A collection of quotes on the topic of agony, life, use, death.
“Longing is the agony of the nearness of the distant.”
Source: Our Blood: Prophecies and Discourses on Sexual Politics
“On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points.”
Source: The Waves
“You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope… I have loved none but you.”
Variant: You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever.
Source: Persuasion
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
The First Notebook
No Longer Human
Jasper Ridley, Tito: A Biography (Constable and Company Ltd., 1994), p. 128.
Other
Source: Address to the electors of Buckinghamshire (12 December 1832), quoted in William Flavelle Monypenny and George Earle Buckle, The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield. Volume I. 1804–1859 (London: John Murray, 1929), p. 225
Paul to the corpse of a French man he has just killed, Ch. 9
Source: All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
Context: I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony — Forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy?
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
Misattributed
Source: This is actually from Zora Neale Hurston, <i>Dust Tracks On the Road,</i> though it is widely attributed to Ms. Angelou's book, <i>I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.</i>
“I cannot contribute anything to this world because I only have one method: agony.”
Source: On the Heights of Despair (1934)
Source: Inner Engineering: A Yogi's Guide to Joy
as quoted in the text of the exhibition 'Kandinsky and der Blaue Reiter', Gemeentemuseum the Hague, Netherlands; February-June, 2010
Gabriele refers to the big change she made, before the period of her first Murnau landscape paintings (c. 1904 - 1914), when she lived and worked together with Kandinsky].
“Grief is the agony of an instant; the indulgence of Grief the blunder of a life.”
Book VI, Chapter 7.
Books, Coningsby (1844), Vivian Grey (1826)
“When I consider the dead and their families, I cannot repress my mental agony.”
Draft of undelivered speech (1948); published in the magazine Bungeishunju as quoted in the Sydney Morning Herald (11 June 2003) http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/06/10/1055220599574.html.
“Hear oh hear, if my prayer be worthy and such as you yourself might whisper to my frenzy. Those I begot (no matter in what bed) did not try to guide me, bereft of sight and sceptre, or sway my grieving with words. Nay behold (ah agony!), in their pride, kings this while by my calamity, they even mock my darkness, impatient of their father's groans. Even to them am I unclean? And does the sire of the gods see it and do naught? Do you at least, my rightful champion, come hither and range all my progeny for punishment. Put on your head this gore-soaked diadem that I tore off with my bloody nails. Spurred by a father's prayers, go against the brothers, go between them, let steel make partnership of blood fly asunder. Queen of Tartarus' pit, grant the wickedness I would fain see.”
Exaudi, si digna precor quaeque ipsa furenti
subiceres. orbum visu regnisque carentem
non regere aut dictis maerentem flectere adorti,
quos genui quocumque toro; quin ecce superbi
—pro dolor!—et nostro jamdudum funere reges
insultant tenebris gemitusque odere paternos.
hisne etiam funestus ego? et videt ista deorum
ignavus genitor? tu saltem debita vindex
huc ades et totos in poenam ordire nepotes.
indue quod madidum tabo diadema cruentis
unguibus abripui, votisque instincta paternis
i media in fratres, generis consortia ferro
dissiliant. da, Tartarei regina barathri,
quod cupiam vidisse nefas.
Source: Thebaid, Book I, Line 73
Homily of St. Gregory as quoted in A History of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, Volume 1 by Henry Charles Lea page 241
A Short History of Decay (1949)
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 73.
“The Victory of the Counter-Revolution in Vienna,” Neue Rheinische Zeitung, 07 November 1848.
Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), p. 172.
Bhawani Mandir, 1905
India's Rebirth
“All men will come to me in due time, but theirs is the agony of awaiting.”
Source: A New Concept of the Universe (1953), p. 141
Dionysian-Dithyrambs (1888)
Religion—a Reality part II. Secondly, "It is not a vain thing"—that is, IT IS NO TRIFLE. (June 22nd, 1862) http://www.biblebb.com/files/spurgeon/0457.HTM
Byzantium, st. 4
The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1933)
III. 156–158 (tr. Robert Fagles); of Helen.
Richmond Lattimore's translation:
: Surely there is no blame on Trojans and strong-greaved Achaians
if for long time they suffer hardship for a woman like this one.
Terrible is the likeness of her face to immortal goddesses.
Iliad (c. 750 BC)
third edition (2006), p. 1-2
Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower
Source: The Quest of the Historical Jesus (1906), p. 3
Letter to James F. Morton (6 November 1930), in Selected Letters III, 1929-1931 edited by August Derleth and Donald Wandrei, p. 207
Non-Fiction, Letters, to James Ferdinand Morton, Jr.
"Nietzscheism and Realism" from The Rainbow, Vol. I, No. 1 (October 1921); reprinted in "To Quebec and the Stars", and also in Collected Essays, Volume 5: Philosophy edited by S. T. Joshi, p. 70
Non-Fiction
Context: It must be remembered that there is no real reason to expect anything in particular from mankind; good and evil are local expedients—or their lack—and not in any sense cosmic truths or laws. We call a thing "good" because it promotes certain petty human conditions that we happen to like—whereas it is just as sensible to assume that all humanity is a noxious pest and should be eradicated like rats or gnats for the good of the planet or of the universe. There are no absolute values in the whole blind tragedy of mechanistic nature—nothing is good or bad except as judged from an absurdly limited point of view. The only cosmic reality is mindless, undeviating fate—automatic, unmoral, uncalculating inevitability. As human beings, our only sensible scale of values is one based on lessening the agony of existence. That plan is most deserving of praise which most ably fosters the creation of the objects and conditions best adapted to diminish the pain of living for those most sensitive to its depressing ravages. To expect perfect adjustment and happiness is absurdly unscientific and unphilosophical. We can seek only a more or less trivial mitigation of suffering. I believe in an aristocracy, because I deem it the only agency for the creation of those refinements which make life endurable for the human animal of high organisation.
