German Philosopher
It is harder to crack a prejudice than an atom.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist