best quotations about
Suffering |
and Pain
| 100 quotes | Visits: 11,902 |
Quotations
 | Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on Earth. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky, 1821-1881, Russian writer 15 likes |
 | To live is to suffer; to survive is to find meaning in suffering. — Victor Frankl, 1905-1997, Austrian neurologist 13 likes |
 | It requires more courage to suffer than to die. — Napoleon, 1769-1821, French Emperor 11 likes |
 | Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but –I hope– into a better shape. — Charles Dickens, 1812-1870, British writer 10 likes |
 | Seeing much, suffering much, and studying much, are the three pillars of learning. — Benjamin Disraeli, 1804-1881, British Prime Minister 9 likes |
 | The more one has suffered, the less one demands. To protest is a sign one has traversed no hell. — Emile M. Cioran, 1911-1995, French-Romanian philosopher 9 likes |
 | He who fears he will suffer, already suffers because of his fear. — Michel de Montaigne, 1533-1592, French thinker 9 likes |
 | It is not actual suffering but a taste of better things which excites people to revolt. — Eric Hoffer, 1902-1983, American writer & philosopher 9 likes |
 | The wound is the place where the Light enters you. — Rumi, 1207-1273, Persian mystic & poet 9 likes |
 | Once I wanted total happiness – now I will settle for a little less pain. — Ashleigh Brilliant, 1933-2025, British cartoonist & epigrammatist 9 likes |
 | The strong usually suffer without complaining, while the weak complain without suffering. — Pierre Claude Boiste, 1765-1824, French lexicographer 8 likes |
 | Those who have suffered much become very bitter or very gentle. — Will Durant, 1885-1981, American historian & philosopher 7 likes |
 | It is only when you suffer that you really understand. — Jules Verne, 1826-1905, French writer 7 likes |
 | So you have no more happiness to give... Well then – there still remains your pain. — Lou Andreas-Salomé, 1861-1937, Russian-German writer & psychoanalyst 6 likes |
 | Years of secret suffering had taught me superhuman self-control. — Vladimir Nabokov, 1899-1977, Russian-American writer 6 likes |
 | The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom. — Arthur Schopenhauer, 1788-1860, German philosopher 6 likes |
 | I have been through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened. — Mark Twain, 1835-1910, American writer 6 likes |
 | It is only by way of pain one arrives at pleasure. — Marquis de Sade, 1740-1814, French writer 6 likes |
 | Remembering is only a new form of suffering. — Charles Baudelaire, 1821-1867, French poet 6 likes |
 | Anaesthesia: wounds without pain. Neurasthenia: pain without wounds. — Karl Kraus, 1874-1936, Austrian writer 6 likes |
 | To see others suffer does one good, to make others suffer even more: this is a hard saying but an ancient, mighty, human, all-too-human principle which even the apes might subscribe. — Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900, German philosopher 6 likes |
 | The great object of life is sensation- to feel that we exist, even though in pain. — Lord Byron, 1788-1824, British poet 5 likes |
 | Fear and hope share life; pleasure and pain occupy only moments. — Duc de Levis, 1764-1830, French politician & author of maxims 5 likes |
 | It is not true that suffering ennobles the character; happiness does that sometimes, but suffering, for the most part, makes men petty and vindictive. — Somerset Maugham, 1874-1965, British writer 5 likes |
| Accept suffering and achieve atonement through it — that is what you must do. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky, 1821-1881, Russian writer 5 likes |
| Don’t get lost in your pain, know that one day your pain will become your cure. — Rumi, 1207-1273, Persian mystic & poet 5 likes |
 | At the end of my suffering there was a door. — Louise Glück, 1943-2023, American poet, Nobel 2020 5 likes |
 | To suffer without complaint is the only lesson we have to learn in this life. — Vincent Van Gogh, 1853-1890, Dutch painter 5 likes |
 | Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it. — Helen Keller, 1880-1968, American writer 4 likes |
 | I sometimes think that I enjoy suffering. But the truth is I would prefer something else. — Fernando Pessoa, 1888-1935, Portuguese poet & writer 4 likes |
 | The happiest is he who suffers least; the most miserable is he who enjoys least. — Jean Jacques Rousseau, 1712-1778, Swiss-French philosopher 4 likes |
 | Illness is the doctor to whom we pay most heed; to kindness, to knowledge, we make promise only; pain we obey. — Marcel Proust, 1871-1922, French writer 4 likes |
 | Yes, it is necessary to suffer, even in vain, so as not to live in vain. — Antonio Porchia, 1885-1968, Italian-Argentinian poet 3 likes |
