Quotes about the night (3936 quotes, page 2)

“The person who does not control his territory does not control his existence. If someone is not conscious, he is taken over, not only outwardly but also with the thoughts that assault him. He is very vulnerable to desires and feelings. For example, you live calmly with your wife, and then—catastrophe! Suddenly you lose control because you have fallen in love with another. You don't have to fall victim to that reality; what you have to do is navigate in it, overcome the winds and sandstorms. Amid the storms at sea and the signs, you must move forward calmly and look toward the port you're heading for. In New York, when I was filming The Holy Mountain, I had problems of all sorts. I soaked six or seven T-Shirts a night with my sweat. I went to see a Chinese sage that someone had recommended. He was a poet, a great master of tai chi, and a doctor. When he first saw me, he said, "What is your purpose in life?" I was disconcerted and did not answer. He continued, "If you do not tell me what is your purpose in life, I cannot heal you."”

Alejandro Jodorowsky (1929) Filmmaker and comics writer

So I understood that if a ship crosses the sea without a purpose, it will arrive at no port. What prevents life from devouring us is having a purpose. The higher it is, the further it will carry us...
Psychomagic: The Transformative Power of Shamanic Psychotherapy (2010)

Love , Life , Feeling , Mountain

“It is difficult to see how Gandhi's methods could be applied in a country where opponents of the regime disappear in the middle of the night and are never heard of again. Without a free press and the right of assembly, it is impossible not merely to appeal to outside opinion, but to bring a mass movement into being, or even to make your intentions known to your adversary.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

Reflections on Gandhi (1949)

Country

“The night can sweat with terror as before
We pieced our thoughts into philosophy,
And planned to bring the world under a rule,
Who are but weasels fighting in a hole.”

W.B. Yeats book The Tower

I, st. 4
The Tower (1928), Nineteen Hundred And Nineteen http://poetry.poetryx.com/poems/1547/

World , Fight

“O Lord, this earth groans and suffers; chaos has made this world its abode. The darkness is so great that Thou alone canst dispel it. Come, manifest Thyself, that Thy work may be accomplished. Solitude, a harsh, intense solitude, and always this strong impression of having been flung headlong into an inferno of darkness! … Sometimes … I cannot prevent my total sub-mission from taking a hue of melancholy, and the calm and mute converse with the Master within is transformed for a moment into an invocation almost suppliant, O Lord, what have I done that Thou throwest me thus into the sombre night?”

The Mother (1878–1973) spiritual collaborator of Sri Aurobindo

Her entry in her diary when she left Pondicherry and on the tumultuous developments in the world for the War, quoted in "Diary notes and Meeting with Sri Aurobindo" and also in IV. Diary Notes And Meeting With Sri Aurobindo http://www.motherandsriaurobindo.org/Content.aspx?ContentURL=/_staticcontent/sriaurobindoashram/-04%20Centers/India/Pondicherry/Sri%20Aurobindo%20Society/Wilfried/The%20Mother%20-%20A%20Short%20Biography/007_Diary%20Notes%20and%20Meeting%20with%20Sri%20Aurobindo.htm, p. 21

World , Solitude , Strong , Suffering

“The night that hides things from us.”

Dante Alighieri book Paradiso

Canto XXIII, line 3 (tr. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Paradiso

“Sprinting from one shady patch to another to escape the blistering heat of the sun on my journey to school
Felling the massacre on that fearsome night when most of my family was slaughtered
racing trains for fun
outrunning the police when I was caught stealing in Shahdra
leaving every one behind in my first race as an army jawan so that I could get an extra glass of milk
surging past my competitors in Tokyo when I was declared Asia’s best athlete
Running in Pakistan and being hailed as "The Flying Sikh."”

