Quotes About Transience

No dominion is everlasting.

Our pleasures, however refined or easily acquired, are by their very nature fleeting. They begin to subside the instant the arise, only to be replaced by fresh desires or feelings of discomfort.

Sometimes I get a funny feeling inside me that I shan't be here very long, and I'm not talking in terms of things like success. It frightens me sometimes

People still don't appreciate how ephemeral success is.

We have our clothes, some more splendid than others,—this is our credit; but when a man dies he has only his skin;

There is only one serious matter to be considered in life, and that is death.

the tree forsakes not the flower—the flower falls from the tree." "My

Un académicien dirait que les soirées du monde sont des collections de fleurs qui attirent papillons inconstants, abeilles affamées et frelons bourdonnants.

Man springs out of nothing, crosses time, and disappears forever in the bosom of God; he is seen but for a moment, staggering on the verge of the two abysses, and there he is lost.

The stranger often learns important truths in the home of his host that the latter would perhaps conceal from a friend; with a stranger one is relieved of obligatory silence; one does not fear his indiscretion because he is passing through.

That's the thing about things. They fall apart, always have, always will, it's in their nature.

She was disappearing a little more each day, so thin, so frail, a wisp of smoke. One day she would surely vanish altogether, and there was no way to stop her.

Once upon a time I was young and beautiful. But that is the fairy tale, because it all passes in the blink of an eye.

He opened his eyes for an instant. Other people were writing and melting, but my brother stopped his flight long enough to look at me. An instant that would have to last forever. And then the flames rose higher and my brother was gone.

It was a moment made of glass, this happiness; it was the easiest thing in the world to break. Every minute was a world, every hour a universe.

The air itself smelled of peaches, here and all over Unity; when the breeze came up, petals fell like snow. If a person didn't move, if she was completely still, the petals streamed over her, catching in the hem of her clothes, in the strands of her hair, white as snow, quiet as snow, silent and fleeting and drifting down from above to cover her and carry her home.

One day she would surely vanish altogether, and there was no way to stop her. She was so busy forgetting, she couldn't take a single step into the future

Her vision was going, but she could see him, the way people see clouds-beautiful, racing by, casting shadows.

It seemed to me that everybody ended up in Toronto at least for a little while.

for since Munro's chosen form is the short story, her overriding theme is brevity—look now, act now, contemplate now, because soon, very soon, this thing that involves you will be over.

Ja vaikka he edelleen esiintyivät minun ei kovin eroottisissa kuvitelmissani, he olivat jo poissa. Jotkut heistä, monet heistä, lopullisesti poissa.

Yet those few hours filled her with an assurance that the life she was going back to, which seemed so makeshift and unsatisfactory, was only temporary and could easily be put up with.

As you sit, make peace also with the reality that, after you die, it won't matter to you how you are remembered; you will not be here to experience it. All the grand things that you do or say, all the skyscrapers you build and cover with gold, your elegant tombstone, all will be completely forgotten eventually. Even your children, and their children, too, will be forgotten. That being so, perhaps it is best to begin to erase your presence well before you leave the scene.

the most resplendent sun setteth at last in a western cloud.