To desire and expect nothing for oneself – and to have profound sympathy for others – is genuine holiness. Ivan Turgenev
A sympathetic person is placed in the dilemma of a swimmer among drowning men, who all catch at him, and if he give so much as a leg or a finger, they will drown him. They wish to be saved from the mischief of their vices, but not from their vices. Ralph Waldo Emerson
A sympathetic look always makes me feel sorry for myself. Mason Cooley
Is there anything more dangerous than sympathetic understanding? Pablo Picasso
I can sympathize with everything, except suffering. Oscar Wilde
Sympathy is a virtue unknown in nature. Paul Eipper
Next to love, sympathy is the divinest passion of the human heart. Edmund Burke
To be in one’s own heart in kindly sympathy with all things; this is the nature of righteousness. Confucius
The more sympathy you give, the less you need. Malcolm Forbes
All sympathy not consistent with acknowledged virtue is but disguised selfishness. Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Sympathy is especially a Christian duty. Charles Haddon Spurgeon