“With despair, true optimism begins: the optimism of the man who expects nothing, who knows he has no rights and nothing coming to him, who rejoices in counting on himself alone and in acting alone for the good of all.”

— Jean Paul Sartre

Characterizations of Existentialism (1944)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Nov. 2, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "With despair, true optimism begins: the optimism of the man who expects nothing, who knows he has no rights and nothing…" by Jean Paul Sartre?

Jean Paul Sartre 321

French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, sc… 1905–1980

Related quotes

“The only man who has the right to say that he is justified by grace alone is the man who has left all to follow Christ.”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–1945) German Lutheran pastor, theologian, dissident anti-Nazi

“Allah's Apostle used to say, "None has the right to be worshipped except Allah Alone (Who) honored His Warriors and made His Slave victorious, and He (Alone) defeated the (infidel) clans; so there is nothing after Him.”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Narrated Abu Huraira, in Bukhari, Volume 5, Book 59, Number 440
Sunni Hadith

“No man is born unto himself alone;
Who lives unto himself, he lives to none.”

Francis Quarles (1592–1644) English poet

Esther (1621), Sec. 1, Meditation 1.

“When a man begins to know himself a little he will see in himself many things that are bound to horrify him. So long as a man is not horrified at himself he knows nothing about himself.”

P. D. Ouspensky book In Search of the Miraculous

In Search of the Miraculous (1949)

“Hold back your mind from pride, for pride comes only from ignorance. The man who does not know thinks that he is great, that he has done this or that great thing; the wise man knows that only God is great, that all good work is done by God alone.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

§ III
1910s, At the Feet of the Master (1911)

“Give me a man who is man enough to give himself just to the woman who is worth him. If that woman were me, I would love him alone and forever”

Giacomo Casanova (1725–1798) Italian adventurer and author from the Republic of Venice

“Every man who has accepted the statement from somebody else, without himself testing and verifying it, is out of court; his word is worth nothing at all. And when we get back at last to the true birth and beginning of the statement, two serious questions must be disposed of in regard to him who first made it: was he mistaken in thinking that he knew about this matter, or was he lying?”

William Kingdon Clifford (1845–1879) English mathematician and philosopher

The Ethics of Belief (1877), The Weight Of Authority
Context: We have no right to believe a thing true because everybody says so unless there are good grounds for believing that some one person at least has the means of knowing what is true, and is speaking the truth so far as he knows it. However many nations and generations of men are brought into the witness-box they cannot testify to anything which they do not know. Every man who has accepted the statement from somebody else, without himself testing and verifying it, is out of court; his word is worth nothing at all. And when we get back at last to the true birth and beginning of the statement, two serious questions must be disposed of in regard to him who first made it: was he mistaken in thinking that he knew about this matter, or was he lying?

“Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

Letter, written in collaboration with John Gay, to William Fortescue (23 September 1725).
A similar remark was made in a letter to John Gay (16 October 1727): "I have many years magnify'd in my own mind, and repeated to you a ninth Beatitude, added to the eight in the Scripture: Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed."
Variant: Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.
Context: "Blessed is the man who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed" was the ninth Beatitude which a man of wit (who, like a man of wit, was a long time in gaol) added to the eighth.

“A person who knows all that is good and all that is true — as much as can be known — but does not resist evils, knows nothing.”
Homo qui scit omnia bona et omnia vera, quotcunque sciri possunt, et non fugit mala, nihil scit

Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772) Swedish 18th century scientist and theologian

Apocalypse Explained #1180

“All writing is an antisocial act, since the writer is a man who can speak freely only when alone; to be himself he must lock himself up, to communicate he must cut himself off from all communication; and in this there is something always a little mad.”

Kenneth Tynan (1927–1980) English theatre critic and writer

"Tennessee Williams" (1956), p. 97
Profiles (1990)

“With despair, true optimism begins: the optimism of the man who expects nothing, who knows he has no rights and nothing coming to him, who rejoices in counting on himself alone and in acting alone for the good of all.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Jean Paul Sartre 321

Related quotes

Related topics