Milkha Singh (1935) Indian track and field athlete

The Race of My Life: An Autobiography Milkha Singh (2013)

School , Family , Sun , Past

“On a dark night, Kindled in love with yearnings — oh, happy chance! —
I went forth without being observed, My house being now at rest.
In darkness and secure, By the secret ladder, disguised — oh, happy chance! —
In darkness and in concealment, My house being now at rest.”

John of the Cross (1542–1591) Spanish mystic and Roman Catholic saint

En una noche oscura,
con ansias, en amores inflamada,
¡oh dichosa ventura!,
salí sin ser notada,
estando ya mi casa sosegada;
One dark night, fired with love's urgent longings — ah, the sheer grace! —
I went out unseen, my house being now all stilled.
In darkness, and secure, by the secret ladder, disguised, — ah, the sheer grace! — in darkness and concealment, my house being now all stilled.
Variant translation by Kieran Kavanaugh and Otilio Rodriguez (1991)
Upon a darkened night the flame of love was burning in my breast
And by a lantern bright I fled my house while all in quiet rest.
Shrouded by the night and by the secret stair I quickly fled.
The veil concealed my eyes while all within lay quiet as the dead
Variant adapted for music by Loreena McKennitt (1994)
Dark Night of the Soul

Love , Secret , Chance , Housing

“Let me offer lesson number one about America: All great change in America begins at the dinner table. So, tomorrow night in the kitchen I hope the talking begins. And children, if your parents haven't been teaching you what it means to be an American, let 'em know and nail 'em on it. That would be a very American thing to do.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989), Farewell Address (1989)

Children , Hope , Parent , Change

“A good idea will keep you awake during the morning, but a great idea will keep you awake during the night.”

Marilyn vos Savant (1946) US American magazine columnist, author and lecturer

As quoted in What Type Am I? : Discover Who You Really Are (1998) by Renee Baron, p. 110

Good Night , Idea

“We shall see that there is great reason to hope that death is a good, for one of two things: either death is a state of nothingness and utter unconsciousness, or, as men say, there is a change and a migration of the soul from this world to another. Now if you suppose there is no consciousness, but a sleep like the sleep of him who is undisturbed even by the site of dreams, death will be an unspeakable gain. For if a person were to select the night in which his sleep was undisturbed even by dreams, and were to compare with this the other days and nights of his life, and then were to tell us how many days and nights he had passed in the course of his life better and more pleasantly than this one, I think that any man, I will not say a private man, but even the great king, will not find many such days or nights, when compared with the others. Now, if death is like this, I say that to die is gain; for eternity is then only a single night. But if death is the journey to another place, and there, as men say, all the dead are, what good, O friends and judges, can be greater than this? …Above all, I shall be able to continue my search into true and false knowledge; as in this world, so also in that; I shall find out who is wise, and who pretends to be wise, and is not. …What infinite delight would there be in conversing with them and asking them questions! For in that world they would not put a man to death for this; certainly not. For besides being happier in that world than in this, they will be immortal, if what is said is true.”

Socrates (-470–-399 BC) classical Greek Athenian philosopher

40c–41c
Plato, Apology

Life , Death , Men , World

“As when Eolus heaven's fair face deforms, Enwrapp'd in tempest and a night of storms; Astonish'd ocean feels the wild uproar, The refluent surges beat the sounding shore; Or thick as leaves in Autumn's golden reign”

Phillis Wheatley (1753–1784) American poet

1770s, To His Excellency, George Washington (1775)

Feeling , Autumn

“No One said there'd be night like this, Risk your life for a stolen kiss.”

Jon Bon Jovi (1962) American singer and musician

The Price Of Love
Music, 7800° Fahrenheit (1985)

Life , Kiss

“I'm proud that I was able to start with nothing, plan it, and have it work as perfectly as it did… I sleep clearly every night.”

