For the first time in my life I began to realize that it is not evil and brutality, but nearly always weakness, that is to blame for the worst things that happen in this world.

Stefan Zweig
About This Quote

This quote is by the renowned American historian, Arnold Toynbee. He said, “For the first time in my life I began to realize that it is not evil and brutality, but nearly always weakness, that is to blame for the worst things that happen in this world.” He means that when pain and misery are caused by weakness, there is nothing to be done about it. But when they are caused by evil or brutality, then there is something that can be done.

Some Similar Quotes
  1. It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not. - Unknown
  2. Just when you think it can't get any worse, it can. And just when you think it can't get any better, it can. - Nicholas Sparks
  3. The one you love and the one who loves you are never, ever the same person. - Chuck Palahniuk
  4. Where there is love there is life. - Mahatma Gandhi
  5. It hurts to let go. Sometimes it seems the harder you try to hold on to something or someone the more it wants to get away. You feel like some kind of criminal for having felt, for having wanted. For having wanted to be wanted.... - Henry Rollins
More Quotes By Stefan Zweig
  1. He was weary of himself, of cold ideas and brain dreams. Life a poem? Not when you went about forever poetizing about your own life instead of living it. How innocuous it all was, and empty, empty, empty! This chasing after yourself, craftily observing your...
  2. He did not think of love as an eternally vigilant, blazing flame, which with its powerful, flickering glow shown into all the peaceful folds of life and in some fantastic way made everything seem bigger and stronger than it was. For him, love was more...
  3. And it all came to pass, all that she had hoped, but it did not fill her with rapture nor carry her away with the power or the fervor she had expected. She had imagined it all different, and had imagined herself different, too. In...
  4. For he has faith enough, he feels, if he were really to delve into himself, faith enough to move mountains, but he cannot manage to put his back into it. Once in a while the need to create wells up in him, the longing to...
  5. For the first time his mind grasped the fact that when life has sentenced you to suffer, the sentence is neither a fancy nor a threat, but you are dragged to the rack, and you are tortured, and there is no marvelous rescue at the...
Related Topics