Quotes · Skopia

141 quotes

The eternal error men make in imagining that happiness consists in the gratification of their wishes. — Leo Tolstoy · 1877 One loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them. — Masanobu Fukuoka · 1975 A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth. — George Bernard Shaw · 1903 Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. — Viktor Frankl · 1946 All I can guarantee you is that as long as you are searching for happiness, you will remain unhappy. — U.G. Krishnamurti · 1984 The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness. — Eric Hoffer · 1955

Letting go5 quotes

We need in love to practice only this: Letting each other go. For holding on Comes easily; we do not need to learn it. — Rainer Maria Rilke · 1909 He who binds to himself a joy Does the winged life destroy; But he who kisses the joy as it flies Lives in eternity's sunrise. — William Blake · 1792 One loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them. — Masanobu Fukuoka · 1975 There's no eternity to the things we can touch. My master used to say, there's nothing we can hold onto in this world. Only by letting go can we finally possess what is real. — Master Li Mu Bai · 2000 If you try to change it, you will ruin it. Try to hold it, and you will lose it. — Lao Tzu · 400 BC

Seeking5 quotes

Even to be attached to the idea of enlightenment is to go astray. — Jianzhi Sengcan · 606 One loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them. — Masanobu Fukuoka · 1975 A man travels the world over in search of what he needs and returns home to find it. — George Moore · 1916 All I can guarantee you is that as long as you are searching for happiness, you will remain unhappy. — U.G. Krishnamurti · 1984 The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness. — Eric Hoffer · 1955

Change4 quotes

One cannot step twice into the same river, for the waters are continually flowing on. — Heraclitus The more things change, the more they are the same. — Alphonse Karr · 1849 There is nothing in this World constant, but Inconstancy. — Jonathan Swift · 1711 If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change. — Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa · 1957

Doubt and skepticism4 quotes

Doubt grows with knowledge. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe · 1819 The skeptical are the most credulous. — Blaise Pascal · 1662 The road to resolution lies by doubt: The next way home's the farthest way about. — Francis Quarles · 1635 There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds. — Alfred Tennyson · 1850

Freedom4 quotes

I am condemned to be free. — Jean-Paul Sartre · 1943 It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything. — Tyler Durden · 1999 A man's worst difficulties begin when he is able to do as he likes. — T.H. Huxley · 1876 You only have power over people as long as you don't take everything away from them. But when you've robbed a man of everything he's no longer in your power-he's free again. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn · 1968

Generosity4 quotes

This is hardest of all: to close the open hand out of love, and keep modest as a giver. — Friedrich Nietzsche · 1883 The sage does not accumulate for himself. The more he uses for others, the more he has himself. The more he gives to others, the more he possesses of his own. The Way of Heaven is to benefit others and not to injure. The Way of the sage is to act but not to compete. — Lao Tzu · 400 BC Generosity truly is the best investment. — Diane von Furstenberg · 2015 Usually the people who are the most generous are the people who have the least to give. I learned this first hand as a newspaper carrier when I was 12 years old. The biggest tips came from the poorest people. — Keith Haring · 1986

Ignorance4 quotes

The first and wisest of them all professed To know this only, that he nothing knew. — John Milton · 1671 To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge. — Benjamin Disraeli · 1845 To know anything well involves a profound sensation of ignorance. — John Ruskin · 1856 The greater the ignorance the greater the dogmatism. — William Osler · 1902

War4 quotes

Make war that we may live in peace. — Aristotle · 322 BC To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace. — George Washington · 1790 A war regarded as inevitable or even probable, and therefore much prepared for, has a very good chance of eventually being fought. — George F. Kennan · 1977 You have to take chances for peace, just as you must take chances in war... The ability to get to the verge without getting into the war is the necessary art. If you try to run away from it, if you are scared to go to the brink, you are lost. — John Foster Dulles · 1956

Death3 quotes

Death, therefore, the most awful of evils, is nothing to us, seeing that, when we are death is not come, and when death is come, we are not. — Epicurus · 240 If there wasn't death, I think you couldn't go on. — Stevie Smith · 1969 Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death. — Ludwig Wittgenstein · 1922

