# Quote — Stefan Zweig, Beware of Pity

> It always demands a far greater degree of courage for an individual to oppose an organized movement than to let himself be carried along with the stream — individual courage, that is, a variety of courage that is dying out in these times of progressive organization and mechanization. During the war practically the only courage I ran across was mass courage, the courage that comes of being one of a herd, and anyone who examines this phenomenon more closely will find it to be compounded of some very strange elements: a great deal of vanity, a great deal of fear — yes, fear of staying behind, fear of being sneered at fear of independent action, and fear, above all, of taking up a stand against the mass enthusiasm of one's fellows.

- Author: [Stefan Zweig](https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig.md)
- Book: [Beware of Pity](https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig/beware-of-pity.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stefan_Zweig#Beware_of_Pity_(1939)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig/beware-of-pity/it-always-demands

## More from this book

> One can run away from anything but oneself.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig/beware-of-pity/one-can-run.md)

> No envy is more mean than that of small-minded beings when they see a neighbor lifted, as though borne aloft by angels, out of the dull drudgery of their common existence; petty spirits are more ready to forgive a prince the most fabulous wealth than a fellow-sufferer beneath the same yoke the smallest degree of freedom.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig/beware-of-pity/no-envy-is-more.md)

> The heart is able to bury deep and well what is urgently desires to forget.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/stefan-zweig/beware-of-pity/the-heart-is-able.md)