- The whole work of man seems to consist in nothing but proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not a piano key.
- The world will be saved by beauty.
- If you wish to glimpse inside a human soul and get to know a man, don't bother analyzing his ways of being silent, of talking, of weeping, of seeing how much he is moved by noble ideas; you will get better results if you just watch him laugh. If he laughs well, he's a good man.
- It is not the brains that matter most, but that which guides them - the character, the heart, generous qualities, progressive ideas.
- I can see the sun, but even if I cannot see the sun, I know that it exists. And to know that the sun is there - that is living.
- The awful thing is that beauty is mysterious as well as terrible. God and the devil are fighting there and the battlefield is the heart of man.
- You can be sincere and still be stupid.
- I swear to you gentlemen, that to be overly conscious is a sickness, a real, thorough sickness.
- Man is sometimes extraordinarily, passionately, in love with suffering...
- The world says: "You have needs -- satisfy them. You have as much right as the rich and the mighty. Don't hesitate to satisfy your needs; indeed, expand your needs and demand more." This is the worldly doctrine of today. And they believe that this is freedom. The result for the rich is isolation and suicide, for the poor, envy and murder.
- To love someone means to see them as God intended them.
- Man is a mystery. It needs to be unravelled, and if you spend your whole life unravelling it, don't say that you've wasted time. I am studying that mystery because I want to be a human being.
- Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid.
- Right or wrong, it's very pleasant to break something from time to time.
- Nothing in this world is harder than speaking the truth, nothing easier than flattery.
- I am a dreamer. I know so little of real life that I just can't help re-living such moments as these in my dreams, for such moments are something I have very rarely experienced. I am going to dream about you the whole night, the whole week, the whole year. I feel I know you so well that I couldn't have known you better if we'd been friends for twenty years. You won't fail me, will you? Only two minutes, and you've made me happy forever. Yes, happy. Who knows, perhaps you've reconciled me with myself, resolved all my doubts.
When I woke up it seemed to me that some snatch of a tune I had known for a long time, I had heard somewhere before but had forgotten, a melody of great sweetness, was coming back to me now. It seemed to me that it had been trying to emerge from my soul all my life, and only now-
If and when you fall in love, may you be happy with her. I don't need to wish her anything, for she'll be happy with you. May your sky always be clear, may your dear smile always be bright and happy, and may you be for ever blessed for that moment of bliss and happiness which you gave to another lonely and grateful heart. Isn't such a moment sufficient for the whole of one's life? - Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.
- Man only likes to count his troubles; he doesn't calculate his happiness.
- People speak sometimes about the "bestial" cruelty of man, but that is terribly unjust and offensive to beasts, no animal could ever be so cruel as a man, so artfully, so artistically cruel.
- I say let the world go to hell, but I should always have my tea.
- Talking nonsense is the sole privilege mankind possesses over the other organisms. It's by talking nonsense that one gets to the truth! I talk nonsense, therefore I'm human.
- The soul is healed by being with children.
- Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.
- What is hell? I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love.
- Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.
- To go wrong in one's own way is better than to go right in someone else's.
- The darker the night, the brighter the stars, The deeper the grief, the closer is God!
- It takes something more than intelligence to act intelligently.
- The mystery of human existence lies not in just staying alive, but in finding something to live for.
- "I love mankind," he said, "but I find to my amazement that the more I love mankind as a whole, the less I love man in particular.
- But how could you live and have no story to tell?
- We sometimes encounter people, even perfect strangers, who begin to interest us at first sight, somehow suddenly, all at once, before a word has been spoken.
- And the more I drink the more I feel it. That's why I drink too. I try to find sympathy and feeling in drink.... I drink so that I may suffer twice as much!
- Lack of originality, everywhere, all over the world, from time immemorial, has always been considered the foremost quality and the recommendation of the active, efficient and practical man.
- I could not become anything; neither good nor bad; neither a scoundrel nor an honest man; neither a hero nor an insect. And now I am eking out my days in my corner, taunting myself with the bitter and entirely useless consolation that an intelligent man cannot seriously become anything, that only a fool can become something.
- A beast can never be as cruel as a human being, so artistically, so picturesquely cruel.
- The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month.
- The more stupid one is, the closer one is to reality. The more stupid one is, the clearer one is. Stupidity is brief and artless, while intelligence squirms and hides itself. Intelligence is unprincipled, but stupidity is honest and straightforward.
- This is my last message to you: in sorrow, seek happiness.
- Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.
- My God, a moment of bliss. Why, isn't that enough for a whole lifetime?
- Killing myself was a matter of such indifference to me that I felt like waiting for a moment when it would make some difference.
- I am alone, I thought, and they are everybody.
- I did not bow down to you, I bowed down to all the suffering of humanity
- If you want to overcome the whole world, overcome yourself.
- I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that all the humiliating absurdity of human contradictions will vanish like a pitiful mirage, like the despicable fabrication of the impotent and infinitely small Euclidean mind of man, that in the world's finale, at the moment of eternal harmony, something so precious will come to pass that it will suffice for all hearts, for the comforting of all resentments, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity, for all the blood that they've shed; that it will make it not only possible to forgive but to justify all that has happened.
- Sarcasm: the last refuge of modest and chaste-souled people when the PRIVACY of their soul is coarsely and intrusively invaded.
- Yet, I didn't understand that she was intentionally disguising her feelings with sarcasm; that was usually the last resort of people who are timid and chaste of heart, whose souls have been coarsely and impudently invaded; and who, until the last moment, refuse to yield out of pride and are afraid to express their own feelings to you.
- Besides, nowadays, almost all capable people are terribly afraid of being ridiculous, and are miserable because of it.
- To love is to suffer and there can be no love otherwise.
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