Quotes by Essayists - Page 9

True affluence is not needing anything.

The world is constantly evolving, while the family endeavours to stay the same. Updated, refurbished, modernised, but essentially the same. A house in the landscape, both shelter and prison.

The fundamentalist seeks to bring down a great deal more than buildings. Such people are against, to offer just a brief list, freedom of speech, a multi-party political system, universal adult suffrage, accountable government, Jews, homosexuals, women's rights, pluralism, secularism, short skirts, dancing, beardlessness, evolution theory, sex. There are tyrants, not Muslims.United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has said that we should now define ourselves not only by what we are for but by what we are against. I would reverse that proposition, because in the present instance what we are against is a no brainer. Suicidist assassins ram wide-bodied aircraft into the World Trade Center and Pentagon and kill thousands of people: um, I'm against that. But what are we for? What will we risk our lives to defend? Can we unanimously concur that all the items in the preceding list -- yes, even the short skirts and the dancing -- are worth dying for?The fundamentalist believes that we believe in nothing. In his world-view, he has his absolute certainties, while we are sunk in sybaritic indulgences. To prove him wrong, we must first know that he is wrong. We must agree on what matters: kissing in public places, bacon sandwiches, disagreement, cutting-edge fashion, literature, generosity, water, a more equitable distribution of the world's resources, movies, music, freedom of thought, beauty, love. These will be our weapons. Not by making war but by the unafraid way we choose to live shall we defeat them.How to defeat terrorism? Don't be terrorized. Don't let fear rule your life. Even if you are scared.

I lost my father this past year, and the word feels right because I keep looking for him. As if he were misplaced. As if he could just turn up, like a sock or a set of keys.

Writing is like sex. First you do it for love, then you do it for your friends, and then you do it for money.

Without kindness there can be no true joy.

What are the occupations of the sage? He resigns himself to seeing, to eating, etc…., he accepts in spite of himself this “wound with nine openings,” which is what the Bhagavad-Gita calls the body.―Wisdom? To undergo with dignity the humiliation inflicted upon us by our holes.

Literature duplicates the experience of living in a way that nothing else can, drawing you so fully into another life that you temporarily forget you have one of your own. That is why you read it, and might even sit up in bed till early dawn, throwing your whole tomorrow out of whack, simply to find out what happens to some people who, you know perfectly well, are made up.

No matter what has happened always behave as if nothing had happened.

You become what you think about all day long.

Fear of death is merely the projection into the future of a fear which dates back to our first moment of life.

Consciousness is a born hermit.

Busy with the ugliness of the expensive success We forget the easiness of free beautyLying sad right around the corner, Only an instant removed, Unnoticed and squandered.

He looked out over the shirtless, muscled, tanned men and realised that right here, on this disco floor, there was such a concentration of fashion, slimming, money, bleaching, plastic surgery, psychotherapy – and all for naught. In a few years they’d all be old walruses, and in a few more, dead.

Reality is a sound, you have to tune in to it not just keep yelling.

The never-ending task of self improvement.

Nothing can be appreciated in a vacuum.

The more we learn of outer space and inner space, of quasars and quarks, of Big Bangs and Little Blips, the more remote, abstract and intellectually inconsequential it all becomes.

To breath through the truth is not the same with knowing it.

Real leaders are people who “help us overcome the limitations of our own individual laziness and selfishness and weakness and fear and get us to do better, harder things than we can get ourselves to do on our own.

My love, do you recall the object which we saw,That fair, sweet, summer morn!At a turn in the path a foul carcassOn a gravel strewn bed,Its legs raised in the air, like a lustful woman,Burning and dripping with poisons,Displayed in a shameless, nonchalant wayIts belly, swollen with gases.

Great poetry is always written by somebody straining to go beyond what he can do.

So to all who are situated as I am, I would say--Grow up as fast as you can.

When moral courage feels that it is in the right there is no personal daring of which it is incapable.

The clock sweats out each minuteof what meat is left to us.

