quotations about life
The life of man on earth is, as a rule, a dangerous journey, over and through shoals and quicksands, beset on his way outwardly by snares, traps, and insinuating temptations of all sorts, and inwardly, he is besieged by contending emotions of good and evil, perpetually at war with each other; however watchful must he then be to steer clear of all the dangers that beset him, and how necessary for him to keep his eye on the chart and compass God has provided him with for his guidance, and to pray for wisdom to understand it correctly. As on he travels day by day, the scenes he often passes through are varied, strange, and wonderful: first the road may be said to be through a smooth and quiet valley, then there comes a hill to climb; if climbed successfully at once, he often tumbles headlong down again, and next time it is more difficult to get up again; on the other hand, should he continue slowly and gradually on his road, he will find the remainder of his journey for the most part uphill, with now and then level and barren spots to cross, every slip or false step, he takes he finds it harder and harder to regain his lost position, and if weak-minded and faint-hearted, he perishes by the way; but if he has the sterling stuff in him, that will ever make a brave, a great, and a good man, with increasing faith and never-dying hope, head erect and body upright, he calmly but with unyielding determination presses on and on, higher and higher, rarely pausing to look back, but gaining summit after summit and peak after peak, till at the close of his career, he has gained earth's highest pinnacles, and his vision made more bright by the glorified blaze of the setting sun of his life below, he raises his eyes aloft, and there, not far distant, in awe-inspiring and dazzling splendour, he beholds with spell-bound rapture the Land of Beulah, the Plains of Heaven, and the homes prepared from the foundation of the world for the faithful earthly servants of their Heavenly Master.
T. AUGUSTUS FORBES LEITH
Notice: Undefined variable: id in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 37
"On the Life of Man", Short Essays
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
So life discloses--
Howe'er the pathway curve or turn--
New hopes that rise, new stars that burn
In changing splendor night or day;
New joys that drive old griefs away.
ANDREW DOWNING
"Among the Roses"
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Men regret their life has been ill-spent, but this does not always induce them to make a better use of the time they have yet to live.
JEAN DE LA BRUYÈRE
"Of Mankind", Les Caractères
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Life is sad
Life is a bust
All ya can do is do what you must
BOB DYLAN
"Buckets of Rain"
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Life is a series of abandonings.
JEFF ABBOTT
The Last Minute
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Life goes on forever like the gnawing of a mouse.
EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY
"Ashes of Life"
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Life divine! O life eternal!
Man cannot translate the thought.
Strong the chain that God hath welded;
Link on link hath chain been wrought.
Fabric new each day is woven,
Woven it on God's own loom.
We the threads can ne'er unravel,
Hidden they in Nature's womb.
ARDELIA COTTON BARTON
"Dost Thou Know?"
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Life ... is only heavy and none else; there is only the one trip, all heavy. Heavy that leads to the grave. For everyone and everything.
PHILIP K. DICK
A Scanner Darkly
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
In the chequered area of human experience the seasons are all mingled as in the golden age: fruit and blossom hang together; in the same moment the sickle is reaping and the seed is sprinkled; one tends the green cluster and another treads the wine-press. Nay, in each of our lives harvest and spring-time are continually one, until Death himself gathers us and sows us anew in his invisible fields.
GEORGE ELIOT
Daniel Deronda
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
If I don't have time to live my life well the first time, when am I going to find the time to go back and live it over?
ROBERT FULGHUM
Uh-Oh
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
You sit
Like a rain puddle in hell
Knitting the socks
Of your life.
CHARLES SIMIC
My Noiseless Entourage
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world.
MARK TWAIN
The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
When I consider Life, 'tis all a cheat;
Yet, fooled with hope, men favour the deceit;
Trust on, and think to-morrow will repay:
To-morrow's falser than the former day;
Lies worse; and while it says, we shall be blest
With some new joys, cuts off what we possessed.
JOHN DRYDEN
Aureng-Zebe
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
What is terrible is that after every one of the phases of my life is finished, I am left with no more than some banal commonplace that everyone knows.
DORIS LESSING
The Golden Notebook
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Well yet, this life such as it is, yet we love it, and loath we are to end it; and if it be in hazard by the law, what running, riding, posting, suing, bribing, and if all will not serve, what breaking prison is there for it!
LANCELOT ANDREWES
Ninety-six Sermons
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
We cross the stream of life at different places. Some wade through the shallows in a drought, others have to swim across deep waters in a storm.
CHARLES EDWARD JERNINGHAM
The Maxims of Marmaduke
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
To live means to finesse the processes to which one is subjugated.
BERTOLT BRECHT
On Politics and Society
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
To live life well is to express life poorly; if one expresses life too well, one is living it no longer.
GASTON BACHELARD
Fragments of a Poetics of Fire
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
Though life's tuition is always ruinous, inexorably we learn.
JOHN BARTH
The Last Voyage of Somebody the Sailor
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65
The way of the world is to bloom and to flower and die but in the affairs of men there is no waning and the noon of his expression signals the onset of night. His spirit is exhausted at the peak of its achievement. His meridian is at once his darkening and the evening of his day.
CORMAC MCCARTHY
Blood Meridian
Notice: Undefined index: bio in /hermes/walnacweb03/walnacweb03ak/b2149/pow.notablequote/htdocs/l/includes/quoter_subj.php on line 65