Paul Tibbets (1915–2007) United States Air Force pilot

1975 interview http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7073441.stm

Sleep

“In the most trying hours, through dismal nights and endless interrogations and maltreatment, during days of killing solitude in cells and close confinement, we were always sustained by the hope that all these agonies were not in vain, that there was a strong and mighty country, however far away, in which all the dreams for which we were fighting had been fulfilled. For us it was the homeland of the workers, in which labour was honoured, in which love, comradeship, and sincerity prevailed. With what joy I had felt the strength of that country as, emerging from prison in 1934, I listened in the dead of each night to Radio Moscow and heard the clock of the Kremlin tower striking the hours, and the stirring strains of the 'International.”

Josip Broz Tito (1892–1980) Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman

Jasper Ridley, Tito: A Biography (Constable and Company Ltd., 1994), p. 128.
Other

Love , Dreams , Hope , Solitude

“You're my bondage and my freedom,
my flesh burning like a naked summer night,
you're my country.
Hazel eyes marbled green,
you're awesome, beautiful, and brave,
you're my desire always just out of reach.”

Nâzım Hikmet (1902–1963) Turkish poet

From You're

Beauty , Freedom , Summer , Country

“No one says in the morning: A day is soon past, let us wait for the night. On the contrary, in the evening we consider what we shall do the next day. We should be very sorry to spend even one day at the mercy of time and bores. … Who can be certain of spending an hour without being bored, if he takes no care to fill even that short period according to his pleasure. Yet what we cannot be certain of for an hour, we sometimes feel assured of for life, and say: “If death is the end of everything, why give ourselves so much trouble? We are extremely foolish to make such a pother about the future”—that is to say, we are extremely foolish not to entrust our destinies to chance, and to provide for the interval which lies between us and death.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 173.

Life , Death , Pleasure , Feeling

“AT LAST, SIR TERRY, WE MUST WALK TOGETHER.

Terry took Death’s arm and followed him through the doors and on to the black desert under the endless night.

The End.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Death

“The fiend with all his comrades
Fell then from heaven above,
Through as long as three nights and days,
The angels from heaven into hell;
And them all the Lord transformed to devils,
Because they his deed and word
Would not revere.”

Cædmon (657–680) Ancient English poet

Creation: The Fall of the Rebel Angels (c. 670).

Angels , Hell

“Every day we started fighting. Every night we fell in love. No one else could make me sadder. But no one else could lift me high above.”

Alexander Rybak (1986) Norwegian singer, actor, violinist, composer, pianist

"Fairytale" (2009).

Love , Fight

“As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence, I have formed during the last few years such close relationships with this best and truest friend of mankind that death's image is not only no longer terrifying to me, but is indeed very soothing and consoling, and I thank my God for graciously granting me the opportunity…of learning that death is the key which unlocks the door to our true happiness. I never lie down at night without reflecting that —- young as I am — I may not live to see another day. Yet no one of all my acquaintances could say that in company I am morose or disgruntled.”

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791) Austrian Romantic composer

Letter to Leopold Mozart (4 April 1787), from The Mozart-Da Ponte Operas by Andrew Steptoe [Oxford University Press, 1988, ISBN 0-198-16221-9], p. 84.

Death , God , Lie , Learning

“I had too much praise, too much flattery and fawning over and I needed to remember who I was, where I came from. One time I called a relative in Tupelo. It was Christmas and they were havin' dinner. I asked, 'What?' and she was kind of quiet, then said, 'Meat loaf.' I was shocked as we'd had the best, you know, turkey, ham, steak, everything. She said that it was near the first and they'd run out of money so they just had meat loaf. It hurt me. and so, I ate meat loaf for about eight months, every night, so I'd remember where I came from and to remind me of how many people were unable to have what I did. It was kind of a penance…”

Elvis Presley (1935–1977) American singer and actor

from the book Blue Star Love by By Maia Chrystine Nartoomid. http://safehaven.0catch.com/quotes.htm,originally

Money , People , Time , Christmas

“Because of you, each day is a melon slice
smelling sweetly of earth
Because of you, all fruits reach out to me
as if I were the sun.
Thanks to you, I live on the honey of hope.
You are the reason my heart beats.
Because of you, even my loneliest nights
smile like an Anatolian kilim on your wall.
Should my journey end before I reach my city,
I've rested in a rose garden thanks to you.
Because of you I don't let death enter,
clothed in the softest garments,
and knocking on my door with songs
calling me to the greatest place.”

