“How difficult, how extremely difficult for the soul to sever itself from its body the world: from mountains, seas, cities, people. The soul is an octopus and these are its tentacles. … No force anywhere on earth is as imperialistic as the human soul. It occupies and is occupied in turn, but it always considers its empire too narrow. Suffocating, it desires to conquer the world in order to breathe freely.”
"My Friend The Poet. Mount Athos.", Ch. 19, p. 188
Report to Greco (1965)
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Nikos Kazantzakis 222
Greek writer 1883–1957Related quotes

“It's the soul's duty to be loyal to its own desires. It must abandon itself to its master passion.”
Source: The Sayings and Teachings of the Great Mystics of Islam (2004), p. 83
Source: Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

§ 27
On Spiritual Knowledge and Discrimination (480 AD)

“Women do not know how to separate the soul from the body.”
La femme ne sait pas séparer l'âme du corps.
Journaux intimes (1864–1867; published 1887), Mon cœur mis à nu (1864)

“Just as science is the intellect of the world, art is its soul.”
Untimely Thoughts (1917-18) (original: Наиболее успешно и могуче будит в нашей душе ее добрые начала сила искусства. Как наука является разумом мира, так искусство — сердце его.)
Context: The good qualities in our soul are most successfully and forcefully awakened by the power of art. Just as science is the intellect of the world, art is its soul.