quotations about fear
Within a system which denies the existence of basic human rights, fear tends to be the order of the day. Fear of imprisonment, fear of torture, fear of death, fear of losing friends, family, property or means of livelihood, fear of poverty, fear of isolation, fear of failure. A most insidious form of fear is that which masquerades as common sense or even wisdom, condemning as foolish, reckless, insignificant or futile the small, daily acts of courage which help to preserve man's self-respect and inherent human dignity. It is not easy for a people conditioned by fear under the iron rule of the principle that might is right to free themselves from the enervating miasma of fear. Yet even under the most crushing state machinery courage rises up again and again, for fear is not the natural state of civilized man.
AUNG SAN SUU KYI
Freedom from Fear
Something indefinite is always worse than something definite, a strong fear that doesn't last very long is easier than one that's nebulous but doesn't go away.
STEFAN ZWEIG
The Post Office Girl
In one way fear is also God's daughter, redeemed on the night of Holy Friday. She is not beautiful to look at -- oh no! -- ridiculed at times, at others cursed, disowned by everyone ... and yet, make no mistake about it, she is present at every deathbed--she is man's intercessor.
GEORGES BERNANOS
Heroic Face of Innocence: Three Stories
A thing may be dreaded as long as it has not overtaken you.
CHANAKYA
Vridda-Chanakya
In regard to the great mass of men, anything that breaks the realm of fear is not salutary, but dangerous; because it takes off one of the hoops that hold the barrel together in which the evil spirits are confined.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Though it may arrive with shocking suddenness, horror devours its prey slowly. Through hours of days and years, it spreads its sullen darkness into every corner of the being it has conquered.
JOSEPHINE HART
Damage
Leaders who feed fear typically are also ones who avoid facts.
BARACK OBAMA
Newsweek, April 29, 2019
Fear hath a numerous progeny.
EDWARD COUNSEL
Maxims
Oh, we can populate the dark with horrors, even we who think ourselves informed and sure, believing nothing we cannot measure or weigh. I know beyond all doubt that the dark things crowding in on me either did not exist or were not dangerous to me, and still I was afraid.
JOHN STEINBECK
Travels with Charley: In Search of America
I would describe a hero as a person who has no fear of life, who can face life squarely.
ALEXANDER LOWEN
Fear of Life
Fear is contagious. You can catch it.
NEIL GAIMAN
The Graveyard Book
Fear is the brother of hate.
LARRY NIVEN
Ringworld
You see something scary, you should stand up and step toward it, not away from it. Instinctively, reflexively, in a raging fury.
LEE CHILD
Echo Burning
You are frightened of everything. You call it caution. You call it common sense. You call it practicality. You call it playing the odds, but that's only because you're afraid to call it by its real name, and its real name is fear.
MICK FARREN
Darklost
Fear was there, too, cold and hot at the same time, making everything in the plain room sharper, with fewer shadows.
ALLISON BRENNAN
Fear No Evil
Not to fear where there is occasion, is as great a weakness as to fear unduly, without reason.... Fear is a kind of bell, or gong, which rings the mind into quick life and avoidance upon the approach of danger.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
The strongest human emotion is fear. It's the essence of any good thriller that, for a little while, you believe in the boogeyman.
JOHN CARPENTER
Time, Nov. 16, 1987
All is well, tho' faith and form
Be sunder'd in the night of fear.
ALFRED
LORD TENNYSON, In Memoriam
All human actions are motivated at their deepest level by two emotions--fear or love. In truth there are only two emotions--only two words in the language of the soul.... Fear wraps our bodies in clothing, love allows us to stand naked. Fear clings to and clutches all that we have, love gives all that we have away. Fear holds close, love holds dear. Fear grasps, love lets go. Fear rankles, love soothes. Fear attacks, love amends.
NEALE DONALD WALSCH
Conversations with God
Fear is ever-present, waiting to be called to the surface. Change brought fear, and fear brought destruction.
BERNARD BECKETT
Genesis