Quotes about the soul
page 31

Sinclair Lewis photo
Sri Aurobindo photo
Ramon Llull photo

“Death has no terrors for a sincere servant of Christ who is laboring to bring souls to a knowledge of the truth.”

Ramon Llull (1232–1316) Majorcan writer and philosopher

Llull cited in: George Frederick Maclear (1863) A history of Christian missions during the Middle Ages . p. 365

Ted Kennedy photo

“I hope for an America where neither "fundamentalist" nor "humanist" will be a dirty word, but a fair description of the different ways in which people of good will look at life and into their own souls.”

Ted Kennedy (1932–2009) United States Senator

Speech on "Truth and Tolerance in America," Oct. 3, 1983, Lynchburg, Va. Cited by latimes.com http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-naw-ted-kennedy-quotes26-2009aug26,0,3918428.story, 26 August 2009

Robert G. Ingersoll photo
Jonathan Edwards photo
Kid Cudi photo
Ayn Rand photo
Daniel Dennett photo
George Eliot photo
Pythagoras photo

“Sobriety is the strength of the soul, for it preserves its reason unclouded by passion.”

Pythagoras (-585–-495 BC) ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher

As quoted in The History of Philosophy: From the Earliest Times to the Beginning of the Present Century (1819) by William Enfield
Sobriety is the strength of the mind; for it preserves reason unclouded by passion.
As quoted in Bible of Reason (1831) by Benjamin F. Powell, p. 157
Strength of mind rests in sobriety; for this keeps your reason unclouded by passion.
As quoted in Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern English and Foreign Sources (1899) by James Wood

José Martí photo

“I am an an honest man
From where the palm tree grows,
And I want, before I die,
to cast these verses from my soul.”

José Martí (1853–1895) Poet, writer, Cuban nationalist leader

Yo soy un hombre sincero
De donde crece la palma
Y antes de morirme quiero
Echar mis versos del alma.
I (Yo soy un hombre sincero) as translated by Esther Allen in José Martí : Selected Writings (2002), p. 273, ISBN 0142437042
Variant translations:
A sincere man am I
From the land where palm trees grow,
And I want before I die
My soul's verses to bestow.
"A Sincere Man Am I" http://oldpoetry.com/opoem/46409-Jose-Marti-A-Sincere-Man-Am-I---Verse-I-, as translated by Manuel A. Tellechea, in Versos Sencillos: Simple Verses (1997) ISBN 1558852042
I am a sincere man
from where the palm tree grows,
and before I die I wish
to pour forth the verses from my soul.
Simple Verses (1891)

Richard Lovelace photo
Angela of Foligno photo
Walter Rauschenbusch photo
W. Somerset Maugham photo
James Elroy Flecker photo

“The poet's business is not to save the soul of man but to make it worth saving.”

James Elroy Flecker (1884–1915) Poet

Quoted by Louis Untermeyer in Modern British Poetry http://books.google.com/books?id=GiwMAQAAIAAJ&q=%22The+poet's+business%22+%22is+not+to+save+the+soul+of+man+but+to+make+it+worth+saving%22&pg=PA178#v=onepage (1920)

Torquato Tasso photo

“About the hill lay other islands small,
Where other rocks, crags, cliffs, and mountains stood,
The Isles Fortunate these elder time did call,
To which high Heaven they reigned so kind and good,
And of his blessings rich so liberal,
That without tillage earth gives corn for food,
And grapes that swell with sweet and precious wine
There without pruning yields the fertile vine.The olive fat there ever buds and flowers,
The honey-drops from hollow oaks distil,
The falling brook her silver streams downpours
With gentle murmur from their native hill,
The western blast tempereth with dews and showers
The sunny rays, lest heat the blossoms kill,
The fields Elysian, as fond heathen sain,
Were there, where souls of men in bliss remain.”

Torquato Tasso (1544–1595) Italian poet

Ecco altre isole insieme, altre pendíci
Scoprian alfin men erte ed elevate.
Ed eran queste l'isole felici;
Così le nominò la prisca etate,
A cui tanto stimava i Cieli amici,
Che credea volontarie, e non arate
Quì partorir le terre, e in più graditi
Frutti, non culte, germogliar le viti.<p>Quì non fallaci mai fiorir gli olivi,
E 'l mel dicea stillar dall'elci cave:
E scender giù da lor montagne i rivi
Con acque dolci, e mormorio soave:
E zefiri e rugiade i raggj estivi
Temprarvi sì, che nullo ardor v'è grave:
E quì gli Elisj campi, e le famose
Stanze delle beate anime pose.
Canto XV, stanzas 35–36 (tr. Fairfax)
Gerusalemme Liberata (1581)

“Translation:
Two souls with but a single thought,
Two hearts that beat as one.”