Danger for danger's sake is senseless.

As I turned over the last page, a wave of sorrow enveloped me. Where had they all gone, these people who had seemed so real? To distract myself, I walked out into the night; instinctively, I lit a cigarette. In the dark, the cigarette glowed, like a fire lit by a survivor. But who would see this light, this small dot among infinite stars? I stood awhile in the dark, the cigarette glowing and growing small, each breath patiently destroying me. How small it was, how brief. Brief, brief, but inside me now, which the stars could never be.

Poems are like dreams: in them you put what you don't know you know.

Brave admiral say but one good word: What shall we do when hope is gone? The words leapt like a leaping sword: "Sail on! sail on! and on!"

There is also a fable told by Phaedrus, about how Simonides was once a victim of shipwreck. As the other passengers scurried about the sinking ship trying to save their possessions, the poet stood idle. When questioned, he declared, mecum mea sunt cuncta: everything that is me is with me.

It was a delicious meal -- skim milk, wheat middlings, leftover pancakes, half a doughnut, the rind of a summer squash, two pieces of stale toast, a third of a gingersnap, a fish tail, one orange peel, several noodles from a noodle soup, the scum off a cup of cocoa, an ancient jelly roll, a strip of paper from the lining of the garbage pail, and a spoonful of raspberry jello.

The difficulties hardships and trials of life the obstacles ... are positive blessings. They knit the muscles more firmly and teach self-reliance.

The case for the humanities is not hard to make, though it can be difficult--to such an extent have we been marginalized, so long have we acceded to that marginalization--not to sound either defensive or naive. The humanities, done right, are the crucible in which our evolving notions of what it means to be fully human are put to the test; they teach us, incrementally, endlessly, not what to do, but how to be. Their method is confrontational, their domain unlimited, their "product" not truth but the reasoned search for truth, their "success" something very much like Frost's momentary stay against confusion.

I am convinced now that the desert has no heart, that it presents a riddle which has no answer, and that the riddle itself is an illusion created by some limitation or exaggeration of the displaced human consciousness.

All things are like spring dreams, passing with no trace.

Let a man's talents or virtues be what they may he will only feel satisfaction in his society as he is satisfied in himself.

Popular poets are the parish priests of the Muse retailing her ancient divinations to a long since converted public.

Wise Blood was written by an author congenitally innocent of theory, but one with certain preoccupations. That belief in Christ is to some a matter of life and death has been a stumbling block for readers who would prefer to think it a matter of no great consequence. For them Hazel Motes' integrity lies in his trying with such vigor to get rid of the ragged figure who moves from tree to tree in the back of his mind. For the author Hazel's integrity lies in his not being able to. Does one's integrity ever lie in what he is not able to do? I think that usually it does, for free will does not mean one will, but many wills conflicting in one man. Freedom cannot be conceived simply. It is a mystery and one which a novel, even a comic novel, can only be asked to deepen.

Good sense tells us that earthly things are rare and fleeting, and that true reality exists only in dreams. To draw sustenance from happiness- natural or artificial - you must first have the courage to swallow it; and those who perhaps most merit happiness are precisely those on whom felicity, as mortals conceive it, always acts as a vomitive.

Milly Brush once might almost have fallen in love with these silences.

Where would David Copperfield be if Dickens had gone to writing classes? Probably about seventy minor characters short, is where. (Did you know that Dickens is estimated to have invented thirteen thousand characters? Thirteen thousand! The population of a small town!)

The world is God's salvation.

