“The anguish of loss may be redeemed, but can never be mediated.”
Source: Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy (1958), Chapter Seven, Kierkegard, p. 138
Source: To the Cambro-Britons and Their Harp, his Ballad of Agincourt (1627), Lines 37-40.
“The anguish of loss may be redeemed, but can never be mediated.”
Source: Irrational Man: A Study in Existential Philosophy (1958), Chapter Seven, Kierkegard, p. 138
Book XLII: Ch. 18: A summary of the changes which have occurred around the globe in my lifetime
Mémoires d'outre-tombe (1848 – 1850)
Context: New storms will arise; one can believe in calamities to come which will surpass the afflictions we have been overwhelmed by in the past; already, men are thinking of bandaging their old wounds to return to the battlefield. However, I do not expect an imminent outbreak of war: nations and kings are equally weary; unforeseen catastrophe will not yet fall on France: what follows me will only be the effect of general transformation. No doubt there will be painful moments: the face of the world cannot change without suffering. But, once again, there will be no separate revolutions; simply the great revolution approaching its end. The scenes of tomorrow no longer concern me; they call for other artists: your turn, gentlemen!
As I write these last words, my window, which looks west over the gardens of the Foreign Mission, is open: it is six in the morning; I can see the pale and swollen moon; it is sinking over the spire of the Invalides, scarcely touched by the first golden glow from the East; one might say that the old world was ending, and the new beginning. I behold the light of a dawn whose sunrise I shall never see. It only remains for me to sit down at the edge of my grave; then I shall descend boldly, crucifix in hand, into eternity.
“Give me the place to stand, and I shall move the earth.”
δῶς[No omega+perispomene doric form per e.g. LSJ, March 2017] μοι πᾶ στῶ καὶ τὰν γᾶν κινάσω.
Dôs moi pâ stô, kaì tàn gân kinásō.
Said to be his assertion in demonstrating the principle of the lever; as quoted by Pappus of Alexandria, Synagoge, Book VIII, c. AD 340; also found in Chiliades (12th century) by John Tzetzes, II.130 http://books.google.com/books?id=dG0GAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA46. This and "Give me a place to stand, and I shall move the world" are the most commonly quoted translations.
Variant translations:
Give me a place to stand and with a lever I will move the whole world.
This variant derives from an earlier source than Pappus: The Library of History of Diodorus Siculus, Fragments of Book XXVI http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/26*.html, as translated by F. R. Walton, in Loeb Classical Library (1957) Vol. XI. In Doric Greek this may have originally been Πᾷ βῶ, καὶ χαριστίωνι τὰν γᾶν κινήσω πᾶσαν [Pā bō, kai kharistiōni tan gān kinēsō [variant kinasō] pāsan].
Give me a lever and a place to stand and I will move the earth.
Give me a fulcrum, and I shall move the world.
Give me a firm spot on which to stand, and I shall move the earth.
letter to Alfred Stieglitz, February 8, 1913; as quoted in Marsden Hartley, by Gail R. Scott, Abbeville Publishers, Cross River Press, 1988, New York p. 44
1908 - 1920