“All the concentrated agony of the Universe bursts out in every living thing.”
The Saviors of God (1923)
Context: The wife of my God is matter; they wrestle with each other, they laugh and weep, they cry out in the nuptial bed of flesh.
They spawn and are dismembered. They fill sea, land, and air with species of plants, animals, men, and spirits. This primordial pair embraces, is dismembered, and multiplies in every living creature.
All the concentrated agony of the Universe bursts out in every living thing. God is imperiled in the sweet ecstasy and bitterness of flesh.
But he shakes himself free, he leaps out of brains and loins, then clings to new brains and new loins until the struggle for liberation again breaks out from the beginning.
Book VII, 7.71-[3] (See also: Fog of war..).
History of the Peloponnesian War, Book VII
Undated letter indicating that, at least at times, Mother Teresa's theological doubts were strong enough to be regarded as Christian atheism, reported by Time (9 March 2007) http://time.com/4126238/mother-teresas-crisis-of-faith/,and quoted in "Was Mother Teresa an atheist?", in The Guardian (24 August 2007) http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/aug/24/wasmotherteresaanatheist
2000s
Context: Lord, my God, who am I that You should forsake me? The Child of your Love–and now become as the most hated one–the one–You have thrown away as unwanted–unloved. I call, I cling, I want–and there is no One to answer–no One on Whom I can cling–no, No One.–Alone … Where is my Faith–even deep down right in there is nothing, but emptiness & darkness–My God–how painful is this unknown pain–I have no Faith–I dare not utter the words & thoughts that crowd in my heart–& make me suffer untold agony. So many unanswered questions live within me afraid to uncover them–because of the blasphemy–If there be God –please forgive me–When I try to raise my thoughts to Heaven–there is such convicting emptiness that those very thoughts return like sharp knives & hurt my very soul.–I am told God loves me–and yet the reality of darkness & coldness & emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul. Did I make a mistake in surrendering blindly to the Call of the Sacred Heart?
Fiction, Hypnos (1922)
Context: Among the agonies of these after days is that chief of torments — inarticulateness. What I learned and saw in those hours of impious exploration can never be told — for want of symbols or suggestions in any language. I say this because from first to last our discoveries partook only of the nature of sensations; sensations correlated with no impression which the nervous system of normal humanity is capable of receiving. They were sensations, yet within them lay unbelievable elements of time and space — things which at bottom possess no distinct and definite existence. Human utterance can best convey the general character of our experiences by calling them plungings or soarings...
Fragment 63 Voigt
The Willis Barnstone translations, Dream
Source: Power and Innocence (1972), Ch. 11 : The Humanity of the Rebel
Context: Civilization begins with a rebellion. Prometheus, one of the Titans, steals fire from the gods on Mount Olympus and brings it as a gift to man, marking the birth of human culture. For this rebellion Zeus sentences him to be chained to Mount Caucasus where vultures consume his liver during the day and at night it grows back only to be again eaten away the next day. This is a tale of the agony of the creative individual, whose nightly rest only resuscitates him so that he can endure his agonies the next day.
Letter to Fanny McCullough (23 December 1862); Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, edited by Roy P. Basler
1860s
Context: In this sad world of ours, sorrow comes to all; and, to the young, it comes with bitterest agony, because it takes them unawares. The older have learned to ever expect it. I am anxious to afford some alleviation of your present distress. Perfect relief is not possible, except with time. You can not now realize that you will ever feel better. Is not this so? And yet it is a mistake. You are sure to be happy again. To know this, which is certainly true, will make you some less miserable now. I have had experience enough to know what I say; and you need only to believe it, to feel better at once.
William Wilson (1839)
Paul to the corpse of a French man he has just killed, Ch. 9
All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)
“Sweet is the god but still I am
in agony and far from my strength.”
The Willis Barnstone translations, Dream
“Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.”
Source: 1980s–1990s, Knowledge and Decisions (1980; 1996), Ch. 5 : Political Trade-Offs
“we had such tremendous fun
and much agony together
for some years”
Source: The People Look Like Flowers at Last
“She was dazzling-- alight; it was agony to comprehend her beauty in a glance.”
Source: The Beautiful And Damned
Source: Journey to the End of the Night
Source: The Prince of Tides
“I can't imagine a sweeter agony, having him so close.”
Source: Again the Magic
Source: Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
Source: Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood
Source: Dragon's Teeth
Source: Tender Is the Night
Source: The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source: Selected Poems
Source: The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born
Source: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Source: The People Look Like Flowers at Last
“It's been agony but I couldn't have done it any other way.”
Variant: the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat
“Excruciating agony makes me cranky.”
Source: Secrets of the Dragon Sanctuary
“Only in the agony of parting do we look into the depths of love.”
Source: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Source: Blood Promise
“Agonies are one of my changes of garments.”
Source: Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition
1960s, Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence (1967)
Context: Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must move on.
And some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak.
Context: Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing, as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we're always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on. Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony. But we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak. And we must rejoice as well, for in all our history there has never been such a monumental dissent during a war, by the American people.
“agony sometimes changes
form
but
it never ceases for
anybody.”
On vivisection. Quoted in Sally Mitchell, Frances Power Cobbe: Victorian Feminist, Journalist, Reformer (Charlottesville and London: University of Virginia Press, 2004), p. 348 https://books.google.it/books?id=eAaC5cVOuuoC&pg=PA348.