Nâzım Hikmet (1902–1963) Turkish poet

From Because of You (29 August 1960)

Death , Smile , Hope , Sun

“We crawled up to bed, tumbled down half dressed, and stayed there ten hours. Most of my Saturday nights went like this. On the whole, the two hours when one was perfectly and wildly happy seemed worth the subsequent headache. For many men in the quarter, unmarried and with no future to think of, the weekly drinking-bout was the one thing that made life worth living.”

George Orwell book Down and Out in Paris and London

Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 17

Life , Men , Drink , Thinking

“The Rock: I have so much love and respect for the fans. I'll never forget where I came from. I love the business. I grew up in the business. And everyone always asks me, from Letterman to Stone Phillips, what I miss about wrestling. Hands down, I miss the interaction with the fans. Outside of the ring I loved it, too. I mean, how hard is it to sign an autograph? Don't be an asshole to your fans. And there's many [in WWE] that won't, which is bullshit. But inside the ring, just that energy and feeding off that energy is great. There's something so special about it. And every night I would just have a blueprint of what I would say and rely so much on ad-libbing and waiting to see what happens when I get out there and let it materialize organically and see what happens. Every night was a different crowd and they gave me so much energy, and I'll always love that and always miss that for sure.”

Dwayne Johnson (1972) American actor and professional wrestler

Interview with WWE.com (October 2005).

Love , Business , Waiting , Forgetting

“The best thing for being sad," replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, "is to learn something. That's the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then — to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting. Learning is the only thing for you. Look what a lot of things there are to learn.”

T. H. White book The Book of Merlyn

The Book of Merlyn (1977)

Depressing , Love , Lie , World

“You dare not think that you ever might experience your self differently: free instead of cowed; open instead of tactical; loving openly instead of like a thief in the night.”

Wilhelm Reich book Listen, Little Man!

Listen, Little Man! (1948)
Context: "What right do you have to tell me things?" I can see this question in your apprehensive look. I hear this question from your impertinent mouth, Little Man. You are afraid to look at yourself, you are afraid of criticism, Little Man, just as you are afraid of the power they promise you. You would not know how to use this power. You dare not think that you ever might experience your self differently: free instead of cowed; open instead of tactical; loving openly instead of like a thief in the night. You despise yourself Little Man. You say: "Who am I to have an opinion of my own, to determine my own life and to declare the world to be mine?" You are right: Who are you to make a claim to your life?

Love , Thinking

“Your lack of common sense (can be well judged from the fact) that the evidence of two women is equal to one man, that is a proof of the lack of common sense, and you spend some nights (and days) in which you do not offer prayer and in the month of Ramadan (during the days) you do not observe fast, that is a failing in religion.”

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

Sahih Muslim, Book 001, Number 0142
Sunni Hadith
Context: It is narrated on the authority of 'Abdullah b. Umar that the Messenger of Allah observed: O womenfolk, you should give charity and ask much forgiveness for I saw you in bulk amongst the dwellers of Hell. A wise lady among them said: Why is it, Messenger of Allah, that our folk is in bulk in Hell? Upon this the Holy Prophet observed: You curse too much and are ungrateful to your spouses. I have seen none lacking in common sense and failing in religion but (at the same time) robbing the wisdom of the wise, besides you. Upon this the woman remarked: What is wrong with our common sense and with religion? He (the Holy Prophet) observed: Your lack of common sense (can be well judged from the fact) that the evidence of two women is equal to one man, that is a proof of the lack of common sense, and you spend some nights (and days) in which you do not offer prayer and in the month of Ramadan (during the days) you do not observe fast, that is a failing in religion. This hadith has been narrated on the authority of Abu Tahir with this chain of transmitters.

