Quotes

The Duel

Anton Chekhov

"“He had cast out of heaven his dim star; it had fallen, and its track was lost in the darkness of night. It would never return to the sky again, because life was given only once and never came a second time. If he could have turned back the days and years of the past, he would have replaced the falsity with truth, the idleness with work, the boredom with happiness; he would have given back purity to those whom he had robbed of it. He would have found God and goodness, but that was as impossible as to put back the fallen star into the sky, and because it was impossible he was in despair.”"

Les Misérables

VICTOR HUGO

"We say that slavery has vanished from European civilization, but this is not true. Slavery still exists, but now it applies only to women and its name is prostitution."

Journals

Andre Gide

"No theory is good except on condition that one use it to go on beyond."

Dubliners

James Joyce

"She dealt with moral problems the way a cleaver deals with meat: and in this case she had made up her mind."

Notes from Underground

Fyodor Dostoevski

"Once it's been proved to you that you're descended from an ape, it's no use pulling a face; just accept it. Once they've proved to you that a single droplet of your own fat must be dearer to you than a hundred thousand of your fellow human beings and consequently that all so-called virtues and duties are nothing but ravings and prejudices, then accept that too, because there's nothing to be done."

The Trial

Franz Kafka

"They're talking about things of which they don't have the slightest understanding, anyway. It's only because of their stupidity that they're able to be so sure of themselves."

The Portrait of Mr. W. H.

Oscar Wilde

"A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it."

To the Lighthouse

Virginia Woolf

"Life, from being made up of little separate incidents which one lived one by one, became curled and whole like a wave which bore one up with it and threw one down with it, there, with a dash on the beach."

Counsels and Maxims

Arthur Schopenhauer

"If you feel irritated by the absurd remarks of two people whose conversation you happen to overhear, you should imagine that you are listening to a dialogue of two fools in a comedy."

The 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People

Stephen R. Covey

"“Admission of ignorance is often the first step in our education.”"

By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept 

Paulo Coelho

"The gods throw the dice, freeing love from its cage. And love can create or destroy — depending on the direction of the wind when it is set free."

Ad Lucilium Epistulae Morales

Lucius Annaeus Seneca

"He only is anxious about the future, to whom the present is unprofitable."

Stranger

Albert Camus

"“I was assailed by memories of a life that wasn’t mine anymore, but one in which I’d found the simplest and most lasting joys.”"

The Trials Of Socrates

Plato

"If the immortal is also imperishable, the soul when attacked by death cannot perish; for the preceding argument shows that the soul will not admit of death, or even be dead, any more than three or the odd number will admit of the even..."

Metamorphosis and Other Stories

Franz Kafka

" "That was something his parents did not understand very well; over the years, they had become convinced that this job would provide for Gregor for his entire life...""

Les Misérables

VICTOR HUGO

"A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is visible labor and there is invisible labor."

The Cherry Orchard

Anton Chekhov

" “The world is, of course, nothing but our conception of it.”"

Demian

Hermann Hesse

"In each of us spirit has become form, in each of us the created being suffers, in each of us a redeemer is crucified."

The Kreutzer Sonata

Leo Tolstoy

"It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness."

Book VIII

Marcus Aurelius

"In the constitution of that rational animal I see no virtue which is opposed to justice, but I see a virtue which is opposed to love of pleasure, and that is temperance."

Book IV

Marcus Aurelius

"That which makes the man no worse than he was makes his life no worse: it has no power to harm, without or within."

The Trials Of Socrates

Plato

"We admitted that everything living is born of the dead. For if the soul existed before birth, and in coming to life and being born can be born only from death and dying, must she not after death continue to exist, since she has to be born again?"

Siddhartha

Hermann Hesse

"“Vasudeva rose. “It is late,” he said, “let’s go to sleep. I can’t tell you that other thing, oh friend. You’ll learn it, or perhaps you know it already. See, I’m no learned man, I have no special skill in speaking, I also have no special skill in thinking. All I’m able to do is to listen and to be godly, I have learned nothing else. If I was able to say and teach it, I might be a wise man, but like this I am only a ferryman, and it is my task to ferry people across the river.” ”"

Lord Arthur Savile's Crime

Oscar Wilde

"The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast."

Essays

Michel De Montaigne

"I find I am much prouder of the victory I obtain over myself, when, in the very ardor of dispute, I make myself submit to my adversary�s force of reason, than I am pleased with the victory I obtain over him through his weakness."

