quotations about life
Life is short, if we are only said to live when we enjoy ourselves; and if we were merely to count up the hours we spent agreeably, a great number of years would hardly make up a life of a few months.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of the Affections", Les Caractères
Behind every man's external life, which he leads in company, there is another which he leads alone, and which he carries with him apart. We see but one aspect of our neighbor, as we see but one side of the moon; in either case there is also a dark half, which is unknown to us.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Life started out one thing and then suddenly turned a corner and became something else.
JEFFREY EUGENIDES
Middlesex
Life can be cruel and uncomfortable at times. That doesn't define you. It's how we survive and create a colorful life with our experiences. Good and bad.
PAMELA ANDERSON
interview, Parade Magazine, January 23, 2015
Life is so complicated a game that the devices of skill are liable to be defeated at every turn by air-blown chances, incalculable as the descent of thistle-down.
GEORGE ELIOT
Romola
No man is matriculated to the art of life till he has been well tempted.
GEORGE ELIOT
Romola
If you have no wounds, how can you know if you're alive?
EDWARD ALBEE
The Play About the Baby
The loves and hours of the life of a man,
They are swift and sad, being born of the sea.
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE
The Triumph of Time
And life itself spoke this secret to me. "Behold," it said, "I am that which must ever overcome itself."
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Thus Spoke Zarathustra
My definition of life is a series of experiences, and the more you have the better off you are.
EMILY FEISTRITZER
"Former nun sees life as a series of experiences, including lucrative ones", Washington Post, August 21, 2016
The understanding of human existence that sees life as having death as its inevitable end presumes that life is lived only in opposition to dying and seeks the conquest of death; that is, immortality, or eternal life. Here, death is always seen as alien to life, something to be overcome. In contrast to this, the understanding of human existence as a continuous living-and-dying does not view life and death as objects in mutual opposition but as two aspects of indivisible reality. Present life is understood as something that undergoes continuous living-and-dying.
MASAO ABE
Zen and the Modern World
Life is sad
Life is a bust
All ya can do is do what you must
BOB DYLAN
"Buckets of Rain"
We will never recognize the true value of our own lives until we affirm the value in the life of others.
RONALD REAGAN
"Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation"
My theory is to enjoy life, but the practice is against it.
CHARLES LAMB
letter to William Wordsworth, Mar. 20, 1822
Life is a stream
On which we strew
Petal by petal the flower of our heart.
AMY LOWELL
"Petals", A Dome of Many-coloured Glass
We say that life is sweet, its satisfactions deep. All this we say, as we sleepwalk our time through years of days and nights. We let time cascade over us like a waterfall, believing it to be never-ending. Yet each day that touches us, and every man in the world, is unique; irredeemable; over. And just another Monday.
JOSEPHINE HART
Damage
By the time you learn the rules of life, you're too old to play the game.
GRENVILLE KLEISER
Dictionary of Proverbs
When people say that they are happy with their lives, they do not usually mean that they are literally joyful, or experiencing pleasure, all the time. They mean that, upon reflection on the balance sheet of pleasures and pains, they feel the balance to be reasonably positive over the long term.
DANIEL NETTLE
Happiness: The Science Behind Your Smile
To live is to war with trolls.
HENRIK IBSEN
dedicatory lines, Peer Gynt
Every day of your life is a day in which you must weigh the messages that rain down upon you. While many of those signals are simply lost in the informational deluge, there are a great number that reinforce or subtly erode the convictions that drive you and guide you in the choices you make as you navigate life.
THOM MOLLOHAN
"World makes no sense without God", Pomeroy Daily Sentinel, September 1, 2016