It is simply not true that war never settles anything. —Felix Frankfurter More about this quote Tags: truth war finality Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
When I despair, I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love has always won. There have been murderers and tyrants, and for a time they can seem invincible. But in the end they always fall. Think of it, always. —Mahatma Gandhi More about this quote Tags: truth love history time inevitability tyranny murder Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
And this is the simple truth — that to live is to feel oneself lost. He who accepts it has already begun to find himself, to be on firm ground. Instinctively, as do the shipwrecked, he will look around for something to which to cling, and that tragic, ruthless glance, absolutely sincere, because it is a question of his salvation, will cause him to bring order into the chaos of his life. These are the only genuine ideas; the ideas of the shipwrecked. All the rest is rhetoric, posturing, farce. —Soren Kierkegaard More about this quote Tags: truth life ideas tragedy clinging chaos salvation being lost Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
An enormous conflict between words and deeds is prevalent today: everyone talks about freedom, democracy, justice, human rights, about peace and saving the world from nuclear apocalypse; and at the same time, everyone, more or less, consciously or unconsciously, serves those values and ideals only to the extent necessary to serve himself and his "worldly" interests, personal interests, group interests, power interests, property interests, and state or great-power interests. . . . So the power structures apparently have no other choice than to sink deeper into this vicious maelstrom, and contemporary people apparently have no other choice than to wait around until the final inhibition drops away. But who should begin? Who should break this vicious circle? Responsibility cannot be preached but only borne, and the only possible place to begin is with oneself. —Vaclav Havel More about this quote Tags: justice truth power freedom peace words democracy change responsibility talk values Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Spiritual awakening is frequently described as a journey to the top of a mountain. We leave our attachments and our worldliness behind and slowly make our way to the top. At the peak we have transcended all pain. The only problem with this metaphor is that we leave all the others behind. . . . In the process of discovering our true nature, the journey goes down, not up. . . . Instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move toward the turbulence and doubt. . . . We explore the reality and unpredictability of insecurity and pain, and we try not to push it away. If it takes years, if it takes lifetimes, we will let it be as it is. At our own pace, without speed or aggression, we move down and down and down. With us move millions of others, our companions in awakening from fear. At the bottom we discover water, the healing water of compassion. Right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die. —Pema Chödrön More about this quote Tags: truth spirituality love reality compassion pain death suffering doubt aggression transcendence healing attachments worldliness turbulence insecurity Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Of course I lie to people. But I lie altruistically — for our mutual good. The lie is the basic building block of good manners. That may seem mildly shocking to a moralist — but then what isn't? —Quentin Crisp More about this quote Tags: truth shock manners lying Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
No one who has stood for high values — love, truth, justice — has died being able to declare victory, once and for all. If we embrace values like those, we need to find ways to stand in the gap for the long haul, and be prepared to die without having achieved our goals. —Parker J. Palmer More about this quote Tags: justice truth love time death goals victory Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Here's the thing with me and the religious thing. This is the flat-out truth: I find the religiosity and philosophy in the music. I don't find it anywhere else. Songs like "Let Me Rest on a Peaceful Mountain" or "I Saw the Light" — that's my religion. I don't adhere to rabbis, preachers, evangelists, all of that. . . . The songs are my lexicon. I believe the songs. —Bob Dylan More about this quote Tags: truth religion philosophy music belief songs Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for joy. —Pema Chödrön More about this quote Tags: truth space grief joy healing relief overcoming test room Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
It is hard to believe that a man is telling the truth when you know that you would lie if you were in his place. —H. L. Mencken More about this quote Tags: truth belief lying Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Do not believe the truth. The truth is tiny compared to what you have to do. —Leonard Cohen More about this quote Tags: truth belief Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Truth can be found everywhere, even on the lips of drunkards, in the noisiest of taverns. —Elie Wiesel More about this quote Tags: truth alcohol drinking drunkards taverns Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Talk to me about the truth of religion and I'll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I'll listen submissively. But don't come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don't understand. —C. S. Lewis, after the death of his wife More about this quote Tags: truth religion duty consolation Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
I studiously avoided all so-called holy men. I did so because I had to make do with my own truth, not accept from others what I could not attain on my own. I would have felt it as a theft had I attempted to learn from the holy men and to accept their truth for myself. Neither in Europe can I make any borrowings from the East, but must shape my life out of myself — out of what my inner being tells me, or what nature brings to me. —Carl Jung More about this quote Tags: truth religion nature theft holy men Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email
Our noses too, and our eyes and ears, are political instruments, protesters. An aesthetic response is a political action. . . . We know instinctively, aesthetically, when a fish stinks, when the sense of beauty is offended. Standing for these moments — and these moments occur each day, within every airless office building, seated in each crippling chair, inundated by senseless noise and fattened on industrial food — standing for our responses, these aesthetic reverberations of truth in the soul, may be the primary civic act of the citizen, the origin of caution and of the precautionary principle itself, with its warnings to stop, look, and listen. —James Hillman More about this quote Tags: truth politics action food control caution Permalink for this quote facebook twitter tumblr email