"The denial by human animals of ethical relations to the rest of the animal world is a phenomenon not differing either in character or cause from the denial of ethical relations by a tribe, people, or race of human beings to the rest of the human world. The provincialism of Jews toward non-Jews, of Greeks toward non-Greeks, of Romans toward non-Romans, of Moslems toward non-Moslems, and of Caucasians toward non-Caucasians, is not one thing and the provincialism of human beings toward non-human beings another. They are all manifestations of the same thing. The fact that these various acts are performed by different individuals and upon different individuals, and are performed at different times and places, does not invalidate the essential sameness of their natures. Crimes are not classified according to the similarity of those who do them or those who suffer from them, but by grouping them according to the similarity of their intrinsic qualities. All acts of provincialism consist essentially in the disinclination or inability to be universal, and they belong in reality, all of them, to the same species of conduct."
React to this quote
More by J. Howard Moore
See allResonant Thoughts
"The world stock market crash... will reorient the governments of all countries towards a more equitable redistribution of food, housing, health care and education, which as universal rights will becom…"
"Indeed, our society, which has seemed so freedom-giving and passive in its attitudes toward the artist really makes extraordinary demands upon him: on the one side, to be free in some vague spiritual …"
Explore Further
Related Quotes
"If I could have those sixty seconds within Bradypus... would I not receive a plea for humans to pause, reas…"
— Stephen Jay Gould"The values that Scientology states are universal values. Values that any good mother or father or friend co…"
— Chick Corea"Humanity, said Edgar Allan Poe, is divided into Men, Women, and Margaret Fuller" in American Heritage magaz…"
— Margaret Fuller"And we’ll never be as young as we are right now"
— Jim Steinman"The West has repudiated Christianity and returned to rationalism, humanism and universalism, all of which a…"
— Sita Ram Goel"High society is a poor play, a bad, boring opera, made slightly better by its staging, costumes and scenery."
— Nicolas Chamfort
Related Thinkers
Related Topics
Deep Dives
- Friedrich Nietzsche on Human Nature
- Baruch Spinoza on Human Nature
- Thomas Carlyle on Human Nature
- Aristotle on Human Nature
- Immanuel Kant on Human Nature
- Ludwig Wittgenstein on human nature
- Michel de Montaigne on Human Nature
- Epictetus on Human Nature
- Friedrich Nietzsche on life
- Friedrich Nietzsche on truth
- knowledge & Beauty
- knowledge & Change