There are persons who honestly do not see the use of books in the home, either for information — have they not radio and even television? — or for decoration — is there not the wallpaper?
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
“In Search of Readers,” in Helen Hull, The Writer’s Book (1950)
Quotations by:
Buck, Pearl S.
To serve is beautiful, but only if it is done with joy and a whole heart and a free mind.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
“Men and Women,” To My Daughters, with Love (1967)
You cannot make yourself feel something you do not feel, but you can make yourself do right in spite of your feelings.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
“My Neighbor’s Son,” To My Daughters, with Love (1967)
The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible — and achieve it, generation after generation.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
(Attributed)
We send missionaries to China so the Chinese can get to heaven, but we won’t let them into our country.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
(Attributed)
Quoted in Clifton Fadiman, The American Treasury: 1455-1955 (1955).
Science and religion … are two sides of the same glass, through which we see darkly until these two, focusing together, reveal the truth.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
A Bridge for Passing, ch. 3 (1962)
I learned early to understand that there is no such condition in human affairs as absolute truth. There is only truth as people see it, and truth, even in fact, may be kaleidoscopic in its variety. The damage such perception did to me I have felt ever since … I could never belong entirely to one side of any question.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
My Several Worlds (1954)
Yet somehow 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.
Hunger makes a thief of any man.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
The Good Earth, ch. 15 (1931)
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.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
To My Daughters, With Love (1967)
None who have always been free can understand the terrible fascinating power of the hope of freedom to those who are not free.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
What America Means to Me, ch. 4 (1943)
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.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
Interview, New York Post (26 Apr 1959)
Often paraphrased, "Inside myself is a place where I live all alone, and that is where I renew my springs that never dry up."
When hope is taken away from the people, moral degeneration follows swiftly after.
Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973) American writer
Letter to New York Times (14 Nov 1941)