Crowds Quotes

“The intelligence of that creature known as a crowd is the square root of the number of people in it.”
― Terry Pratchett, Jingo

“Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one.”
― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

“As a recluse I couldn't bear traffic. It had nothing to do with jealousy, I simply disliked people, crowds, anywhere, except at my readings. People diminished me, they sucked me dry.”
― Charles Bukowski, Women

“A group experience takes place on a lower level of consciousness than the experience of an individual. This is due to the fact that, when many people gather together to share one common emotion, the total psyche emerging from the group is below the level of the individual psyche. If it is a very large group, the collective psyche will be more like the psyche of an animal, which is the reason why the ethical attitude of large organizations is always doubtful. The psychology of a large crowd inevitably sinks to the level of mob psychology. If, therefore, I have a so-called collective experience as a member of a group, it takes place on a lower level of consciousness than if I had the experience by myself alone.”
― C.G. Jung, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious

“Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.”
― Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart

“Wherever I went, I was on the wrong end of the stampede.”
― Rachel Cohn, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares

“The mob rushes in where individuals fear to tread.”
― B.F. Skinner, Walden Two

“It is always the enemy who started it, even if he was not the first to speak out, he was certainly planning it; and if he was not actually planning it, he was thinking of it; and, if he was not thinking of it, he would have thought of it.”
― Elias Canetti, Crowds and Power

“I do not like the raw sound of the human voice in unison unless it is under the discipline of music.”
― Flannery O'Connor, The Habit of Being: Letters of Flannery O'Connor

“I don't like crowds of people in general. When they're all talking at the same time, and making noise. Crowds are the worst ... All the lights and the shouting and the people. It's like broken glass in my head.”
― Cassandra Clare, Lord of Shadows

“Three causes especially have excited the discontent of mankind; and, by impelling us to seek remedies for the irremediable, have bewildered us in a maze of madness and error. These are death, toil, and the ignorance of the future..”
― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

“...I thought how I hate any kind of mob - I hate mobs of sports fans, mobs of environmental demonstrators, I even hate mobs of super-models, that's how much I hate mobs. I tell you, mankind is bearable only when you get him on his own.”
― Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole

“I think one can tell a lot about a person from the way he chooses to let the stub of his cigarette burn out...”
― Sanhita Baruah

“When there is noise and crowds, there is trouble;
When everything is silent and perfect,
There is just perfection and nothing
To fill the air.”
― Dejan Stojanovic

“To be far from the madding crowd is to be mad indeed.”
― A.E. Coppard, Dusky Ruth and Other Stories

“And this that you call solitude is in fact a big crowd.”
― Dejan Stojanovic, The Shape

“If everyone you knew jumped off a bridge, would you too?” Dr. Roger asked.
David had heard this before and knew you were supposed to say no. But was that really true? If everyone jumped off a bridge, maybe there was a good reason. Maybe the bridge was on fire.If anything, the guy who didn’t jump was the crazy one.”
― John M. Cusick, Girl Parts

“[I]t may be that a crowd at a particular moment of history creates the object to justify its gathering.”
― Jennifer Egan, A Visit from the Goon Squad

“I thought I was getting away from politics for a while. But I now realise that the vuvuzela is to these World Cup blogs what Julius Malema is to my politics columns: a noisy, but sadly unavoidable irritant. With both Malema and the vuvuzela, their importance is far overstated. Malema: South Africa's Robert Mugabe? I think not. The vuvuzela: an archetypal symbol of 'African culture?' For African civilisation's sake, I seriously hope not.

Both are getting far too much airtime than they deserve. Both have thrust themselves on to the world stage through a combination of hot air and raucous bluster. Both amuse and enervate in roughly equal measure. And both are equally harmless in and of themselves — though in Malema's case, it is the political tendency that he represents, and the right-wing interests that lie behind his diatribes that is dangerous. With the vuvu I doubt if there are such nefarious interests behind the scenes; it may upset the delicate ears of the middle classes, both here and at the BBC, but I suspect that South Africa's democracy will not be imperilled by a mass-produced plastic horn.”
― Richard Calland

“For the record, the vuvuzela is not my enemy — and I even have, for reasons of self-defence installed a mini-vuvu with surprisingly powerful performance levels around my neck — though I miss hearing the crescendo of noise from the crowd that should accompany a promising attack on goal or a goal itself. Instead, of course, there is the monotone drone — a constant that belies the ebbs and flows of a game.”
― Richard Calland

“I'm fine. I'm fine, he says, and fine, fine repeats in his head as he escapes back into the chill. Around him, a spin of bodies in dark coats, tapping thumbs on pads, pressing phones to heads, settling buds into ear canals, projecting an invisible shield of music as they move through the crowd, digital companionship warmer than the bodies around them. Every soul on the street is sunk within its body. Sometimes Bit imagines that he, alone, bears witness to the world.”
― Lauren Groff, Arcadia

“By the way, if you knew how you sounded when you hissed, you wouldn't do it: you sound like such berks when you do that.”
― Christopher Hitchens

“So far as the majority of their acts are considered, crowds display a singularly inferior mentality; yet there are other acts in which they appear to be guided by those mysterious forces which the ancients denominated destiny, nature, or providence, which we call the voices of the dead, and whose power it is impossible to overlook, although we ignore their essence. It would seem, at times, as if there were latent forces in the inner being of nations which serve to guide them.”
― Gustave Le Bon, سيكولوجية الجماهير

“I travelled with crowds and learned some things; I travelled alone, I learned many things!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“No matter which country you live in, go in the direction the mind points, not in the direction of the crowd, because the crowd destroys thought, creates fog, you cannot know the right direction, you cannot see the right path!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“Sometimes a terrible forest fire breaks out, an entire forest turns to ash, but a lonely tree standing outside the forest shouts "I'm here!" When you think you are safe among the stupid crowds, remember the noble stance of the smart tree standing outside the crowd!”
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“Tranquility and discontent are games of numbers. Pockets of discontent keep coexisting with pockets of peace. It is only when the former become ubiquitous that the latter is disturbed.”
― R. N. Prasher

“Every day,
I always have
to be
surrounded by
people

Funny how I can’t live all of their lives

We are always confined to
certain roles,
because other people
take all the other ones”
― Lucy Carter, For the Intellect

“It is in man’s nature to be drawn by the crowd, if only to see what everybody else is up to. Even when that crowd was composed entirely of albino snow monkeys…”
― Mat Johnson, Pym

“Logical minds, accustomed to be convinced by a chain of somewhat close reasoning, cannot avoid
having recourse to this mode of persuasion when addressing crowds, and the inability of their
arguments always surprises them”
― Gustave Le Bon, The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind Gustave Le Bon Gustave Le Bon