The Quotes canon
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Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Lao Tzu2 quotes
If you try to change it, you will ruin it. Try to hold it, and you will lose it. — Lao Tzu · 400 BCLet people hold on to these:
Manifest plainness,
Embrace simplicity,
Reduce selfishness,
Have few desires. — Lao Tzu · 400 BCWilliam Shakespeare2 quotes
Cudgel thy brains no more about it. — William Shakespeare · 1616Things past redress are now with me past care. — William Shakespeare · 1595Cecil Day-Lewis1 quote
Selfhood begins with a walking away,
And love is proved in the letting go. — Cecil Day-Lewis · 1962Epictetus1 quote
Happiness and freedom begin with a clear understanding of one principle: Some things are within our control, and some things are not. — Epictetus · 135Euripides1 quote
Be happy, drink, think each day your own as you live it and leave the rest to fortune. — Euripides · 438 BCHorace1 quote
Cease your efforts to find where the last rose lingers. — Horace · 23 BCLester Burnham1 quote
And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. — Lester Burnham · 1999Linji Yixuan1 quote
Seekers of the Way. In Buddhism no effort is necessary. All one has to do is to do nothing except to move his bowels, urinate, put on his clothing, eat his meals, and lie down if he is tired. The stupid will laugh at him, but the wise will understand. — Linji Yixuan · 886Masanobu Fukuoka1 quote
One loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them. — Masanobu Fukuoka · 1975Master Li Mu Bai1 quote
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 · 2000Morpheus1 quote
You have to let it all go, Neo—fear, doubt, and disbelief. Free your mind. — Morpheus · 1999Rainer Maria Rilke1 quote
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 · 1909Tim Cavanaugh1 quote
That's why I don't have an ulcer, because I know when to say, "I don't give a fuck." — Tim Cavanaugh · 1989Timon and Pumbaa1 quote
Hakuna Matata. — Timon and Pumbaa · 1994Ty Webb1 quote
I’m going to give you a little advice. There’s a force in the universe that makes things happen and all you have to do is get in touch with it, stop thinking, let things happen, and be the ball. — Ty Webb · 1980Walter Hagen1 quote
You're only here for a short visit. Don't hurry. Don't worry. And be sure to smell the flowers along the way. — Walter Hagen · 1956William Blake1 quote
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 · 1792Zhuang Zhou1 quote
Those who are contented and at ease when the occasion comes and live in accord with the course of Nature cannot be affected by sorrow or joy. This is what the ancients called release from bondage. Those who cannot release themselves are so because they are bound by material things. — Zhuang Zhou · 221 BC