André Gide idézet

oldal 2

„Én olyannyira kételkedem mindenben, hogy azt gondolom, talán a kételkedés lehet az egyetlen kiindulópont; mert, gondolom, a kételkedésnek sose leszünk híjával. Mindenben kételkedhetem, bárminek a valóságában, de kételkedésem valóságában nem.”

„Az előitéletek a civilizáció pillérei.”

„Ha valami nem untat, mindjárt azt hiszed, hogy nem elég mély.”

„Jobb, ha azért gyűlölnek, ami vagy, mintha azért szeretnének, ami nem.”

„Az ember nem fedez fel új világrészeket, ha nincs mersze az ismert partokat maga mögött hagyni.”

“The most decisive actions of our life — I mean those that are most likely to decide the whole course of our future — are, more often than not, unconsidered.”

“To read a writer is for me not merely to get an idea of what he says, but to go off with him and travel in his company.”

“Every instant of our lives is essentially irreplaceable: you must know this in order to concentrate on life.”

“The truth is that as soon as we are no longer obliged to earn our living, we no longer know what to do with our life and recklessly squander it.”

“In other people's company I felt I was dull, gloomy, unwelcome, at once bored and boring…”

“We should enjoy this summer, flower by flower, as if it were to be the last one we’ll see.”

“A man thinks he owns things, and it is he who is owned”

“I wished for nothing beyond her smile, and to walk with her thus, hand in hand, along a sun warmed, flower bordered path.”

“The capacity to get free is nothing; the capacity to be free is the task.”

“Nothing is more fatal to happiness than the remembrance of happiness.”

“I can't expect others to share my virtues. It's good enough for me if they share my vices.”

“Welcome everything that comes to you, but do not long for anything else.”

“Seize from every moment it's unique novelty, and do not prepare your joys.”

“When people felt they had a right to seek out Christ before the torment, and in the fullness of his joy—it was too late; the cross had overcome Christ himself; it was Christ crucified that people continued to see and teach. And thus it is that religion came to plunge the world into gloom.”

“True kindness presupposes the faculty of imagining as one’s own the suffering and joys of others.”

“The sole art that suits me is that which, rising from unrest, tends toward serenity.”

“The only really Christian art is that which, like St. Francis, does not fear being wedded to poverty. This rises far above art-as-ornament.”

“At times it seems to me that I am living my life backwards, and that at the approach of old age my real youth will begin. My soul was born covered with wrinkles—wrinkles my ancestors and parents most assiduously put there and that I had the greatest trouble removing.”

“True intelligence very readily conceives of an intelligence superior to its own; and this is why truly intelligent men are modest.”

“A straight path never leads anywhere except to the objective.”

“When intelligent people pride themselves on not understanding, it is quite natural they should succeed better than fools.”

“The most important things to say are those which often I did not think necessary for me to say — because they were too obvious.”

“There is no feeling so simple that it is not immediately complicated and distorted by introspection.”

“Pay attention only to the form; emotion will come spontaneously to inhabit it. A perfect dwelling always finds an inhabitant. The artist’s business is to build the dwelling; as for the inhabitant, it is up to the reader to provide him.”

“The artist who is after success lets himself be influenced by the public. Generally such an artist contributes nothing new, for the public acclaims only what it already knows, what it recognizes.”

“Often the best in us springs from the worst in us.”

“Families, I hate you! Shut-in homes, closed doors, jealous possessions of happiness.”

“To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one's freedom.”

“We call “happiness” a certain set of circumstances that makes joy possible. But we call joy that state of mind and emotions that needs nothing to feel happy.”