Deute den lieblichen Schein und mache Ernst aus dem Spiel, so wirst du das Centrum fassen und die verehrte Kunst in höherm Lichte wieder finden.
“Ideas,” Lucinde and the Fragments, P. Firchow, trans. (1991), § 109
Deute den lieblichen Schein und mache Ernst aus dem Spiel, so wirst du das Centrum fassen und die verehrte Kunst in höherm Lichte wieder finden.
“I don't take art as seriously as politics.”
Original: La tua sublime bellezza ti permetterà ogni volta di donare gioia e luce agli occhi dei fortunati che avranno occasione di incontrarti.
Source: prevale.net
Author's Forward, p. xxv
Thinking and Destiny (1946)
Context: From November of 1892 I passed through astonishing and crucial experiences, following which, in the spring of 1893, there occurred the most extraordinary event of my life. I had crossed 14th Street at 4th Avenue, in New York City. Cars and people were hurrying by. While stepping up to the northeast corner curbstone, Light, greater than that of myriads of suns opened in the center of my head. In that instant or point, eternities were apprehended. There was no time. Distance and dimensions were not in evidence.
Source: Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 39.
Porém, pera cantar de vosso gesto
A composição alta e milagrosa
Aqui falta saber, engenho e arte.
The Collected Lyric Poems of Luis de Camoes (2016), trans. Landeg White, p. 25
Lyric poetry, Sonnets, Eu cantarei de amor tão docemente
1950s, Loving Your Enemies (November 1957)
Context: There is something within all of us that causes us to cry out with Ovid, the Latin poet, "I see and approve the better things of life, but the evil things I do." There is something within all of us that causes us to cry out with Plato that the human personality is like a charioteer with two headstrong horses, each wanting to go in different directions. There is something within each of us that causes us to cry out with Goethe, "There is enough stuff in me to make both a gentleman and a rogue." There is something within each of us that causes us to cry out with Apostle Paul, "I see and approve the better things of life, but the evil things I do." So somehow the "isness" of our present nature is out of harmony with the eternal "oughtness" that forever confronts us. And this simply means this: That within the best of us, there is some evil, and within the worst of us, there is some good. When we come to see this, we take a different attitude toward individuals. The person who hates you most has some good in him; even the nation that hates you most has some good in it; even the race that hates you most has some good in it. And when you come to the point that you look in the face of every man and see deep down within him what religion calls "the image of God," you begin to love him in spite of. No matter what he does, you see God’s image there. There is an element of goodness that he can never sluff off. Discover the element of good in your enemy. And as you seek to hate him, find the center of goodness and place your attention there and you will take a new attitude.
Interviewed on the Danish Monitor radio programme 2005-11-30
