It is my fundamental conviction that compassion – the natural capacity of the human heart to feel concern for and connection with another human being – constitutes a basic aspect of our nature shared by all human beings, as well as being the foundation of our happiness. All ethical teachings, whether religious or nonreligious, aim to nurture this innate and precious quality, to develop it and to perfect it.

14th Dalai Lama

from the book Toward a True Kinship of Faiths: How the World's Religions Can Come Together

Read a random quote or see all quotes by the 14th Dalai Lama.

Further quotes from the book Toward a True Kinship of Faiths:

• Universal equality