Women , Religion , Sense

“Spending the night out of doors has nothing attractive about it in London, especially for a poor, ragged, undernourished wretch.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Beggars in London", in Le Progrès Civique (12 January 1929), translated into English by Janet Percival and Ian Willison
Context: Spending the night out of doors has nothing attractive about it in London, especially for a poor, ragged, undernourished wretch. Moreover sleeping in the open is only allowed in one thoroughfare in London. If the policeman on his beat finds you asleep, it is his duty to wake you up. That is because it has been found that a sleeping man succumbs to the cold more easily than a man who is awake, and England could not let one of her sons die in the street. So you are at liberty to spend the night in the street, providing it is a sleepless night. But there is one road where the homeless are allowed to sleep. Strangely, it is the Thames Embankment, not far from the Houses of Parliament. We advise all those visitors to England who would like to see the reverse side of our apparent prosperity to go and look at those who habitually sleep on the Embankment, with their filthy tattered clothes, their bodies wasted by disease, a living reprimand to the Parliament in whose shadow they lie.

“Christ comes as a thief in the night, & it is not for us to know the times & seasons which God hath put into his own breast.”

Isaac Newton (1643–1727) British physicist and mathematician and founder of modern classical physics

An Historical Account of Two Notable Corruptions of Scripture (1704), regarding his calculations "Of the End of the World" based upon the prophecies of Daniel, quoted in Look at the Moon! the Revelation Chronology (2007) by John A. Abrams, p. 141
Modern typographical and spelling variant:
This I mention not to assert when the time of the end shall be, but to put a stop to the rash conjectures of fanciful men who are frequently predicting the time of the end, and by doing so bring the sacred prophesies into discredit as often as their predictions fail.
As quoted in "The world will end in 2060, according to Newton" in the London Evening Standard (19 June 2007) http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23401099-the-world-will-end-in-2060-according-to-newton.do
Context: The 2300 years do not end before the year 2132 nor after 2370.
The time times & half time do not end before 2060..... It may end later, but I see no reason for its ending sooner. This I mention not to assert when the time of the end shall be, but to put a stop to the rash conjectures of fancifull men who are frequently predicting the time of the end, & by doing so bring the sacred prophesies into discredit as often as their predictions fail. Christ comes as a thief in the night, & it is not for us to know the times & seasons which God hath put into his own breast.

God , Time , Christ , Season

“That is the devilish thing about poverty, the ever-recurrent thing - loneliness. Day after day with never an intelligent person to talk to; night after night back to your godless room, always alone. Perhaps it sounds rather fun if you are rich and sought-after; but how different it is when you do it from necessity!”

George Orwell book Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Source: Keep the Aspidistra Flying (1936), Ch. 4

Personality , Intelligence , Loneliness

“Our road not marked on maps.
Fugitives of the centuries,
our origin is the breathing
and our destination is exhalation,
A thousand suns are flowing in our blood,
and the vision of infinity is always chasing us.
The form cannot tame us,
Our days are a fire and our nights a sea.”

Alexis Karpouzos (1967)

Source: https://hellopoetry.com/alexis-karpouzos/

Sun , Sea

“It all comes down to the last person you think of at night, that's where the heart is.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Original: Tutto si riduce all'ultima persona a cui pensi la notte, è lì che si trova il cuore.
Source: In Una sorcia bianca – nella raccolta Storie di ordinaria follia

Personality , Heart , Thinking

“It is crucial to know and understand the truest name of God before wasting your time and praying day and night.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

God , Time , Understanding

“Our civilization has fallen out of touch with night. With lights, we drive the holiness and beauty of night back to the forests and the sea; the little villages, the crossroads even, will have none of it. Are modern folk, perhaps, afraid of night? Do they fear that vast serenity, the mystery of infinite space, the austerity of stars?”

