When the land kills of its own volition we acquiesce and say the victim had no right to live

The letter of the law says, "Let them glean." The spirit of the law says, "Feed them." Two entirely different concepts. Ruth's bold proposal exposes the difference.

The public have neither shame nor gratitude.

If you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the other end fastens itself around your own.

We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the size of our automobiles rather than by the quality of our service and relationship to mankind.

My walk is a public one. My business is in the world, and I must mix in the assemblies of men or quit the post which Providence seems to have assigned me.

The faults of women, of children, of the feeble, the indigent, and the ignorant, are the fault of the husbands, the fathers, the masters, the strong, the rich, and the wise.

It is the church's responsibility, the government's responsibility, and the personal responsibility of every one of us to love.

You can win a victory in your neighbourhood. You can win a victory in your school. You can win a victory in your place of worship... Be ashamed of your existence until you've done a little something to make the world in which we all must live a little better than it was when you arrived.

But I contend that if we're providing total medical coverage for every man, woman, and child in Iraq, shouldn't we at least be doing the same thing for every man, woman, and child in the United States?

Charity is merely returning what we have stolen.

The world of efficiency and anonymity dehumanises us. We have to ask who the invisible people are. Who makes our clothes? Who picks our vegetables? And how are they treated?