Learning After some time, you learn the subtle difference betweenholding a handand imprisoning a soul;You learn that love does not equal sex,and that company does not equal security,and you start to learn….That kisses are not contracts and gifts are not promises, and you start to accept defeat with the head up highand open eyes,and you learn to build all roads on today,because the terrain of tomorrow is too insecure for plans…and the future has its own way of falling apart in half.And you learn that if it’s too mucheven the warmth of the sun can burn.So you plant your own garden and embellish your own soul,instead of waiting for someone to bring flowers to you.And you learn that you can actually bear hardship,that you are actually strong,and you are actually worthy,and you learn and learn…and so every day.Over time you learn that being with someonebecause they offer you a good future,means that sooner or later you’ll want to return to your past.Over time you comprehend that only who is capable of loving you with your flaws, with no intention of changing youcan bring you all happiness.Over time you learn that if you are with a persononly to accompany your own solitude, irremediably you’ll end up wishing not to see them again.Over time you learn that real friends are fewand whoever doesn’t fight for them, sooner or later,will find himself surrounded only with false friendships.Over time you learn that words spoken in moments of angercontinue hurting throughout a lifetime.Over time you learn that everyone can apologize,but forgiveness is an attribute solely of great souls.Over time you comprehend that if you have hurt a friend harshlyit is very likely that your friendship will never be the same.Over time you realize that despite being happy with your friends,you cry for those you let go.Over time you realize that every experience lived, with each person, is unrepeatable.Over time you realize that whoever humiliatesor scorns another human being, sooner or laterwill suffer the same humiliations or scorn in tenfold.Over time you learn to build your roads on today,because the path of tomorrow doesn’t exist.Over time you comprehend that rushing things or forcing them to happencauses the finale to be different form expected.Over time you realize that in fact the best was not the future,but the moment you were living just that instant.Over time you will see that even when you are happy with those around you,you’ll yearn for those who walked away.Over time you will learn to forgive or ask for forgiveness,say you love, say you miss, say you need,say you want to be friends, since beforea grave, it will no longer make sense.But unfortunately, only over time…

I'm not afraid of new things. I'm just afraid of feeling alone even when there's somebody else there. I'm afraid of feeling bad. Maybe that's selfish, but it's the way I feel.

The shallow consider liberty a release from all law, from every constraint. The wise man sees in it, on the contrary, the potent Law of Laws.

Deep is the well of the past. Should we not call it bottomless?

Lies written in ink cannot disguise facts written in blood.

We cannot put off living until we are ready. The most salient characteristic of life is its coerciveness: it is always urgent, ‘here and now,’ without any postponement. Life is fired at us point-blank.

Last night I walked for hours. It was as if I wanted to get lost down some unknown street. To get absolutely and happily lost. But there are moments when we can’t, when we don’t know how to lose our way. Even if we always go in the wrong direction. Even if we lose all our points of reference. Even if it begins to grow late and we feel the weight of morning as we advance. There are times when no matter how we try to find out what we don’t know, we can’t lose our way. And perhaps we long for the time when we could be lost. The time when all the streets were new.

Why can't we simply borrow what is useful to us from Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, especially Zen, as we borrow from Christianity, science, American Indian traditions and world literature in general, including philosophy, and let the rest go hang? Borrow what we need but rely principally upon our own senses, common sense and daily living experience.

so that it may grow fatter and

It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.

Cities force growth and make men talkative and entertaining but they make them artificial.

Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness natives give it solidity and continuity but the settlers give it passion.

I think the world divides neatly into those who are excited by the managed induction of terror and those who are not. I do not find terror exciting. I find it terrifying. One of my basic goals is to subject my nervous system to as little total terror as possible. The cruel paradox of course is that this kind of makeup usually goes hand in hand with a delicate nervous system that's extremely easy to terrify.

They sicken of the calm that know the storm.

When my friends lack an eye I look at them in profile.

He also said - pointedly - that space travel nowadays was an escape from the problems of Earth. That is, one took off for the stars in the hope that the worst would happen and be done with in one's absence. And indeed I couldn't deny that more than once I had peered anxiously out the porthole - especially when returning from a long voyage - to see whether or not our planet resembled a burnt potato.

They fuck you up, your mum and dad? No, that wasn't it at all. Well, they did do that, perhaps, but they also allowed you to become the person, and the writer, that you had it in you to be.

A contented mind is the greatest blessing a man can enjoy in this world.