Henry Beston book Northern Farm

Source: Northern Farm

Fear , Beauty , Star , Light

“I saved a girl from being attacked last night. I controlled myself.”

Rodney Dangerfield (1921–2004) American actor and comedian

Variant: I saved a girl from being attacked last night. I controlled myself.

Girl

“May I kiss you then? On this miserable paper? I might as well open the window and kiss the night air.”

Franz Kafka (1883–1924) author

Good Night , Kiss

“I opened the door and blinked out into the bright hall. I had the impression it wasn't night and it wasn't day, but some lurid third interval that had suddenly slipped between them and would never end.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

“In the silence of night I have often wished for just a few words of love from one man, rather than the applause of thousands of people.”

Judy Garland (1922–1969) actress, singer and vaudevillian from the United States

Depressing , Love , People , Silence

“This is not good. This is not right. My feet stick out of bed all night. And when I pull them in, oh dear! My head sticks out of bed out here!”

Dr. Seuss (1904–1991) American children's writer and illustrator, co-founder of Beginner Books

“Glory follows afflictions, not as the day follows the night but as the spring follows the winter; for the winter prepares the earth for the spring, so do afflictions sanctified prepare the soul for glory.”

Richard Sibbes (1577–1635) English theologian

Soul , Spring , Affliction , Winter

“I am not to speak to you, I am to think of you when I sit alone or
wake at night alone,
I am to wait, I do not doubt I am to meet you again,
I am to see to it that I do not lose you.”

Walt Whitman book Fulles d'herba

Source: Leaves of Grass

Thinking , Waiting

“Nights and days came and passed
And summer and winter
and the rain.
And it was good to be a little Island.
A part of the world
and a world of its own
All surrounded by the bright blue sea.”

Margaret Wise Brown book The Little Island

Variant: nights and days came and passed
and summer and winter
and the sun and the wind
and the rain.
and it was good to be a little island
a part of the world
and a world of its own
all surrounded by the bright blue sea.
Source: The Little Island

World , Winter , Summer , Parting

“She walked quickly through the darkness with the frank stride of someone who was at least certain that the forest, on this damp and windy night, contained strange and terrible things and she was it.”

Terry Pratchett book Wyrd Sisters

Source: Wyrd Sisters

“I’d ruin any day, all my days, for those long nights with you, and I did.”

Daniel Handler book Why We Broke Up

Source: Why We Broke Up

“So here is my story, may it bring
Some smiles and a tear or so,
It happened once upon a time,
Far away, and long ago,
Outside the night wind keens and wails,
Come listen to me, the Teller of Tales!”

Brian Jacques book Lord Brocktree

Source: Lord Brocktree

Smile , Tear , Time

“I staggered into a Manchester bar late one night on a tour and the waitress said "You look as if you need a Screaming Orgasm". At the time this was the last thing on my mind…”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Usenet

Time

“Ceaseless as the interminable voices of the bell-cricket, all night till dawn my tears flow.”

Murasaki Shikibu book The Tale of Genji

Source: Tale of Genji, The Tale of Genji, trans. Arthur Waley, Ch. 1

Tear

“In dark ages people are best guided by religion, as in a pitch-black night a blind man is the best guide; he knows the roads and paths better than a man who can see. When daylight comes, however, it is foolish to use blind, old men as guides.”

Heinrich Heine (1797–1856) German poet, journalist, essayist, and literary critic

Men , People , Age , Religion

“Why should we rise because 'tis light?
Did we lie down because t'was night?”

William Shakespeare book Shakespeare's Sonnets

Source: Shakespeare's Sonnets

Lie , Light

“There are nights when the wolves are silent and only the moon howls.”

George Carlin book Brain Droppings

Source: Brain Droppings

“Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
in the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?”

