“To read a poem is to hear it with our eyes; to hear it is to see it with our ears.”

— Octavio Paz

Alternating Current (1967)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update May 25, 2022. History

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Octavio Paz 71

Mexican writer laureated with the 1990 Nobel Prize for Lite… 1914–1998

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“All the knowledge seekers must pray like this: 'Oh The Creator! Open our eyes to see the truth. Our ears to hear Your Commands and obey with a steadfast heart. Amen!”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Attention involves seeing and hearing. We hear not only with our ears but also we are sensitive to the tones, the voice, to the implication of words, to hear without interference, to capture instantly the depth of a sound.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

Vol. II, p. 30
1980s, Letters to the Schools (1981, 1985)
Context: Attention involves seeing and hearing. We hear not only with our ears but also we are sensitive to the tones, the voice, to the implication of words, to hear without interference, to capture instantly the depth of a sound. Sound plays an extraordinary part in our lives: the sound of thunder, a flute playing in the distance, the unheard sound of the universe; the sound of silence, the sound of one’s own heart beating; the sound of a bird and the noise of a man walking on the pavement; the waterfall. The universe is filled with sound. This sound has its own silence; all living things are involved in this sound of silence. To be attentive is to hear this silence and move with it.

“He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis

Fragment of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (1905) Ch. 2 : The First Dream
1900s
Source: Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis
Context: He that has eyes to see and ears to hear may convince himself that no mortal can keep a secret. If his lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.

“Just as the eye was made to see colours, and the ear to hear sounds, so the human mind was made to understand”

Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) German mathematician, astronomer and astrologer

I. 31 as quoted by Edwin Arthur Burtt in The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science
Joannis Kepleri Astronomi Opera Omnia, ed. Christian Frisch (1858)
Context: Just as the eye was made to see colours, and the ear to hear sounds, so the human mind was made to understand, not whatever you please, but quantity.

“Having eyes, but not seeing beauty; having ears, but not hearing music; having minds, but not perceiving truth…These are the things to fear…”

Tetsuko Kuroyanagi (1933) Japanese actress

“Many people think they cannot have knowledge or understanding of God without reading books. But hearing is better than reading, and seeing is better than hearing. Hearing about Benares is different from reading about it; but seeing Benares is different from either hearing or reading.”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

Source: The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (1942), p. 863

“The proximate goal of all perception is what we can get our hands upon. If we traverse the distance that separate us from that which we see or hear and find nothing for the hand to manipulate, the experience is an illusion or a hallucination. The world of perceptual reality, the world of physical things, is the world of our contacts and our manipulations, and the distance experience of the eye and the ear means first of all these physical things. Physical things are not only the meaning of what we see and hear; they are also the means we employ to accomplish our ends.”

George Herbert Mead (1863–1931) American philosopher, sociologist, and psychologist

George Herbert Mead (1926). "The Nature of Aesthetic Experience." International Journal of Ethics, Vol. 36, No. 4 (Jul., 1926), pp. 382-393; p. 382

“The Miracles of the Church seem to me to rest not so much upon faces or voices or healing power coming suddenly near to us from afar off, but upon our perceptions being made finer, so that for a moment our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there about us always.”

Willa Cather book Death Comes for the Archbishop

Book I, Ch. 4
Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927)

“One ought, every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture, and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German writer, artist, and politician

Bk. V, Ch. 1
Wilhelm Meister's Lehrjahre (Apprenticeship) (1786–1830)
Original: (de) Man sollte alle Tage wenigstens ein kleines Lied hören, ein gutes Gedicht lesen, ein treffliches Gemälde sehen und, wenn es möglich zu machen wäre, einige vernünftige Worte sprechen.

“The deaf eye sees what is invisible to the hearing eye.”

Emilio Insolera (1979) Actor and film producer

Source: As quoted in https://twitter.com/emilioinsolera/status/725116275349950465(April 26, 2016)

“To read a poem is to hear it with our eyes; to hear it is to see it with our ears.”

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Octavio Paz 71

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