Quotes About Illusion

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is a hallucinating idiot...for he sees what no one else does: things that, to everyone else, are not there.

How we lie to ourselves when we've fallen in love with the wrong man.

Satan can make men dance upon the brink of hell as though they were on the verge of heaven.

Even if a man should chance to speak the most complete truth, yet he himself does not know it; all things are wrapped in appearances

A house must be built on solid foundations if it is to last. The same principle applies to man, otherwise he too will sink back into the soft ground and becomes swallowed up by the world of illusion.

All lies and jests, still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.

I have seen many a man turn his gold into smoke, but you are the first who has turned smoke into gold.

Examine the religious principles which have, in fact, prevailed in the world. You will scarcely be persuaded that they are other than sick men's dreams.

Man has the supreme knack of deceiving himself; the Englishman is supremest among men.

Imagine a man who stands before a mirror; a stone strikes it, and it falls to ruin all in an instant. And the man learns that he is himself, and not the mirrored man he had believed himself to be.

Every man looks out for himself, and he has the happiest life who manages to hoodwink himself best of all.

One man pretends to be rich, yet has nothing; another pretends to be poor, yet has great wealth.

While men are gazing up to Heaven, imagining after a happiness, or fearing a Hell after they are dead, their eyes are put out, that they see not what is their birthright.

Between the worlds of men and make believe I can be found.

The democratic concept of man is false, because it is Christian. The democratic concept holds that . . . each man is a sovereign being. This is the illusion, dream, and postulate of Christianity.

When a man mistakes his thoughts for persons and things, he is mad.

Sits like a man, but smiles like a reptile.

The world of men is dreaming, it has gone mad in its sleep, and a snake is strangling it, but it can't wake up.

Simplicity is the most deceitful mistress that ever betrayed man.

Men who can succeed in deceiving no one else, will succeed at last in deceiving themselves.

Men think highly of those who rise rapidly in the world; whereas nothing rises quicker than dust, straw, and feathers.

Man does not see reality as it is, but only as he perceives it, and his perception may be mistaken or biased.

When life attains a crisis, man's focus narrows. […] The world becomes a stage of immediate concern, swept free of illusion.

Vain are the thousand creeds That move men's hearts, unutterably vain; Worthless as withered weeds, Or idlest froth amid the boundless main.