Whenyou meet someone better thanyourself, turnyour thoughts to becoming his equal.When you meet someone not as good as you are, look within and examine your own self.

-Confucius or K'ung Fu-tse,'The MasterK'ung'
c.479  BC  The Analects.

Until a woman is free to be as incompetent as the average male then she will never be completely equal.

-Cunningham, Roseanna
  By-election campaign speech, May.

Le bon sens est la chose du monde la mieux partage¤  e: car chacun pense en e"  tre si bien pourvu, que ceux me"  me qui sont les plus difficiles a'   contenter en toute autre chose n'ont point coutume d'en de¤  sirer plus qu'ils ont. En quoi il n'est pas vraisemblable que tous se trompent; mais pluto" t  cela te¤  moigne que la puissance de bien juger et distinguer le vrai d'avec le faux, qui est proprement ce qu'on nomme le bon sens ou la raison, est naturellement e¤  gale en tous les hommes. Good sense is the most fairly distributed thing in the world; for everyone thinks himself so well supplied with it, that even those who are hardest to satisfy in every other way do not usually desire more of it than they already have. In this matter it is not likely that everybody is mistaken; it rather goes to show that the power of judging well and distinguishing truth from falsehood, which is what we properly mean by good sense or reason, is naturally equal in all men.

-Descartes, Rene¤
  Discours de la me¤  thode (Discourse on Method),1st discourse (translated by G E M  Anscombe and Peter Geach).

Since every man who lives is born to die, And none can boast sincere felicity, With equal mind, what happens, let us bear, Nor joy nor grieve too much for things beyond our care. Like pilgrims to th'appointed place we tend; The world's an inn, and death the journey's end.

-Dryden,John
  Palamon and  Arcite, bk.3, l.883^8.

Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on refining, And thought of convincing, while they thought of dining; Though equal to all things, for all things unfit, Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit.

-Goldsmith, Oliver
  Of Edmund Burke. Retaliation, l.29^32.

All men are equal before a fish.

-Hoover, Herbert Clark
  Quoted in Colin  Jarman The Guinness Dictionary of Sports Quotations (1990).

That all men are equal is a proposition to which, at ordinary times, no sane human being has ever given his assent.

-Huxley, Aldous Leonard
  Proper Studies,'The Idea of Equality'.

We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable; that all men are created equal and independent; that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent and inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

-Jefferson,Thomas
c.1776  Draft of the  American Declaration of Independence. Collected in  J P Boyd et al Papers of  Thomas Jefferson (1950), vol.1.

The landlady of a boarding-house is a parallelogramöthat is, an oblong angular figure, which cannot be described, but which is equal to anything.

-Leacock, Stephen Butler
  Literary Lapses,'Boarding-House Geometry'.

All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others.

-Orwell, George pseudonym of  Eric Arthur Blair
  Animal Farm, ch.10.

   Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish, or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurled, And now a bubble burst, and now a world.

-Pope, Alexander
  An Essay on Man, epistle1, l.87^90.

The loathsome mask has fallen, the man remains Sceptreless, free, uncircumscribed, but man Equal, unclassed, tribeless, and nationless, Exempt from awe, worship, degree, the king Over himself; just, gentle, wise: but man Passionless?öno, yet free from guilt or pain, Which were, for his will made or suffered them, Nor yet exempt, though ruling them like slaves, From chance, and death, and mutability, The clogs of that which else might oversoar The loftiest star of unascended heaven, Pinnacled dim in the intense inane.

-Shelley, Percy Bysshe
  Prometheus Unbound, act 3, sc.4, l.193^204.

The glories of our blood and state Are shadows, not substantial things; There is no armour against fate; Death lays his icy hand on kings: Scepter and crown Must tumble down, And in the dust be equal made With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

-Shirley,James
  The Contention of Ajax and Ulysses, act1, sc.3.

Capitals are increased by parsimony, and diminished by prodigalityand misconduct. By what a frugal man annually saves he not onlyaffords maintenance to an additional number of productive hands†but†he establishes as it were a perpetual fund for the maintenance of an equal number in all times to come.

-Smith, Adam
  An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of theWealth of Nations, bk.2, ch.3.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

-Stanton, Elizabeth ne¤  e  Cady
  'Declaration of Sentiments', Seneca FallsWomen's Rights Convention,19^20 Jul.This is modelled on theAmerican Declaration of Independence of 4 Jul1776.

As to woman's subjection†it is important to note that equal dominion isgiven to woman over every living thing, but not oneword issaidgiving mandominionover woman.

-Stanton, Elizabeth ne¤  e  Cady
  TheWoman's Bible, pt.1, ch.1,'Comments on Genesis'.

Le journal repre¤  sente l'association; l'on peut dire qu'il parle a'   chacun de ses lecteurs au nom de tous les autres, et il les entra|"ne d'autant plus aise¤  ment qu'ils sont individuellement plus faibles. L'empire des journaux doit donc cro|"tre a'   mesure que les hommes s'e¤  galisent. A newspaper represents an association; one might say that it addresses each of its readers in the name of all the others, and influences them in proportion to their individual weakness. The power of newspapers should therefore increase as men become more equal.

-Tocqueville, Alexis Charles Henri Cle¤  rel de
^40  De la De¤  mocratie en Ame¤  rique (Democracy in America), vol.2, pt.2, ch.6.

The human desire for food and sex is relatively equal. If there are armed rapes why should there not be armed hot dog thefts?

-Toole,John Kennedy
A Confederacy of Dunces (published1980), ch.7, pt.1.

We who are liberal and progressive know that the poor are our equals in every sense except that of being equal to us.

-Trillin, Calvin Marshall
  The Liberal Imagination,'Princess Casamassima'.

We the Peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war, whichtwice in our lifetime has brought untold sorrow to 873 mankind, and to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignityand worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, and to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of international law can be maintained, and to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom, and for these ends, to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one anotherasgood neighbours, and tounite our strengthto maintain international peace and security, and to ensure by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples, have resolved to combine our efforts to accomplish these aims.

-United Nations Charter
  26 Jun.