Pure love is a willingness to give without a thought of receiving anything in return.

- Peace Pilgrim

It is not the gift, but the thought that counts.

- Henry Van Dyke

Even after all this time,
The sun never says to the earth,
"You owe me."
Look what happens with
A love like that.
It lights the whole sky.

- Hafiz of Persia

I take as my guide the hope of a saint: in crucial things, unity; in important things, diversity; in all things, generosity.

- George H. W. Bush

You cannot sink someone else's end of the boat and still keep your own afloat.

- Charlie Brower

The robb'd that smiles steals something from the thief.

- William Shakespeare

If you believe that you can damage, then believe that you can fix.

- Rebbe Nachman of Breslov

Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.

- Simone Weil

Keep feeling the need for being first. But I want you to be the first in love. I want you to be the first in moral excellence. I want you to be the first in generosity.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Every time we love, every time we give, it's Christmas.

- Dale Evans

Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.

- Buddha

So I would hope they would develop some kind of habit that involves understanding that their life is so full they can afford to give in all kinds of ways to other people. I consider that to be baseline spirituality.

- Susan Sarandon

But it is a cold, lifeless business when you go to the shops to buy something, which does not represent your life and talent, but a goldsmith's.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

When a man dies he clutches in his hands only that which he has given away during his lifetime.

- Jean Jacques Rousseau

Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can.

- John Wesley

Many people despise wealth, but few know how to give it away.

- Francois de La Rochefoucauld

One isn't necessarily born with courage, but one is born with potential. Without courage, we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. We can't be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest.

- Maya Angelou

The habit of giving only enhances the desire to give.

- Walt Whitman

Every time we love, every time we give, it's Christmas.

- Dale Evans

You make a living by what you get. You make a life by what you give.

- Winston Churchill

Any ordinary favor we do for someone or any compassionate reaching out may seem to be going nowhere at first, but may be planting a seed we can't see right now. Sometimes we need to just do the best we can and then trust in an unfolding we can't design or ordain.

- Sharon Salzberg

But for money and the need of it, there would not be half the friendship in the world. It is powerful for good if divinely used. Give it plenty of air, and it is sweet as the hawthorn; shut it up, and it cankers and breeds worms.

- George Macdonald

There is no beautifier of complexion, or form, or behavior, like the wish to scatter joy and not pain around us. 'Tis good to give a stranger a meal, or a night's lodging. 'Tis better to be hospitable to his good meaning and thought, and give courage to a companion. We must be as courteous to a man as we are to a picture, which we are willing to give the advantage of a good light.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Think of giving not as a duty but as a privilege.

- John D. Rockefeller

Giving presents is a talent; to know what a person wants, to know when and how to get it, to give it lovingly and well. Unless a character possesses this talent there is no moment more annihilating to ease than that in which a present is received and given.

- Pamela Glenconner

The poor don't know that their function in life is to exercise our generosity.

- Jean-Paul Sartre

Generosity during life is a very different thing from generosity in the hour of death; one proceeds from genuine liberality and benevolence, the other from pride or fear.

- Horace Mann

Money is like manure; it's not worth a thing unless it's spread around encouraging young things to grow.

from "The Matchmaker"

- Thornton Wilder

There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life -- happiness, freedom, and peace of mind -- are always attained by giving them to someone else.

- Peyton Conway March

We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.

- Winston Churchill

Giving frees us from the familiar territory of our own needs by opening our mind to the unexplained worlds occupied by the needs of others.

- Barbara Bush

Kindness in words creates confidence.
Kindness in thinking creates profundity.
Kindness in giving creates love.

- Laozi (Lao Tzu, Lao Tse, Lao Tsu)

To look forward and not back,
To look out and not in, and
To lend a hand.

- Edward Everett Hale