Zwei Seelen und ein Gedanke,
Zwei Herzen und ein Schlag.
Der Sohn der Wildnis (1842), Act ii (published in English as Ingomar the Barbarian; translation by Maria Lovell), reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919). Compare: "Two friends, two bodies with one soul inspir’d", Alexander Pope, The Iliad of Homer, Book xvi, line 267.; "’T was then we luvit ilk ither weel, ’T was then we twa did part: Sweet time—sad time! twa bairns at scule— Twa bairns and but ae heart", William Motherwell, Jeannie Morrison (c. 1832), Stanza 3.

George William Russell photo

“Only in clouds and dreams I felt those souls
In the abyss, each fire hid in its clod,
From which in clouds and dreams the spirit rolls
Into the vast of God.”

George William Russell (1867–1935) Irish writer, editor, critic, poet, and artistic painter

"Dusk"
By Still Waters (1906)

Thomas Moore photo
Cora L. V. Scott photo
Sister Nivedita photo
Burkard Schliessmann photo

“The listener with no preconceptions hears massive waves of sound breaking over him and forms from them the image of a passionate soul seeking and finding the path to faith and peace in God through a life of struggle and a vigorous pursuit of ideals. It is impossible not to hear the confessional tone of this musical language; Liszt’s sonata becomes - perhaps involuntarily on the part of the composer - an autobiographical document and one which reveals an artist in the Faustian mold in the person of its author. As in the Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, the underlying religious concept which dominates and permeates the whole work demands a special kind of approach. Whereas representations of human passions and conflicts force themselves on our understanding with their powerfully suggestive coloring, this concept only becomes manifest to those souls who are prepared to soar to the same heights. The equilibrium of the sonata’s hymnic chordal motif, the transformation of its defiant battle motif (first theme) into a triumphant fanfare, and its appearance in bright, high notes on the harp, together with the devotional atmosphere of the Andante, represent a particular challenge to the listener; he is, after all, also expected to grasp the wide-spanned arcs of sound which, from the first hesitant descending octaves to the radiant final chords, build up a graphic panorama of the various stages of progress of a human spirit filled with faith and hope. As the reflection of a remarkable artistic personality worthy of deep admiration and, by extension, of the whole Romantic period, Liszt’s B minor Sonata deserves lasting recognition.”

Burkard Schliessmann classical pianist

About the Liszt Sonata in B minor

Dan Bern photo

“Are you gonna follow your soul? Or just the style of the day?”

Dan Bern (1965) American musician

Soul
(2003)

Philip K. Dick photo
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu photo
Herbert Hoover photo
Hélène Binet photo
Jacopone da Todi photo
Julian of Norwich photo
John Gray photo
Julian of Norwich photo
Ahad Ha'am photo
W. Somerset Maugham photo
Alan Keyes photo

“There's not a single thing on offer in this all-too-temporary world for which you should ever sell your soul.”

Alan Keyes (1950) American politician

Lynn University Commencement Speech, May 6, 2000. http://renewamerica.us/archives/speeches/00_05_06lynnu.htm.
2000

Jean Paul Sartre photo
Dante Gabriel Rossetti photo

“Around her, lovers, newly met
'Mid deathless love's acclaims,
Spoke evermore among themselves
Their heart-remember'd names;
And the souls mounting up to God
Went by her like thin flames.”

Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828–1882) English poet, illustrator, painter and translator

Stanza 7.
The Blessed Damozel http://www.cs.rice.edu/~ssiyer/minstrels/poems/715.html (1850)

Keshia Chante photo

“You need to love this with your heart and soul. You need to breathe music. My best advice — perform as much as you can. With every mistake, progress.”

Keshia Chante (1988) Canadian actor and musician

Interview with Shelia M. Goss, "Women In Music" at BellaOnline (2009) http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art44926.asp

John Buchan photo
John Ruysbroeck photo
Robert Fulghum photo
Frederick William Robertson photo
Marcus Aurelius photo
Marcus Aurelius photo
Emma Goldman photo

“The right to vote, or equal civil rights, may be good demands, but true emancipation begins neither at the polls nor in courts. It begins in woman's soul.”

