Gratitude quotes
Thankfulness for small things and large ones. Quotes about gratitude for thank-you posts, harvest seasons and quiet mornings.
The library has 159 quotes on this topic. Here are 60 of the most quoted, no more than four from any one writer.
60 gratitude quotes
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How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is To have a thankless child!
William Shakespeare King Lear, Act i. Sc. 4 -
Blow, blow, thou winter wind! Thou art not so unkind As man’s ingratitude.
William Shakespeare As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7 -
Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks.
William Shakespeare Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. 2 -
I hate ingratitude more in a man Than lying, vainness, babbling, drunkenness, Or any taint of vice whose strong corruption Inhabits our frail blood.
William Shakespeare Troilus and Cressida, iii. 1 -
Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity is the blessing of the New, which carrieth the greater benediction and the clearer revelation of God’s favour.
Francis Bacon Essays -
The gratitude of most men is but a secret desire of receiving greater benefits.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 298 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
If anyone meets us who owes us a debt of gratitude, it immediately crosses our mind. How often can we meet some one to whom we owe gratitude, without thinking of it!
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Maxims and Reflections, Life and Character, No. 283 · translated by T. Bailey Saunders -
Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many—not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.
Charles Dickens -
Let us be grateful to Adam our benefactor. He cut us out of the “blessing of idleness,” and won for us the “curse of labor.”
Mark Twain Following the Equator -
For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, And though a late, a sure reward succeeds.
William Congreve The Mourning Bride, Act v. Sc. 12 -
Thanksgiving Day. Let all give humble, hearty, and sincere thanks, now, but the turkeys. In the island of Fiji they do not use turkeys; they use plumbers. It does not become you and me to sneer at Fiji.
Mark Twain Pudd’nhead Wilson -
Ingratitude is always a kind of weakness. I have never known men of ability to be ungrateful.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Maxims and Reflections, Life and Character, No. 152 · translated by T. Bailey Saunders -
Prosperity is the blessing of the Old Testament; adversity is the blessing of the New.
Francis Bacon Of Adversity -
I’ve heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds With coldness still returning; Alas! the gratitude of men Hath oftener left me mourning.
William Wordsworth Simon Lee -
How blessings brighten as they take their flight!
Edward Young Night thoughts. Night ii, Line 602 -
A man must thank his defects, and stand in some terror of his talents.
Ralph Waldo Emerson The Conduct of Life -
Come forth, depart with thanksgiving and modesty—give place to others that must come into being even as thyself.
Epictetus Golden Sayings, No. CXXXIX · translated by Hastings Crossley -
Small thanks to the man for keeping his hands clean who would not touch the work but with gloves on.
Thomas Carlyle On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History -
Gratitude is a fruit of great cultivation; you do not find it among gross people.
Samuel Johnson Tour to the Hebrides. Sept. 20, 1773 -
Instead of complaining that God had hidden Himself, you will give Him thanks for having revealed so much of Himself; and you will also give Him thanks for not having revealed Himself to haughty sages, unworthy to know so holy a God.
Blaise Pascal Pensées, No. 288 · translated by W. F. Trotter -
What makes false reckoning, as regards gratitude, is that the pride of the giver and the receiver cannot agree as to the value of the benefit.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 225 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
Almost all the world takes pleasure in paying small debts; many people show gratitude for trifling, but there is hardly one who does not show ingratitude for great favours.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 299 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
All those who pay the debts of gratitude cannot thereby flatter themselves that they are grateful.
François de La Rochefoucauld Maxims, Maxim 224 · translated by J. W. Willis Bund and J. Hain Friswell -
Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar, Like Scipio, buried by the upbraiding shore.
Lord Byron Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, Canto iv. Stanza 57 -
A grateful mind By owing owes not, but still pays, at once Indebted and discharged.
John Milton Paradise Lost, Bk. IV -
We never reflect on the man we love without exulting in our choice; while he who has bound us to him by benefits alone rises to our idea as a person to whom we have, in some measure, forfeited our freedom.