William Blake (1757–1827) English Romantic poet and artist

St. 1
1790s, The Tyger (1794)

Fear

“The sky hides the night behind it and shelters the people beneath from the horror that lies above.”

Paul Bowles (1910–1999) American composer, writer, translator

People

“Night had come—night that she loved of all times, night in which the reflections in the dark pool of the mind shine more clearly than by day.”

Virginia Woolf book Orlando: A Biography

Source: Orlando

Love , Time

“… Night has chosen thee; thy death will be thy birth. Night calls to thee; harken to Her sweet voice. Your destiny awaits you at the House of Night.”

P. C. Cast book Marked

Source: Marked

Death , Birth , Housing

“Any fool can fight a winning battle, but it needs character to fight a losing one, and that should inspire us; which reminds me that I dreamed the other night that I was being hanged, but was the life and soul of the party.”

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright

Life , Dreams , Fools , Soul

“Time is rhythm: the insect rhythm of a warm humid night, brain ripple, breathing, the drum in my temple—these are our faithful timekeepers; and reason corrects the feverish beat.”

Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-American novelist, lepidopterist, professor

Source: Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle

Faith , Time

“But let me tell you this: sometimes at night, when I look up at the stars, an see the whole sky jus laid out there, don't you think I ain't rememberin it all. I still got dreams like anybody else, an ever so often, I am thinkin about how things might of been. An then, all of a sudden, I'm forty, fifty, sixty years ole, you know?
Well, so what? I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing-- an dreams is jus dreams, ain't they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain't led no hum-drum life.
You know what I mean?”

Winston Groom Forrest Gump

Source: Forrest Gump

Life , Dreams , Star , Thinking

“I realized that searching was my symbol, the emblem of those who go out at night with nothing in mind, the motives of a destroyer of compasses.”

Julio Cortázar (1914–1984) Argentinian writer

Search , Motivation

“I thought it was keep your friends close so you have someone to drive the car when you sneak over to your enemy's house at night and throw up in his mailbox,"
-Jace”

Cassandra Clare book City of Fallen Angels

Source: City of Fallen Angels

Cars , Housing

“O, speak again, bright angel! for thou art
As glorious to this night, being o'er my head
As is a winged messenger of heaven”

William Shakespeare book Romeo and Juliet

Source: Romeo and Juliet

Art , Angels

“without you, dearest dearest I couldn't see or hear or feel or think - or live - I love you so and I'm never in all our lives going to let us be apart another night.”

Zelda Fitzgerald (1900–1948) Novelist, wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Love , Feeling , Thinking

“You must read, you must persevere, you must sit up nights, you must inquire, and exert the utmost power of your mind. If one way does not lead to the desired meaning, take another; if obstacles arise, then still another; until, if your strength holds out, you will find that clear which at first looked dark.”

Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375) Italian author and poet

Way , Reading , Perseverance

“Make me a willow cabin at your gate,
And call upon my soul within the house;
Write loyal cantons of contemned love
And sing them loud even in the dead of night.”

William Shakespeare Twelfth Night

Source: Twelfth Night

Love , Soul , Singing , Housing

“It is not night when I do see your face,
Therefore I think I am not in the night;
Nor doth this wood lack worlds of company,
For you in my respect are all the world:
Then how can it be said I am alone,
When all the world is here to look on me?”

William Shakespeare A Midsummer Night's Dream

Source: A Midsummer Night's Dream

World , Thinking

“Sometimes, they say, the moon is so busy with the new souls of the world that it disappears from the sky. That is why we have moonless nights. But in the end, the moon always returns, as do we all.”

Mitch Albom Tuesdays with Morrie

Source: Tuesdays with Morrie

World , Soul , Business

“A poetess who had died young of cancer had said in one of her poems that for her, on sleepless nights, 'the night offers toads and black dogs and corpses of the drowned.”