Emma Goldman (1868–1940) anarchist known for her political activism, writing, and speeches

p. 219 http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2162/2162-h/2162-h.htm#emancipation
The Tragedy of Woman's Emancipation (1906)

Albert Einstein photo

“I am fascinated by Spinoza's pantheism, but I admire even more his contribution to modern thought because he is the first philosopher to deal with the soul and body as one, and not two separate things.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

Did not appear in Saturday Evening Post story, but quoted in Einstein: His Life and Universe http://books.google.com/books?id=dJMpQagbz_gC&lpg=PP1&pg=PA387#v=onepage&q&f=false by Walter Isaacson, p. 387, in the section discussing Viereck's interview.
1920s, Viereck interview (1929)

Maya Angelou photo
William Hazlitt photo

“Grace has been defined the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.”

"On Manner"
The Round Table (1815-1817)

Sri Aurobindo photo

“To rotate on its own axis is not the one movement for the human soul. There is also its wheeling round the Sun of an inexhaustible illumination.”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

Thoughts and Glimpses (1916-17)

J. M. Barrie photo
Derren Brown photo
Alan Keyes photo

“A callous disregard for the claims of innocent human life is the heart and soul of the evil of terrorism.”

Alan Keyes (1950) American politician

Speech at Thanksgiving Point, Lehi, Utah, September 24, 2002. http://renewamerica.us/archives/speeches/02_09_24utah.htm.
2002

Zakir Hussain (politician) photo

“Our sweat is the answer to all our problems, and that the tiller, the artisan and the teacher are the three agents who feed the body, mind and soul.”

Zakir Hussain (politician) (1897–1969) 3rd President of India

Source: Uniqueness of Zakir Husain and His Contributions (1997), p. 19.

Pythagoras photo

“When the wise man opens his mouth, the beauties of his soul present themselves to the view, like the statues in a temple”

Pythagoras (-585–-495 BC) ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher

"Pythagorean Ethical Sentences From Stobæus" (1904)
Florilegium

Robert G. Ingersoll photo
Thomas Carlyle photo
Johannes Tauler photo
James David Forbes photo

“Most merciful and gracious God, who hast preserved me unto this hour, I most humbly acknowledge Thee as the guide and companion of my youth. Thou hast protected me through the dangers of infancy and childhood, and in my youth Thou didst bless me with the full enjoyment, the happy intimacy, of the best of fathers. Be as gracious and merciful then as Thou hast hitherto been, now that I am about to enter a new stage of existence. Teach me, I beseech Thee, to strengthen in my soul the cultivation of Thy truth, the recollection of the uncertainty of life, the greatness of the objects for which I was created. Revive those delightful religious impressions which in early days I felt more strongly than now; and as Thou hast been pleased lately to permit me to look to a way of life to which formerly I dared not to do, let the leisure I shall enjoy enlarge my warmth of heart towards Thee. Make every branch of study which I may pursue strengthen my confidence in Thy ever-ruling providence, that, undeceived by views of false philosophy, I may ever in singleness of heart elevate my mind from Thy works unto Thy divine essence. Keep from me a vain and overbearing spirit; let me- ever have a thorough sense of my own ignorance and weakness; and keep me through all the trials and troubles of a transitory state in body and soul unto everlasting life, for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.”

James David Forbes (1809–1868) Scottish physicist and glaciologist

"Completing my Twenty-first Year" (1839), a prayer written by Forbes on April 20th, 1830. Life and letters of James David Forbes p. 450.

Henry Van Dyke photo
Jeanne Marie Bouvier de la Motte Guyon photo
Paul Tillich photo
Thomas Chatterton photo

“Chatterton, the marvellous boy,
The sleepless soul that perished in his pride.”

Thomas Chatterton (1752–1770) English poet, forger

William Wordsworth, "Resolution and Independence" (1802) line 43.
Criticism

Richard Monckton Milnes, 1st Baron Houghton photo

“They who have steeped their souls in prayer
Can every anguish calmly bear.”

Richard Monckton Milnes, 1st Baron Houghton (1809–1885) British politician and poet

The Sayings of Rabia. iv.

Henry Liddon photo
Clive Staples Lewis photo
Lucy Mack Smith photo
Swami Vivekananda photo
Nelson Mandela photo

“Difficulties break some men but make others. No axe is sharp enough to cut the soul of a sinner who keeps on trying, one armed with the hope that he will rise even in the end.”

Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist

Nelson Mandela on challenges, Letter to Winnie Mandela (1 February 1975), written on Robben Island. Source: From Nelson Mandela By Himself: The Authorised Book of Quotations © 2010 by Nelson R. Mandela and The Nelson Mandela Foundation http://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/mini-site/selected-quotes
1970s

Rumi photo
Omar Khayyám photo
Colum McCann photo
Kent Hovind photo
François Fénelon photo
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg photo

“Body and soul: a horse harnessed beside an ox.”

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–1799) German scientist, satirist

D 103
Aphorisms (1765-1799), Notebook D (1773-1775)

Frederick Douglass photo

“Old as the everlasting hills; immovable as the throne of God; and certain as the purposes of eternal power, against all hinderances, and against all delays, and despite all the mutations of human instrumentalities, it is the faith of my soul, that this anti-slavery cause will triumph.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

The Anti-Slavery Movement. Extracts from a Lecture before Various. Anti-Slavery Bodies, in the Winter of 1855.
1850s, My Bondage and My Freedom (1855)

Ossip Zadkine photo
Giordano Bruno photo

“Oh holy asinity! holy ignorance!
Holy foolishness and pious devotion!
You who alone do more to advance and make souls good
Than human ingenuity and study…”

Giordano Bruno (1548–1600) Italian philosopher, mathematician and astronomer

Cabal of the Cheval Pegasus (1585)

Paula Modersohn-Becker photo
William Morley Punshon photo
James Russell Lowell photo

“Great truths are portions of the soul of man;
Great souls are portions of eternity.”

James Russell Lowell (1819–1891) American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat

Sonnet VI
Sonnets (1844)

Alexander Pope photo

“Tell me, my soul, can this be death?”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

The Dying Christian to His Soul (1712)

Albert Barnes photo
Sinclair Lewis photo
Francisco De Goya photo

“My dear soul, I can stand on my own feet, but so poorly that I don't know if my head is on my shoulders. I have no appetite or desire to do anything at all. Only your letters cheer me up – only yours. I don't know what will become of me now that I have lost sight of you; I who idolize you have given up hope that you'll ever glance at these blurred lines and get consolation from them.”

Francisco De Goya (1746–1828) Spanish painter and printmaker (1746–1828)

letter to his friend Martín Zapater https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q3915977 and https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bestand:Francisco_de_Goya_-_Portrait_of_Mart%C3%ADn_Zapater_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg, March 1793; from: 'Francisco de Goya. MS Letters to Martín Zapater 1774-99', Collection of Prado - published as Cartas a Martín Zapater; ed, X. de Salas & M. Agueda, Madrid 1982, p. 211; as quoted by Robert Hughes, in: Goya. Borzoi Book - Alfred Knopf, New York, 2003, p. 127
Goya started to become deaf then, had fainting fits and spells of semi-blindness. From 1793 onward [he was 46] he became functionally deaf, till his death
1790s

Rose Wilder Lane photo
African Spir photo
B. W. Powe photo

“Threaten the balances of justice and you threaten the potential enlargements of mind and soul. Therefore justice is part of the safeguarding of the heart.”

B. W. Powe (1955) Canadian writer

Emanations, Destinies, p. 61
Mystic Trudeau: The Fire and the Rose (2007)

Bob Dylan photo

“I know she ain't you, but she's here, and she's got that dark rhythm in her soul.”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

Song lyrics, Knocked Out Loaded (1986), Brownsville Girl (with Sam Shepard)

Ralph Waldo Emerson photo

“The soul active sees absolute truth; and utters truth, or creates.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

1830s, The American Scholar http://www.emersoncentral.com/amscholar.htm (1837)

George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax photo

“When by habit a man cometh to have a bargaining soul, its wings are cut, so that it can never soar. It bindeth reason an apprentice to gain, and instead of a director, maketh it a drudge.”

George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax (1633–1695) English politician

Political, Moral, and Miscellaneous Reflections (1750), Moral Thoughts and Reflections

Elizabeth Barrett Browning photo
Stanley Cavell photo

“The crucified human body is our best picture of the unacknowledged human soul.”

Stanley Cavell (1926–2018) American philosopher

The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality, and Tragedy (Oxford: 1979), p. 430