Explore the wonderful quotes under this tag
I think animal testing is a terrible idea; they get all nervous and give the wrong answers.
Sep 10, 2025
A robin redbreast in a cage Puts all heaven in a rage.
The squirrel that you kill in jest, dies in earnest.
Man is the only creature that consumes without producing
If we cut up beasts simply because they cannot prevent us and because we are backing our own side in the struggle for existence, it is only logical to cut up imbeciles, criminals, enemies, or capitalists for the same reasons.
You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.
Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight.
The animals of the world exist for their own reasons. They were not made for humans any more than black people were made for white, or women created for men.
The assumption that animals are without rights, and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance, is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.
I had bought two male chimps from a primate colony in Holland. They lived next to each other in separate cages for several months before I used one as a [heart] donor. When we put him to sleep in his cage in preparation for the operation, he chattered and cried incessantly. We attached no significance to this, but it must have made a great impression on his companion, for when we removed the body to the operating room, the other chimp wept bitterly and was inconsolable for days. The incident made a deep impression on me. I vowed never again to experiment with such sensitive creatures.
When a man has pity on all living creatures then only is he noble.
The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. I hold that the more helpless a creature the more entitled it is to protection by man from the cruelty of humankind.
True benevolence or compassion, extends itself through the whole of existence and sympathizes with the distress of every creature capable of sensation.
The indifference, callousness and contempt that so many people exhibit toward animals is evil first because it results in great suffering in animals, and second because it results in an incalculably great impoverishment of the human spirit.
Animals are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time.
The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity.
universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality.
Compassion, in which all ethics must take root, can only attain its full breadth and depth if it embraces all living creatures and does not limit itself to mankind.
It is a man's sympathy with all creatures that first makes him truly a man.
We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty with which we treat the animals. Animals suffer as much as we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such sufferings on them. It is our duty to make the whole world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of compassion to all living things, humanity will not find peace.
Our task must be to free ourselves by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty.
The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man.
As often as Herman had witnessed the slaughter of animals and fish, he always had the same thought: in their behavior toward creatures, all men were Nazis.
Deerstalking would be a very fine sport if only the deer had guns.
A good deed done to an animal is as meritorious as a good deed done to a human being, while an act of cruelty to an animal is a bad as an act of cruelty to a human being.
When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.
No one in the world needs a mink coat but a mink.
Laws exist in every state that make animal cruelty a crime. Horse slaughter is simply another form of animal abuse.
Humanity's true moral test, its fundamental test…consists of its attitude towards those who are at its mercy: animals.
I ask people why they have deer heads on their walls. They always say because it's such a beautiful animal. There you go. I think my mother is attractive, but I have photographs of her.
Until one has loved an animal a part of one's soul remains unawakened.
In 1968, I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry, and unhappy like we do.
The word "veganism" denotes a philosophy and way of living which seeks to exclude - as far as is possible and practical - all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose; and by extension, promotes the development and use of animal-free alternatives for the benefit of humans, animals and the environment. In dietary terms it denotes the practice of dispensing with all products derived wholly or partly from animals.
I became a vegetarian after realizing that animals feel afraid, cold, hungry and unhappy like we do. I feel very deeply about vegetarianism and the animal kingdom. It was my dog Boycott who led me to question the right of humans to eat other sentient beings.
He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.
As long as man continues to be the ruthless destroyer of lower living beings he will never know health or peace. For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other.
My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt.
Stay positive, joyful, and optimistic in your activism, even in the face of adversity. Understand that most people continue to consume animal products because they are unaware of the hidden cost - animal cruelty - not because they are bad or apathetic. Offer information, support, and resources in a friendly and supportive manner, as few people have begun their journey toward a compassionate lifestyle by being shamed or ridiculed. Turn anger and frustration into motivation to be as effective as possible.
Because the heart beats under a covering of hair, of fur, feathers, or wings, it is, for that reason, to be of no account?
Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.
The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated.
It seems to me of great importance to teach children respect for life. Towards this end, experiments on living animals in classrooms should be stopped. To encourage cruelty in the name of science can only destroy the finer emotions of affection and sympathy, and breed an unfeeling callousness in the young towards suffering in all living creatures.
As custodians of the planet it is our responsibility to deal with all species with kindness, love, and compassion. That these animals suffer through human cruelty is beyond understanding. Please help to stop this madness.
Ever occur to you why some of us can be this much concerned with animals' suffering? Because government is not. Why not? Animals don't vote.
If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men.
Atrocities are not less atrocities when they occur in laboratories and are called medical research.
We have enslaved the rest of the animal creation, and have treated our distant cousins in fur and feathers so badly that beyond doubt, if they were able to formulate a religion, they would depict the Devil in human form.
If a man aspires towards a righteous life, his first act of abstinence is from injury to animals.
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
In the supposedly enlightened eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, parental indifference, child neglect, and raw cruelty appearedamong Europeans of all classes.... In mid-nineteenth- century France, families abandoned their children at the rate of thirty-three thousand a year.... It took sixty years after the criminalization of cruelty to animals for cruelty to children to be made punishable under English law.... Industrialized America added brutalizing child labor to the oppressions of the young.