Oliver Goldsmith -
Every man in his lifetime needs to thank his faults.
Ralph Waldo Emerson Essays: First Series -
Thanks to the human heart by which we live, Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears; To me the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
William Wordsworth -
The still small voice of gratitude.
Thomas Gray Ode for Music. V, Line 8 -
Men are not so ungrateful as they are said to be. If they are often complained of, it generally happens that the benefactor claims more than he has given.
Napoleon -
To him who is finished off, nothing you can do is right; a growing man (a learner) will be always thankful.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe -
Health, beauty, vigor, riches, and all the other things called goods, operate equally as evils to the vicious and unjust as they do as benefits to the just.
Plato -
Do you know what is more hard to bear than the reverses of fortune? It is the baseness, the hideous ingratitude, of man.
Napoleon -
Ingratitude is always a kind of weakness. I have never seen that clever men have been ungrateful.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe -
Blessedness consists in the accomplishment of our desires, and in our having only regular desires.
Augustine of Hippo -
Gratitude is a duty which ought to be paid, but which none have a right to expect.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau -
I am above being injured by fortune; though she snatch away much, more will remain to me. The blessings I now enjoy transcend fear.
Ovid -
Ah, how unjust to Nature and himself Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man!
Edward Young Night thoughts. Night ii, Line 112 -
A kindness is always delightful to a grateful man; to an ungrateful, only at the time of its receipt.
Seneca -
He is an ungrateful man who is unwilling to acknowledge his obligation before others.
Seneca -
Thanks are justly due for things we have not to pay for.
Ovid -
Gratitude is a burden, and every burden is made to be shaken off.
Denis Diderot -
The blessings of life do not equal its ills, even when of equal number; nor can any pleasure, however incense, compensate for even the slightest pain.
Pliny the Elder -
Man is, beyond dispute, the most excellent of created beings, and the vilest animal is a dog; but the sages agree that a grateful dog is better than an ungrateful man.
Saadi -
A man is very apt to complain of the ingratitude of those who have risen far above him.
Samuel Johnson Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. vi, Chap. iv. 1776 -
To heal divisions, to relieve the oppressed, In virtue rich; in blessing others, blessed.
Homer Odyssey, Bk. VII · translated by Pope -
Be thankful for your ennui; it is your last mark of manhood.
Thomas Carlyle -
Those who bring sunshine to the lives of others, can not keep it from themselves.
J. M. Barrie -
But revenge is a blessing sweeter than life itself; so rude men feel.
Juvenal -
We do not learn to value our blessings till we have lost them.
Johann Gottfried Herder -
These things are exactly according to the disposition of him who possesses them. To him who knows how to use them, they are blessings; to him who does not use them aright, they are evils.
Terence -
The blessings of health and fortune, as they have a beginning, must also have an end. Everything rises but to fall, and grows but to decay.
Sallust -
He that forgets his friend is ungrateful to him; but he that forgets his Saviour is unmerciful to himself.
John Bunyan -
Riches without charity are nothing worth. They are a blessing only to him who makes them a blessing to others.
Henry Fielding -
Wherever there is cupidity, there the blessing of the Gospel cannot rest. The actual poor, therefore, may altogether fail to be objects of that blessing, the actual rich may be the objects of it in the highest degree.
Matthew Arnold -
It is much better to make presents in articles than in money, because gratitude for the latter is spent as soon as that is.
Jean Paul -
We receive but little advantage from repeated protestations of gratitude, but they cost them very much from whom we exact them in return.
Oliver Goldsmith -
When weary reapers quit the sultry field, And, crowned with corn, their thanks to Ceres yield.
Alexander Pope Summer -
Swinish gluttony ne’er looks to heav’n amidst his gorgeous feast, But with besotted base ingratitude Crams, and blasphemes his feeder.
John Milton Comus, Line 776 -
Good health and good sense are two of life’s greatest blessings.
Publilius Syrus Maxim 827