The chief source of man’s inhumanity to man seems to be the tribal limits of his sense of obligation to other men.
REINHOLD NIEBUHRThe development of a managerial class in Russia, combing economic with political power, is an historic refutation of the Marxist theory.
More Reinhold Niebuhr Quotes
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Certainly, anybody who says, “in the eyes of God,” is pretentious.
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Self-righteousness is the inevitable fruit of simple moral judgments.
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All men who live with any degree of serenity live by some assurance of grace.
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That’s why history is not an answer to our problem, because history complicates, enlarges every problem of human existence. Now, the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries didn’t believe this.
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All this talk about atheistic materialism and God-fearing American I think is beside the point; it’s a rather vapid form of religion.
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God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
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If you equate God’s judgment with your judgment, you have a wrong religion.
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This insinuation of the interests of the self into even the most ideal enterprises and most universal objectives, envisaged in moments of highest rationality, makes hypocrisy an inevitable by product of all virtuous endeavor.
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We ought to really at least recognize the common predicament of Communists and democrats – or Americans, whatever.
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We judge the Russians because they’re living under despotism and we don’t like it, but we’ve gotten into a fix now where we’re living in a common predicament, and we ought to recognize this common predicament.
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Great talents have some admirers, but few friends.
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Adam Smith’s was a real universalism in intent. Laissez Faire was intended to establish a world community as well as a natural harmony of interests within each nation… But the “children of darkness” were able to make good use of his creed.
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What is funny about us is precisely that we take ourselves too seriously.
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The history of mankind is a perennial tragedy; for the highest ideals which the individual may project are ideals which he can never realize in social and collective terms.
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A republic properly understood is a sovereignty of justice, in contradistinction to a sovereignty of will.
REINHOLD NIEBUHR






