Selected Pearl S. Buck Quotations
• The basic discovery about any people is the discovery of the relationship between its men and its women.
• A good marriage is one which allows for change and growth in the individuals and in the way they express their love.
• When good people in any country cease their vigilance and struggle, then evil men prevail.
• None who have always been free can understand the terrible fascinating power of the hope of freedom to those who are not free.
• To eat bread without hope is still slowly to starve to death.
• Hunger makes a thief of any man.
• Growth itself contains the germ of happiness.
• I am comforted by life's stability, by earth's unchangeableness. What has seemed new and frightening assumes its place in the unfolding of knowledge. It is good to know our universe. What is new is only new to us.
• I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in human beings. Like Confucius of old, I am so absorbed in the wonder of earth and the life upon it that I cannot think of heaven and angels.
• When men destroy their old gods they will find new ones to take their place.
• It may be that religion is dead, and if it is, we had better know it and set ourselves to try to discover other sources of moral strength before it is too late.
• I love people. I love my family, my children . . . but inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that's where you renew your springs that never dry up.
• The person who tries to live alone will not succeed as a human being. His heart withers if it does not answer another heart. His mind shrinks away if he hears only the echoes of his own thoughts and finds no other inspiration.
• You cannot make yourself feel something you do not feel, but you can make yourself do right in spite of your feelings.
• Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied.
• Self-expression must pass into communication for its fulfillment.
• The truth is always exciting. Speak it, then. Life is dull without it.
• Praise out of season, or tactlessly bestowed, can freeze the heart as much as blame.
• The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible - and achieve it, generation after generation.
• Our society must make it right and possible for old people not to fear the young or be deserted by them, for the test of a civilization is the way that it cares for its helpless members.
• You can judge your age by the amount of pain you feel when you come in contact with a new idea.
• Perhaps one has to be very old before one learns to be amused rather than shocked.
• We should so provide for old age that it may have no urgent wants of this world to absorb it from meditation on the next.
• We send missionaries to China so the Chinese can get to heaven, but we won't let them into our country.
• The secret of joy in work is contained in one word -- excellence. To know how to do something is to enjoy it.
• I don't wait for moods. You accomplish nothing if you do that. Your mind must know it has got to get down to work.
• In a mood of faith and hope my work goes on. A ream of fresh paper lies on my desk waiting for the next book. I am a writer and I take up my pen to write.
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About These Quotes
Quote collection assembled by Jone Johnson Lewis. Each quotation page in this collection and the entire collection © Jone Johnson Lewis 1997-2009. This is an informal collection assembled over many years. I regret that I am not be able to provide the original source if it is not listed with the quote.
Citation information:
Jone Johnson Lewis. "Pearl S. Buck Quotes." About Women's History. URL: http://womenshistory.about.com/od/quotes/a/pearl_buck.htm . Date accessed: (today). (More on how to cite online sources including this page)