 | Don’t build a wall around your suffering. It may devour you from the inside. — Frida Kahlo, 1907-1954, Mexican painter 3 likes |
 | If suffering brings wisdom, I would wish to be less wise. — William Butler Yeats, 1865-1939, Irish poet, Nobel 1923 3 likes |
 | All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. — Leo Tolstoy, 1828–1910, Russian writer (the first phrase in “Anna Karenina”) 3 likes |
| If you feel pain, you are alive, but if you feel the pain of others, you are human. — Leo Tolstoy, 1828–1910, Russian writer 3 likes |
 | Life is pain and the enjoyment of love is an anesthetic. — Cesare Pavese, 1908-1950, Italian writer 1 likes |
| But the real, tremendous truth is this: suffering serves no purpose whatever. — Cesare Pavese, 1908-1950, Italian writer 1 likes |
 | To be alive at all is to have scars. — John Steinbeck, 1902-1968, American writer, Nobel 1962 1 likes |
 | Ah! What pleasure it must be to a woman to suffer for the one she loves! — Honoré de Balzac, 1799-1850, French writer 1 likes |
 | Hope is one of those remedies which does not heal but which allows one to suffer longer. — Marcel Achard, 1899-1974, French playwright 1 likes |
 | I have the true feeling of myself only when I am unbearably unhappy. — Franz Kafka, 1883-1924, Bohemian writer 1 likes |
 | The memory hurts wherever you touch it. — Giorgos Seferis, 1900-1971, Greek poet, Nobel 1963 1 likes |
 | It is easier for the imagination to compose a hell with pain than a paradise with pleasure. — Antoine Rivarol, 1753-1801, French author of maxims 1 likes |
| In some ways suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice. — Victor Frankl, 1905-1997, Austrian neurologist 1 likes |
| If there is meaning in life at all, then there must be meaning in suffering. — Victor Frankl, 1905-1997, Austrian neurologist 1 likes |
| Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose. — Victor Frankl, 1905-1997, Austrian neurologist 1 likes |
| To suffer unnecessarily is masochistic rather than heroic. — Victor Frankl, 1905-1997, Austrian neurologist 1 likes |
| Nearly everybody has his box of secret pain, shared with no one. — John Steinbeck, 1902-1968, American writer, Nobel 1962 1 likes |
 | The deepest way to feel something is to suffer from it. — Gustave Flaubert, 1821-1880, French writer 1 likes |
| In love, there is always one who suffers and another who is bored. — Honoré de Balzac, 1799-1850, French writer 1 likes |
 | As long as one suffers one lives. — Graham Greene, 1904-1991, British writer 1 likes |
 | The worst suffering is in the loneliness that accompanies it. — André Malraux, 1901-1976, French writer & statesman 1 likes |
| Death is not such a serious thing; pain, yes. — André Malraux, 1901-1976, French writer & statesman 1 likes |
 | People are not soured by misfortune, but by the reception they meet with in it. — William Hazlitt , 1778-1830, English essayist & critic 1 likes |
 | A man is the sum of his misfortunes. One day you’d think misfortune would get tired but then time is your misfortune. — William Faulkner, 1897-1962, American writer, Nobel 1949 1 likes |
 | The need to let suffering speak is a condition of all truth. For suffering is objectivity that weighs upon the subject. — Theodore Adorno, 1903-1969, German philosopher 1 likes |
 | If I am the chief of sinners, I am the chief of sufferers also. — Robert Louis Stevenson, 1850-1894, Scottish writer 1 likes |
 | Pain is the hammer of the Gods to break a dead resistance in the mortal’s heart. — Sri Aurobindo, 1872-1950, Indian nationalist, yogi & philosopher 1 likes |
 | We're programmed for suffering, not joy. The masochism is built in at a very early age. You're supposed to work and suffer – and the trouble is: you believe it. — Erica Jong, 1942-, American writer 1 likes |
 | Love your suffering. Do not resist it, do not flee from it. It is only your aversion to it that hurts, nothing else. — Hermann Hesse, 1877-1962, German writer, Nobel 1946 1 likes |
 | There is nothing so unfortunate as a man who has never suffered. — Joseph De Maistre, 1753-1821, Savoyard diplomat & philosopher 1 likes |
 | If we did not suffer from time to time, happiness would no longer be bearable. — Henri Jeanson, 1900-1970, French critic & columnist 1 likes |
 | There's something perverse about women...they're all masochists at heart. — Henry Miller, 1891-1980, American writer 1 likes |
 | Don’t hide your scars. They make you who you are. — Frank Sinatra, 1915-1998, American singer 1 likes |
| For most, love is probably a form of greed; for the rest of mankind, it is the cult of a suffering and masked divinity. — Lou Andreas-Salomé, 1861-1937, Russian-German writer & psychoanalyst 1 likes |
 | The pain you hide leaves the deepest scars. — Marty Rubin, 1930-1994, Canadian gay activist, author & journalist 1 likes |