Human nature3 quotes

The tyrant grinds down his slaves and they don't turn against him; they crush those beneath them. — Emily Bronte · 1847 It is part of human nature to hate the man you have hurt. — Tacitus · 56 It is the most violent people who go for love and peace. — John Lennon · 1980

Love3 quotes

My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep. The more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite. — William Shakespeare · 1597 It is difficult not to be unjust to what one loves. — Oscar Wilde · 1891 A woman's love for us increases The less we love her, sooth to say- She stoops, she falls, her struggling ceases; Caught fast, she cannot get away. — Alexander Pushkin · 1837

Seeking happiness3 quotes

One loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them. — Masanobu Fukuoka · 1975 All I can guarantee you is that as long as you are searching for happiness, you will remain unhappy. — U.G. Krishnamurti · 1984 The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness. — Eric Hoffer · 1955

Success3 quotes

Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. — Viktor Frankl · 1946 Success has ruin’d many a Man. — Benjamin Franklin · 1752 Men of genius sometimes accomplish most when they work the least. — Leonardo da Vinci · 1568

The only constant is change3 quotes

One cannot step twice into the same river, for the waters are continually flowing on. — Heraclitus There is nothing in this World constant, but Inconstancy. — Jonathan Swift · 1711 If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change. — Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa · 1957

Wisdom3 quotes

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. — William Blake · 1793 The first and wisest of them all professed To know this only, that he nothing knew. — John Milton · 1671 To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge. — Benjamin Disraeli · 1845

Beauty2 quotes

Beauty can pierce one like a pain. — Thomas Mann · 1901 I think the peasant girl is more beautiful than a lady, in her dusty, patched blue skirt and bodice, which get the most delicate hues from weather, wind, and sun. But if she puts on a lady's dress, she loses her peculiar charm. — Vincent van Gogh · 1885

Coveting2 quotes

In order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. — Mark Twain · 1876 The more things are forbidden, the more popular they become. — Mark Twain · 1895

Downsides of freedom2 quotes

I am condemned to be free. — Jean-Paul Sartre · 1943 A man's worst difficulties begin when he is able to do as he likes. — T.H. Huxley · 1876

Downsides of wealth2 quotes

A great fortune is a great slavery. — Seneca · 44 You know, Mr. Bernstein, if I hadn't been very rich, I might have been a really great man. — Kane · 1941

End justifies the means2 quotes

I must be cruel only to be kind. — William Shakespeare · 1616 To do a great right, do a little wrong. — William Shakespeare · 1598

Eternity2 quotes

Every instant of time is a pinprick of eternity. — Marcus Aurelius · 180 Eternity was in that moment. — William Congreve · 1693

Excess2 quotes

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. — William Blake · 1793 A strange species we are. We can stand anything God and nature can throw at us save only plenty. If I wanted to destroy a nation, I would give it too much, and I would have it on its knees, miserable, greedy, and sick. — John Steinbeck · 1959

Hate2 quotes

If I didn't have to hate her, I'd adore her. — Julianne Potter · 1997 It is part of human nature to hate the man you have hurt. — Tacitus · 56

Humility2 quotes

But many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first. — Jesus · 60 For whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. — Luke 14:11 · 61

Hurting others2 quotes

It is difficult not to be unjust to what one loves. — Oscar Wilde · 1891 It is part of human nature to hate the man you have hurt. — Tacitus · 56

Impermanence2 quotes

There's no eternity to the things we can touch. My master used to say, there's nothing we can hold onto in this world. Only by letting go can we finally possess what is real. — Master Li Mu Bai · 2000 There is nothing in this World constant, but Inconstancy. — Jonathan Swift · 1711

Inflection points2 quotes

The most decisive actions of our life-I mean those that our most likely to decide the whole course of our future-are more often than not, unconsidered. — Andre Gide · 1926 Most of what matters in our lives takes place in our absence. — Salman Rushdie · 1981

Intellectual humility2 quotes

He who knows most, knows best how little he knows. — Thomas Jefferson · 1812 The first and wisest of them all professed To know this only, that he nothing knew. — John Milton · 1671

Kindness2 quotes

I must be cruel only to be kind. — William Shakespeare · 1616 In human relations kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths. — Graham Greene · 1948

Sourced and curated.