Great Throughts Treasury

"No one who has not a complete knowledge of himself will ever have a true understanding of another."

"Not wise does it seem to attempt comprehending and understanding a Human World without full perfected Humanity. No talent must sleep; and if all are not alike active, all must be alert, and not oppressed and enervated. As we see a future Painter in the boy who fills every wall with sketches and variedly adds color to figure; so we see a future Philosopher in him who restlessly traces and questions all natural things, pays heed to all, brings together whatever is remarkable, and rejoices when he has become master and possessor of a new phenomenon, of a new power and piece of knowledge. Moral Action is that great and only Experiment, in which all riddles of the most manifold appearances explain themselves."

"Nostalgia philosophy to home, and a tendency to be all over the place, as if at home."

"Not only England, but every Englishman is an island."

"Now to some it appears not at all worthwhile to follow out the endless divisions of Nature; and moreover a dangerous undertaking, without fruit and issue. As we can never reach, say they, the absolutely smallest grain of material bodies, never find their simplest compartments, since all magnitude loses itself, forwards and backwards, in infinitude; so likewise is it with the species of bodies and powers; here too one comes on new species, new combinations, new appearances, even to infinitude. These seem only to stop, continue they, when our diligence tires; and so it is spending precious time with idle contemplations and tedious enumerations; and this becomes at last a true delirium, a real vertigo over the horrid Deep"

"Once when I was shedding bitter tears, when, dissolved in pain, my hope was melting away, and I stood alone by the barren mound which in its narrow dark bosom hid the vanished form of my life -- lonely as never yet was lonely man, driven by anxiety unspeakable -- powerless, and no longer anything but a conscious misery. -- As there I looked about me for help, unable to go on or to turn back, and clung to the fleeting, extinguished life with an endless longing: -- then, out of the blue distances -- from the hills of my ancient bliss, came a shiver of twilight -- and at once snapt the bond of birth -- the chains of the Light. Away fled the glory of the world, and with it my mourning -- the sadness flowed together into a new, unfathomable world -- Thou, Night-inspiration, heavenly Slumber, didst come upon me -- the region gently upheaved itself; over it hovered my unbound, newborn spirit. The mound became a cloud of dust -- and through the cloud I saw the glorified face of my beloved. In her eyes eternity reposed -- I laid hold of her hands, and the tears became a sparkling bond that could not be broken. Into the distance swept by, like a tempest, thousands of years. On her neck I welcomed the new life with ecstatic tears. It was the first, the only dream -- and just since then I have held fast an eternal, unchangeable faith in the heaven of the Night, and its Light, the Beloved."

"Now I know when will come the last morning -- when the Light no more scares away Night and Love -- when sleep shall be without waking, and but one continuous dream. I feel in me a celestial exhaustion. Long and weariful was my pilgrimage to the holy grave, and crushing was the cross. The crystal wave, which, imperceptible to the ordinary sense, springs in the dark bosom of the mound against whose foot breaks the flood of the world, he who has tasted it, he who has stood on the mountain frontier of the world, and looked across into the new land, into the abode of the Night -- truly he turns not again into the tumult of the world, into the land where dwells the Light in ceaseless unrest."

"Oh draw at my heart, love, draw till I'm gone, that, fallen asleep, I still may love on. I feel the flow of death's youth-giving flood to balsam and ether transform my blood --I live all the daytime in faith and in might and in holy fire I die every night."

"One cannot understand language because language cannot understand itself; does not want to understand"

"One Makes a great error if one believes there is 'ancients.' Only now is starting to ARISE antiquity. It arises in the eyes and soul of the artist."

"On those heights he builds for himself tabernacles -- tabernacles of peace, there longs and loves and gazes across, until the welcomest of all hours draws him down into the waters of the spring -- afloat above remains what is earthly, and is swept back in storms, but what became holy by the touch of love, runs free through hidden ways to the region beyond, where, like fragrances, it mingles with love asleep."

