Thinking fragments reality – it cuts it up into conceptual bits and pieces.
Eckhart TolleOne and the same thing can at the same time be good, bad, and indifferent, e.g., music is good to the melancholy, bad to those who mourn, and neither good nor bad to the deaf.
Baruch SpinozaWriting is fun – at least mostly. I write for four hours every day. After that I go running. As a rule, 10 kilometers (6.2 miles). That’s easy to manage.
Haruki MurakamiWe often want one thing and pray for another, not telling the truth even to the gods.
Lucius Annaeus SenecaAs I approve of a youth that has something of the old man in him, so I am no less pleased with an old man that has something of the youth. He that follows this rule may be old in body, but can never be so in mind.
Marcus Tullius CiceroThe beginnings and ends of shadow lie between the light and darkness and may be infinitely diminished and infinitely increased. Shadow is the means by which bodies display their form. The forms of bodies could not be understood in detail but for shadow.
Leonardo da VinciThe mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive. To put it more accurately… you usually don’t use it at all. It uses you.
Eckhart TolleDespair is a narcotic. It lulls the mind into indifference.
Charlie ChaplinEthics is in origin the art of recommending to others the sacrifices required for cooperation with oneself.
Bertrand RussellThose who have knowledge, don’t predict. Those who predict, don’t have knowledge.
Lao TzuIt is much more secure to be feared than to be loved.
Niccolo MachiavelliNature does nothing in vain.
AristotleLove is anterior to life, posterior to death, initial of creation, and the exponent of breath.
Emily DickinsonWhen the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.
Oscar WildeImagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is.
Francis BaconIt has always been a mystery to me how men can feel themselves honoured by the humiliation of their fellow beings.
Mahatma GandhiAs I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.
Abraham LincolnHe who is unable to live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a beast or a god.
AristotleIt is not living that matters, but living rightly.
SocratesCertainly the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried, or childless men.
Francis BaconThe utmost extent of man’s knowledge, is to know that he knows nothing.
Joseph AddisonMost damage that others do us is out of fear, humiliation and pain. Those feelings occur in all of us, not just in those of us who profess a certain religious or racial devotion.
Alice WalkerHell is other people.
Jean-Paul SartreTrue virtue is life under the direction of reason.
Baruch SpinozaOne always dies too soon or too late. And yet, life is there, finished: the line is drawn, and it must all be added up. You are nothing other than your life.
Jean-Paul SartreIt is as natural to die as to be born; and to a little infant, perhaps, the one is as painful as the other.
Francis BaconThe more powerful and original a mind, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude.
Aldous HuxleyThere is no love of life without despair of life.
Albert CamusOne has to pay dearly for immortality; one has to die several times while one is still alive.
Friedrich NietzscheIt is with trifles, and when he is off guard, that a man best reveals his character.
Arthur SchopenhauerNothing is divine but what is agreeable to reason.
Immanuel KantEvery person takes the limits of their own field of vision for the limits of the world.
Arthur SchopenhauerTo do nothing is also a good remedy.
HippocratesThe greatness of man is great in that he knows himself to be wretched. A tree does not know itself to be wretched.
Blaise PascalThe theoretical understanding of the world, which is the aim of philosophy, is not a matter of great practical importance to animals, or to savages, or even to most civilised men.
Bertrand RussellWhoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods.
Albert EinsteinThe fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.
Mark TwainThere never was and is not likely soon to be a nation of philosophers, nor am I certain it is desirable that there should be.
Henry David ThoreauOf course, when I say that human nature is gentleness, it is not 100 percent so. Every human being has that nature, but there are many people acting against their nature, being false.
Dalai LamaEvery man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world’s phenomena intersect, only once in this way, and never again.
Hermann HesseFor having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise.
Benjamin FranklinMutability of temper and inconsistency with ourselves is the greatest weakness of human nature.
Joseph AddisonWell, we know that people in Australia love the idea of both Impulse and Virgin Blue getting up and adding a bit of competition, and it’s fun to be able to deliver it.
Richard BransonDying is one of the few things that can be done as easily lying down.
Woody AllenThere is no such thing as Something for nothing.
Napoleon HillIt is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts.
Carl JungFor centuries, theologians have been explaining the unknowable in terms of the-not-worth-knowing.
H. L. MenckenSin is geographical.
Bertrand RussellDeath is a commingling of eternity with time; in the death of a good man, eternity is seen looking through time.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheTo depend upon a profession is a less odious form of slavery than to depend upon a father.
Virginia WoolfDancing in high heels is kind of tough. I learn the dances without the heels, and then we add them. We just practice, and I get used to it. My feet hurt really badly at the end of the shows, but it’s fun. While it’s happening it’s fun. I feel tall.
Ariana GrandeTolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.
Gilbert K. ChestertonMan takes his law from the Earth; the Earth takes its law from Heaven; Heaven takes its law from the Tao. The law of the Tao is its being what it is.
Lao TzuNothing is more terrible than activity without insight.
Thomas CarlyleDon’t part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.
Mark TwainWe’re all of us guinea pigs in the laboratory of God. Humanity is just a work in progress.
Tennessee WilliamsThere is nothing good or evil save in the will.
EpictetusPessimists are the people who have no hope for themselves or for others. Pessimists are also people who think the human race is beneath their notice, that they’re better than other human beings.
James BaldwinTo have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher.
Blaise PascalI’m not a serious person, and I don’t like serious people.
Ray Bradbury