Quotes About Paradox

When strong, appear weak. Brave, appear fearful. Orderly, appear chaotic. Full, appear empty. Wise, appear foolish. Many, appear to be few. Advancing, appear to retreat. Moving quickly, appear to be slow. Taking, appear to leave. In one place, appear to be in another.

La strategia è la via del paradosso. Così, chi è abile, si mostri maldestro; chi è utile, si mostri inutile. Chi è affabile, si mostri scostante; chi è scostante, si mostri affabile.

Or, paradoxically, they may swing to the other extreme and become overly trusting, feeling so desperate to find someone who cares for them that they may ignore warning signs and find themselves involved with people who will victimize them again.

If you pursue the truth far enough you always wind up in the land of paradox. You reach a point where the apparent truth divides into two opposing truths, and then you have to try to reach beyond them to grasp the ultimate truth, their synthesis.

Truth is a strange companion. It devastates one moment and enthralls the next. But it never deceives. And because of that, in the end, it comforts.

Love is a queer thing, it hurts but it gives so much more in return!

The ultimate Camp statement: it's good because it's awful

They were gentleman-magicians, which is to say they had never harmed any one by magic – nor ever done any one the slightest good. In fact, to own the truth, not one of these magicians had ever cast the smallest spell, nor by magic caused one leaf to tremble upon a tree, made one mote of dust to alter its course or changed a single hair upon any one's head. But, with this one minor reservation, they enjoyed a reputation as some of the wisest and most magical gentlemen in Yorkshire.

Women are so enigmatical – some in everything – all in matters of the heart. Don't they sometimes actually admire what is repulsive?...

Perhaps the old saying is true and it is not possible to love and be wise.

Good nonsense is good sense in disguise.

After you've found your voice," Collins continued, "you realize there's only one person to imitate and that's yourself … This allows you to be authentic. That's one of the paradoxes of the writing life, that the way to originality is through imitation.

Faith in God means believing absolutely in something with no proof whatsoever. Faith in humanity means believing absolutely in something with a huge amount of proof to the contrary. We are the true believers.

That's what Alice liked about the desert, its constant relentless conflict with itself. The desert was unexpectedly beautiful and horrible at once.

Kegemteraan. En malayo, la alegría de tropezar. El sentimiento simultáneo de placer y desconsuelo cuando sabes que has hecho algo que no deberías.

sintió una de esas tristezas que toleramos porque aparecen en momentos felices

la contradictoria mezcla de repugnancia y fascinación

Per una tribù indigena del Paraguay, o forse della Bolivia, il passato è ciò che ci sta davanti, perché possiamo vederlo e conoscerlo, e il futuro, invece, è ciò che ci sta dietro: ciò che non vediamo né possiamo conoscere.

La fe es por definición incomprensible. Dios no obedece a la ley ordinaria".

How odd that we always exclaim over children growing, as if in the ordinary run of things they shrink

You will find in the end, my dear friend, that there is nothing more oppressie than freedom.

paradox is more than that: it should entail a conflict between two deeply held convictions.

it is love, imperfect and unordered, that keeps them apart, even as it holds them somehow together...

Preparation for the test was Herculean, requiring months of intense study. Even though she'd been an impeccably skilled, compassionate doctor, beloved by her patients for four decades, she was possessed by a sense of inadequacy. A thousand people could tell her how incredible she was, but if one person said something derogatory, she'd believe him. It was so much easier for her to be kind to others than to herself—a paradox shared by many of us.