"Only as far as a man is happily married to himself is he fit for married life and family life in general."

"Only an artist can interpret the meaning of life."

"One should, when overwhelmed by the shadow of a giant, move aside and see if the colossal shadow isn't merely that of a pygmy blocking out the sun."

"Only fools fail to recognize you, knowing no sleep but the shadow which you, taking pity, cast over us in the twilight before true night. They do not taste you in the golden flood of grapes, in the magic oil of the almond tree and the brown juice of the poppy. They do not know that it is you who hovers over a tender maiden?s bosom, making a heaven of her lap ? never suspect that it is you who comes to them out of old stories, opening the doors to heaven and carrying the key to the dwellings of the blessed, a silent messenger of infinite mysteries."

"Only the most perfect human being can design the most perfect philosophy."

"Others do not survive anything like that, but heard the same stories"

"Our life is no Dream, but it may and will perhaps become one."

"Our body is a molded river"

"Philosophy ? bears witness to the deepest love of reflection, to absolute delight in wisdom."

"Over his own heart and his own thoughts he watched attentively. He knew not whither his longing was carrying him. As he grew up, he wandered far and wide; viewed other lands, other seas, new atmospheres, new rocks, unknown plants, animals, men; descended into caverns, saw how in courses and varying strata the edifice of the Earth was completed, and fashioned clay into strange figures of rocks. By and by, he came to find everywhere objects already known, but wonderfully mingled, united; and thus often extraordinary things came to shape in him. He soon became aware of combinations in all, of conjunctures, concurrences. Erelong, he no more saw anything alone. ? In great variegated images, the perceptions of his senses crowded round him; he heard, saw, touched and thought at once. He rejoiced to bring strangers together. Now the stars were men, now men were stars, the stones animals, the clouds plants; he sported with powers and appearances; he knew where and how this and that was to be found, to be brought into action; and so himself struck over the strings, for tones and touches of his own. No one, of a surety, wanders farther from the mark than he who fancies to himself that he already understands this marvelous Kingdom, and can, in few words, fathom its constitution, and everywhere find the right path."

"Our life is no dream; but it ought to become one, and perhaps will."

"Play is experimenting with chance."

"Practical reason is pure creative fantasy."

"Religion contains infinite sadness. If we are to love God, he must be in distress (lit. in need of help)."

"Reason and imagination are religion - reason and intelligence science."

"Romanticize the world."

"Sacrifice of the self is the source of all humiliation, as also on the contrary is the foundation of all true exaltation. The first step will be an inward gaze?an isolating contemplation of ourselves. Whoever stops here has come only halfway. The second step must be an active outward gaze?autonomous, constant observation of the external world. No one will ever achieve excellence as an artist who cannot depict anything other than his own experiences, his favorite objects, who cannot bring himself to study assiduously even a quite strange object, which does not interest him at all, and to depict it at leisure. An artist must be able and willing to depict everything. This is how a great artistic style is created, which rightly is so much admired in Goethe."

"Run away from the pain, not love. The lover that leaves open wounds."

"Someone arrived there ? who lifted the veil of the goddess, at Sais. ? But what did he see? He saw ? wonder of wonders ? himself."

"Shame is a feeling of profanation. Friendship, love and piety ought to be handled with a sort of mysterious secrecy; they ought to be spoken of only in the rare moments of perfect confidence,--to be mutually understood in silence. Many things are too delicate to be thought,--many more, to be spoken."

"Sleep is for the inhabitants of Planets only. In another time, Man will sleep and wake continually at once. The greater part of our Body, of our Humanity itself, yet sleeps a deep sleep."