Yasunari Kawabata (1899–1972) Japanese author, Nobel Prize winner

Source: House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories

Dogs

“Last night there seemed to be a chance. Anything was possible last night. That was the trouble with last nights. They were always followed by this mornings.”

Terry Pratchett book Small Gods

Source: Small Gods

Chance

“We will meet; and there we may rehearse most
obscenely and courageously.

Shakespeare, Midsummer Night's Dream. Spoken by Bottom, Act I Sc. 2”

William Shakespeare A Midsummer Night's Dream

Source: A Midsummer Night's Dream

Dreams , Courage

“I read like a wolf eats.
I read myself to sleep every night.”

Gary Paulsen (1939) American writer and musher

Sleep , Wolf , Reading

“He was afraid of touching his own wrist. He never attempted to sleep on his left side, even in those dismal hours of the night when the insomniac longs for a third side after trying the two he has.”

Vladimir Nabokov book Pnin

Source: Pnin

Sleep

“Ten truths must you find during the day; otherwise will you seek truth during the night, and your soul will have been hungry.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Source: Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Truth , Soul

“On the beach, Roran stood alone, watching them go. Then he threw back his head and uttered a long, aching cry, and the night echoed with the sound of his loss.”

Christopher Paolini book Inheritance

Source: Inheritance

Loss , Cry

“Last night I had a peace dream…”

Ringo Starr (1940) British musician, former member of the Beatles

Peace , Dreams

“I desired always to stretch the night and fill it fuller and fuller with dreams.”

Virginia Woolf book The Waves

Source: The Waves

Dreams

“One winter morning Peter woke up and looked out the window. Snow had fallen during the night. It covered everything as far as he could see.”

Ezra Jack Keats book The Snowy Day

Source: The Snowy Day

Winter

“The wise man thinks about his troubles only when there is some purpose in doing so; at other times he thinks about other things, or, if it is night, about nothing at all.”

Bertrand Russell book The Conquest of Happiness

Source: The Conquest of Happiness

Thinking , Time

“All days are nights to see till I see thee,
And nights bright days when dreams do show thee me.”

William Shakespeare book Shakespeare's Sonnets

Source: Shakespeare's Sonnets

Missing You , Dreams

“I buried my head under the darkness of the pillow and pretended it was night. I couldn't see the point of getting up. I had nothing to look forward to.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

“I slept with faith and found a corpse in my arms on awakening; I drank and danced all night with doubt and found her a virgin in the morning.”

Aleister Crowley book The Book of Lies

45 : Chinese Music
Source: The Book of Lies (1913)

Faith , Dance

“I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain - and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.
I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.”

Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet

Light

“I think it would dismay them to know what it takes to feed you. Not to mention that you could empty their cellars of beer and wine in a single night.' Eragon said. Saphira sniffed.”

Christopher Paolini book Eldest

Source: Eldest

Beer , Thinking , Wine

“Receive what cheer you may. The night is long that never finds the day.”

William Shakespeare Macbeth

Source: Macbeth

“An empty day, though clear and bright,
Is just as dark as any night.”

Anne Frank (1929–1945) victim of the Holocaust and author of a diary

Source: The Diary of a Young Girl

“this woman is a genius in the day time and a beauty at night”

Oscar Wilde An Ideal Husband

Source: An Ideal Husband

Beauty , Time

“In the deepest hour of the night, confess to yourself that you would die if you were forbidden to write. And look deep into your heart where it spreads its roots, the answer, and ask yourself, must I write?”

Rainer Maria Rilke book Letters to a Young Poet

Source: Letters to a Young Poet

Heart

“Never build a dungeon you wouldn't be happy to spend the night in yourself. The world would be a happier place if more people remembered that.”

Terry Pratchett book Guards! Guards!

Source: Guards! Guards!

People , World , Happiness

“When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,
Before high piled books, in charact’ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen’d grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love!”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.
"When I have fears that I may cease to be" (1817)
Source: The Complete Poems

Love , Books , World , Fear