When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people. -- Abraham Heschel

"...Ultimately we must heed the advice of Henry James. When asked by his nephew what he ought to do in life, James replied, "Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind." The key to those words is the hortatory verb--the insistence that one find an existence that enables one to be kind. How to do so? By wading in, over and over, with that purpose in mind, with a willingness to sail on, tacking and tacking again, helped by those we aim to help, guided by our moral yearnings on behalf of others, on behalf of ourselves with others: a commitment to others that won’t avoid squalls and periods of drift, a commitment that will become the heart of the journey itself." -- Robert Coles, Time, 1/20/97(The Moral Intelligence of Children)

If you want to be holy, be kind. -- Frederick Buechner

You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-1882

You can get more with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.