Quotes About Existence

Just when the gods had ceased to be, and the Christ had not yet come, there was a unique moment in history, between Cicero and Marcus Aurelius, when man stood alone.

What an awful thing life is, isn't it? It's like soup with lots of hairs floating on the surface. You have to eat it nevertheless.

At last she sighed. But the most wretched thing — is it not? — is to drag out, as I do, a useless existence. If our pains were only of some use to someone, we should find consolation in the thought of the sacrifice.

God is only a word dreamed up to explain the world

The artist must manage to make posterity believe that he never existed.

Non leggete, come fanno i bambini, per divertirvi, o, come fanno gli ambiziosi per istruirvi. No, leggete per vivere.

I believe in Supreme Being, a Creator, whoever he may be, it's of no importance to me, who put us here on earth to do our duty as citizens and fathers; but I don't need to go to church and kiss silver platters and dig into my pocket to fatten up a lot of humbugs who eat better than you or I do! Because he can be worshiped just as well in a wood, a field, or even just gazing at the ethereal vault, like the ancients.

Are you not tired as I am of waking up every morning and seeing the sun all over again? Tired of living the same life, suffering the same sorrow? Tired of desiring, and tired of being sated? Tired of waiting, and tired of possessing?

As there was no rational foundation for Frederick's complaints, and as he could not give evidence of any real misfortune, Martinon was unable to understand his lamentations about existence. As for him, he went every morning to the school, after that took a walk in the Luxembourg, in the evening swallowed his half-cup of coffee; and with fifteen hundred francs a year, and the love of this work-woman, he felt perfectly happy.

When you are some-'one', why would you wish to be some-'thing'?

Le monde est l'Å"uvre d'un Dieu en délire.

No, read in order to live.

Quelle bassesse que de penser toujours au prolongement de son existence! La vie n'est bonne qu'à la condition d'en jouir. (ch. III)

But the most wretched thing, is it not—is to drag out, as I do, a useless existence. If our pains were only of some use to someone, we should find consolation in the thought of the sacrifice.

Thus death is only an illusion, a veil, masking betimes the continuity of life.

Souvent, en regardant le soleil, je me suis dit « Pourquoi viens-tu chaque jour éclairer tant de souffrances, découvrir tant de douleurs, présider à tant de sottes misères ? »

I was born longing to die.

Me?utim, ako brojim godine, nije tome davno što sam se rodio, ali imam brojne uspomene koje osje?am kako me tište, kao što tište starce svi dani što su ih proživjeli; ?ini mi se katkada da sam trajao dugim stolje?ima, i da moje bi?e sadržava u sebi ostatke od tisu?u prošlih života.

It was not the first time that they had seen trees, a blue sky, meadows; that they had heard the water flowing and the wind blowing in the leaves; but, no doubt, they had never admired all this, as if Nature had not existed before, or had only begun to be beautiful since the gratification of their desires.

There's a fundamental stupidity in mankind which is as eternal as life itself.

Fins quan havia de durar aquella existència miseriosa? No se'n sortiria mai? Què tenien de més, que ella no posseís, aquelles que trobaven el consol de la felicitat? [...] Això li feia execrar la injustícia de Déu.

I sense tenir consciència s'encaminà cap a l'església amb l'ànim de recollir-se en qualsevol devoció per bé que comportés el vinclament de l'ànima i, amb ell, la desaparició total de l'existència.

Era uno de esos sentimientos puros que en nada obstaculizan el disfrute de la existencia, que se fomentan porque son raros y cuya pérdida resultaría más triste que gozosa fuera su posesión.

Ascend skyward forever and forever,–yet thou wilt not attain the summit. Descend below the earth for billions of billions of centuries: never wilt thou reach the bottom. For there is no summit, there is no bottom; there is no Above, no Below – there is no end.