"Still wakest thou, cheerful Light, that weary man to his labor -- and into me pourest joyous life -- but thou wilest me not away from Memory's moss-grown monument. Gladly will I stir busy hands, everywhere behold where thou hast need of me -- praise the lustre of thy splendor -- pursue unwearied the lovely harmonies of thy skilled handicraft -- gladly contemplate the clever pace of thy mighty, luminous clock -- explore the balance of the forces and the laws of the wondrous play of countless worlds and their seasons. But true to the Night remains my secret heart, and to creative Love, her daughter. Canst thou show me a heart eternally true? has thy sun friendly eyes that know me? do thy stars lay hold of my longing hand? and return me the tender pressure and the caressing word? was it thou did adorn them with colors and a flickering outline -- or was it she who gave to thy jewels a higher, a dearer weight? What delight, what pleasure offers thy life, to outweigh the transports of Death? Wears not everything that inspires us the color of the Night? She sustains thee mother-like, and to her thou owest all thy glory. Thou wouldst vanish into thyself -- in boundless space thou wouldst dissolve, if she did not hold thee fast, if she swaddled thee not, so that thou grewest warm, and flaming, begot the universe. Truly I was, before thou wast -- the mother sent me with my brothers and sisters to inhabit thy world, to hallow it with love that it might be an ever-present memorial -- to plant it with flowers unfading. As yet they have not ripened, these thoughts divine -- as yet is there small trace of our coming revelation -- One day thy clock will point to the end of time, and then thou shalt be as one of us, and shalt, full of ardent longing, be extinguished and die. I feel in me the close of thy activity -- heavenly freedom, and blessed return. With wild pangs I recognize thy distance from our home, thy resistance against the ancient, glorious heaven. Thy rage and thy raving are in vain. Unscorchable stands the cross -- victory-banner of our breed."

"Spinoza was a God-intoxicated man."

"Surely this voice meant our Teacher; for it is he that can collect the indications which lie scattered on all sides. A singular light kindles in his looks, when at length the high Rune lies before us, and he watches in our eyes whether the star has yet risen upon us, which is to make the Figure visible and intelligible."

"Symbolic incite, stimulate - touches and moves."

"That which the external world perceives as quite motionless has the appearance of being quite at rest. However much it may change, in relation to the external world it always stays at rest. This principle governs all self-modifications. That is why the beautiful appears so much at rest. Everything beautiful is a self-illuminated, perfect individual."

"The art of writing books is not yet invented. But it is at the point of being invented. Fragments of this nature are literary seeds. There may be many an infertile grain among them: nevertheless, if only some come up!"

"The Academy would be a purely philosophical institute - Only a single faculty - the seat of the entire organized to stimulate and practicing appropriate labor of thinking."

"The essence of the disease is as dark as life."

"The fate which oppresses us is the inertia of our spirit. Through extending and cultivating our activity we shall transform ourselves into fate. Everything seems to stream inward into us, because we do not stream outward. We are negative because we want to be?the more positive we become, the more negative will the world around us become?until at last there will be no more negation?but instead we are all in all. God wants there to be gods."

"The first Man is the first Spirit-seer; all appears to him as Spirit. What are children, but first men? The fresh gaze of the Child is richer in significance than the forecasting of the most indubitable Seer."

"The first step is to look within, the discriminating contemplation of the self. He who remains at this point only half develops. The second step must be a telling look without, independent, sustained contemplation of the external world."

"The fresh gaze of a child is richer in significance than the forecasting of the most indubitable seer."

"The artist stands on the human being as a statue does on a pedestal."

"The Bible begins gloriously with Paradise, the symbol of youth, and ends with the everlasting kingdom, with the holy city. The history of every man should be a Bible."

"The Christian religion is especially remarkable, as it so decidedly lays claim to mere goodwill in man, to his essential temper, and values this independently of all culture and manifestation. It stands in opposition to science and art, and properly to enjoyment."

"The badge of honesty is simplicity."

"The division of Philosopher and Poet is only apparent, and to the disadvantage of both. It is a sign of disease, and of a sickly constitution."

"The highest life is mathematics."