The Post Office Girl 

Stefan Zweig

"Fear is a distorting mirror in which anything can appear as a caricature of itself, stretched to terrible proportions; once inflamed, the imagination pursues the craziest and most unlikely possibilities. What is most absurd suddenly seems the most probable."

The Alchemist

Paulo Coelho

"No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn’t know it."

Atomic Habits

James Clear

"Some people spend their entire lives waiting for the time to be right to make an improvement."

Leo Africanus

Amin Maalouf

"“Virtue becomes unhealthy if it is not softened by some misdemeanors, and faith quickly becomes cruel if is not subdued by certain doubts.”"

A Hunger Artist

Franz Kafka

"“Experience had proven that for about forty days, through gradually intensified publicity, you could go on stimulating a city’s interest, but beyond that time there was no audience.” "

Joan of Arc

Mark Twain

"Human nature is the same everywhere; it deifies success, it has nothing but scorn for defeat."

A Hunger Artist

Franz Kafka

"“If I had found the food I liked, believe me, I should have made no fuss and stuffed myself like you or anyone else.” These were his last words, but in his dimming eyes there remained the firm though no longer proud persuasion that he was still continuing to fast.” "

Siddhartha

Hermann Hesse

"“Do you hear?” Vasudeva’s mute gaze asked. Siddhartha nodded. “Listen better!” Vasudeva whispered."

Never Give In!

Winston S Churchill

"Of this I am quite sure, that if we open a quarrel between the past and the present, we shall find that we have lost the future."

Essays

Michel De Montaigne

"Those that will combat use and custom by the strict rules of grammar do but jest. "

Great Expectations

Charles Dickens

"I'll tell you ... what real love is. It is blind devotion, unquestioning self-humiliation, utter submission, trust and belief against yourself and against the whole world, giving up your whole heart and soul to the smiter -- as I did!"

The Practice of Psychological Assessment

John Steinbeck

"Underneath the topmost layers of frailty, men want to be good and want to be loved. Indeed most of their vices are attempted shortcuts to love."

The Inspector General

Nikolai Gogol

"The sergeant's widow told you a lie when she said I flogged her. I never flogged her. She flogged herself."

History as a System

Jose Ortega y Gasset

"The nineteenth century, utilitarian throughout, set up a utilitarian interpretation of the phenomenon of life which has come down to us and may still be considered as the commonplace of everyday thinking. … An innate blindness seems to have closed the eyes of this epoch to all but those facts which show life as a phenomenon of utility"

Maxim for Revolutionists

George Bernard Shaw

"Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself."

The Remarkable Rocket

Oscar Wilde

"The only thing that sustains one through life is the consciousness of the immense inferiority of everybody else, and this is a feeling that I have always cultivated."

Self-Analysis

Karen Horney

"the idea of a finished human product not only appears presumptuous but even, in my opinion, lacks any strong appeal. Life is struggle and striving, development and growth - and analysis is one of the means that can help in this process. Certainly its positive accomplishments are important, but also the striving itself is of intrinsic value."

The Trials Of Socrates

Plato

"I do not mean to affirm that the description which I have given of the soul and her missions is exactly true—a man of sense ought hardly say that. But I do say that, inasmuch as the soul is shown to be immortal, he may venture to think, not improperly or unworthily, that something of this kind is true."

Gorgias

Plato

"Speech is a powerful master and achieves the most divine feats with the smallest and least evident body. It can stop fear, relieve pain, create joy, and increase pity"

By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept 

Paulo Coelho

"Life takes us by surprise and orders us to move toward the unknown — even when we don't want to and when we think we don't need to."

The Mysterious Stranger

Mark Twain

"There is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a Dream, a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And You are but a Thought — a vagrant Thought, a useless Thought, a homeless Thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities."

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

Yuval Noah Harari

" “There are no gods, no nations, no money and no human rights, except in our collective imagination.”"

Seagull

Anton Chekhov

"It has become customary to say that a man needs only six feet of land. But a corpse needs six feet, not a person."

Nicholas Nickleby

Charles Dickens

"There are only two styles of portrait painting: the serious and the smirk."

Book VI

Marcus Aurelius

"Adapt yourself to the environment in which your lot has been cast, and show true love to the fellow-mortals with whom destiny has surrounded you."