 | I want to tell you, don't marry suffering. Some people do. They get married to it, and sleep and eat together, just as husband and wife. If they go with joy they think it's adultery. — Saul Bellow, 1914-2005, Canadian-American writer, Nobel 1976 1 likes |
 | Never to suffer would have been never to have been blessed. — Edgar Allan Poe, 1809-1849, American writer 1 likes |
 | The pleasure of those who injure you lies in your pain. Therefore they will suffer if you take away their pleasure by not feeling pain. — Tertullian, 155-240 AD, Berber-Roman Christian author 1 likes |
| I’m not sick. I am broke. But I'm happy to live as long as I can paint. — Frida Kahlo, 1907-1954, Mexican painter 1 likes |
 | The Greek word for “return” is nostos. Algos means “suffering.” So nostalgia is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return. — Milan Kundera, 1929-2023, Czech writer 1 likes |
| Pain doesn't listen to reason, it has it's own reason, which is not reasonable — Milan Kundera, 1929-2023, Czech writer 1 likes |
 | Etymologically, 'patient' means sufferer. — Susan Sontag, 1933-2004, American writer, critic, activist 1 likes |
| It is not suffering as such that is most deeply feared but suffering that degrades. — Susan Sontag, 1933-2004, American writer, critic, activist 1 likes |
 | The extreme greatness of Christianity lies in the fact that it does not seek a supernatural remedy for suffering, but a supernatural use for it. — Simone Weil, 1909-1943, French philosopher 1 likes |
| Pain and suffering are a kind of currency passed from hand to hand until they reach someone who receives them but does not pass them on. — Simone Weil, 1909-1943, French philosopher 1 likes |
 | He who is indifferent to the suffering of others is a traitor to that which is truly human. — Saadi Shirazi, 1210-1292, Persian poet 1 likes |
 | Always make the audience suffer as much as possible. — Alfred Hitchcock, 1899-1980, British film director 1 likes |
 | The wound that bleedeth inward is most dangerous. — John Lyly, 1554-1606, English writer 1 likes |
 | The deeper the feeling, the greater the pain. — Leonardo da Vinci, 1452-1519, Italian polymath & painter 1 likes |
 | Pleasures are always children, pains always have wrinkles. — Joseph Joubert, 1754-1824, French author of maxims 1 likes |
 | Universal suffering in the end does not recognize any of the individual’s rights except the “right” to be alternately oppressor or oppressed. — Nicolas Gomez Davila, 1913-1994, Colombian writer 1 likes |
| Why is there still so much pain and suffering being produced when there's so little demand for it? — Ashleigh Brilliant, 1933-2025, British cartoonist & epigrammatist 1 likes |
Latin Quotes
 | Be patient and tough; someday this pain will be useful to you. Perfer et obdura, dolor hic tibi proderit olim. — Ovid, 43 BC-17 AD, Roman poet 163 likes |
Quotes in Verse
 | Midway upon the journey of our life I found myself within a forest dark, For the straight-forward pathway had been lost. — Dante, 1265-1321, Italian poet 4 likes |
| That's why I'm not to be trusted. Because a wound to the heart is also a wound to the mind. — Louise Glück, 1943-2023, American poet, Nobel 2020 2 likes |
| So much pain so much life they went to the abyss for an empty shirt, for a Helen. — Giorgos Seferis, 1900-1971, Greek poet, Nobel 1963 1 likes |
| To feel nostalgia for you place being in your place nothing is more bitter. — Giorgos Seferis, 1900-1971, Greek poet, Nobel 1963 1 likes |
| From the beginning of time, in childhood, I thought that pain meant I was not loved. It meant I loved. — Louise Glück, 1943-2023, American poet, Nobel 2020 1 likes |
 | I measure every Grief I meet With narrow, probing, Eyes; I wonder if It weighs like Mine, Or has an Easier size. — Emily Dickinson, 1830-1886, American poet 1 likes |
Funny Quotes
 | A world without women? Certainly is a pain on each guys ass! — Anonymous 8 likes |
Ancient Greek
 | Better to die once and for all than to suffer pain for all my life. Κρείσσον γαρ εισάπαξ θανείν ή τας απάσας ημέρας πάσχειν κακώς. — Aeschylus, 525-456 BC, Ancient Greek tragedian ‐ Prometheus Bound 24 likes |
 | Nothing happens to anybody which he is not fitted by nature to bear. Ουδέν ουδενί συμβαίνει, ό ου πέφυκε φέρειν. — Marcus Aurelius, 121-180 AD, Roman Emperor ‐ Meditations V, 18 5 likes |
 | Endure suffering. Because you were pleased when you made others suffering. Ανάσχου πάσχων. Δρων γαρ έχαιρες. — Euripides, 480-406 BC, Ancient Greek tragedian 4 likes |
| It is easier to give advice to others who suffer than bear yourself. Ράον παραινείν ή παθόντα καρτερείν. — Euripides, 480-406 BC, Ancient Greek tragedian ‐ Alcestis 4 likes |
 | All share the same sufferings; life is a wheel; fortune is unstable. Κοινά πάθη πάντων· ο βίος τροχός· άστατος όλβος. — Phocylides, c. 5th cent. BC, Ancient Greek poet 2 likes |
Proverbs
 | The heaviest burden is an empty pocket. 4 likes |
