Quotes About Introspection

And you know what wickedness is, and shame, and fear. There were days when you peered into yourself, into the secret places of your heart, and what you saw there made you faint with horror.

Je ne peux plus rien d'autre. Je ne les entends plus, tu sais. C'est sans doute qu'ils en ont fini avec moi. Fini: l'affaire est classée, je ne suis plus rien sur terre, même plus un lâche. Inès, nous voilà seuls: il n'y a plus que vous deux pour penser à moi. Elle ne compte pas. Mais toi, toi qui me hais, si tu me crois, tu me sauves.

Everything happens to every man as if the entire human race were staring at him and measuring itself by what he does. So every man ought to be asking himself, Am I really a man who is entitled to act in such a way that the entire human race should be measuring itself by my actions? And if he does not ask himself that, he masks his anguish.

Je n'ai jamais gratté la terre ni quêté des nids, je n'ai pas herborisé ni lancé des pierres aux oiseaux. Mais les livres ont été mes oiseaux et mes nids, mes bêtes domestiques, mon étable et ma campagne.

I am no longer sure of anything. If I satiate my desires, I sin but I deliver myself from them; if I refuse to satisfy them, they infect the whole soul.

He is not one: he is afraid. What is he afraid of? When you want to understand something you stand in front of it, alone, without help: all the past in the world is of no use. Then it disappears and what you wanted to understand disappears with it.

Every man ought to say to himself, Am I really the kind of man who has the right to act in such a way that humanity might guide itself by my actions?

Aku suka menyadari betapa kerasnya buku bertahan, tidak pernah mau takluk begitu saja padaku; aku jadi terpedaya, capai, tetapi aku amat menikmati ambiguitas posisiku: mengerti tetapi tidak mengerti.

Las palabras se habían desvanecido, y con ellas la significación de las cosas, sus modos de empleo, las débiles marcas que los hombres han trazado en su superficie. Estaba sentado, un poco encorvado, cabizbajo, solo frente a aquella masa negra y nudosa, enteramente bruta y que me daba miedo. Y entonces tuve esa iluminación.

Dans mes mains, par exemple, il y a quelque chose de neuf, une certaine façon de prendre ma pipe ou ma fourchette. Ou bien c'est la fourchette qui a, maintenant, une certaine façon de se faire prendre, je ne sais pas.

all of us abandon ourselves to existence, because we were among ourselves, only among ourselves, it has taken us unawares, in the disorder, the day to day drift: I am ashamed for myself and for what exists in front of it.

When you want to understand something you stand in front of it, alone, without help: all the past in the world is of no use.

The Intellectual is someone who meddles in what does not concern him.

I am illuminated within by a diminishing light.

One always dies too soon — or too late. And yet, life is there, finished: the line is drawn, and it must all be added up. You are nothing other than your life.

There's no need for red-hot pokers. Hell is--other people!

Quelquefois je m'approchais pour observer ces boîtes qui se fendaient comme des huîtres et je découvrais la nudité de leurs organes intérieurs, des feuilles blêmes et moisies, légèrement boursouflées, couvertes de veinules noires, qui buvaient l'encre et sentaient le champignon.

It is the reflection of my face. Often in these lost days I study it. I can understand nothing of this face. The faces of others have some sense, some direction. Not mine. I cannot even decide whether it is handsome or ugly. I think it is ugly because I have been told so. But it doesn't strike me. At heart, I am even shocked that anyone can attribute qualities of this kind to it, as if you called a clod of earth or a block of stone beautiful or ugly.

what summits would I not reach if my own life made the subject of the melody.

Only he who knows how to speak can be silent.

La plupart du temps, faute de s'attacher à des mots, mes pensées restent des brouillards. Elles dessinent des formes vagues et plaisantes, s'engloutissent : aussitôt, je les oublie.

Ama barda??m?n dibinde biram ?l?ksa, aynada koyu renkli lekeler varsa, fazlal?ksam; en içten ve en kat???ks?z ac?m, ay?bal??? gibi, hem bir y???n et hem gepgeniÅŸ bir deriyle ve insan?n içine dokunan ?slak, ama kötülük dolu gözlerle sürüklenip hantalla??yorsa bu benim kabahatim mi?

I can't explain what I see. To anyone. There: I am quietly slipping into the water's depths, towards fear. I am alone in the midst of these happy, reasonable voices. All these creatures spend their time explaining, realizing happily that they agree with each other. In Heaven's name, why is it so important to think the same things all together.

One thus arrives at a curious conception of thought. Thought has no real, concrete existence, accessible to immediate consciousness, since the datum of introspection is the image. It has no universality in act, because, if it were so, one should be able to grasp it directly. But it is a potential universality that one derives from the fact that a word can be accompanied by very different images.