Henri Frédéric Amiel

“Spite is anger which is afraid to show itself, it is an impotent fury conscious of its impotence.”

“Hindoo wisdom long ago regarded the world as the dream of Brahma. Must we hold with Fichte that it is the individual dream of each individual ego? Every fool would then be a cosmogonic poet producing the firework of the universe under the dome of the infinite.”

“A journal takes the place of a confidant, that is, of friend or wife; it becomes a substitute for production, a substitute for country and public. It is a grief-cheating device, a mode of escape and withdrawal; but, factotum as it is, though it takes the place of everything, properly speaking it represents nothing at all...”

“Uncertainty is the refuge of hope.”

“I begin to realize that my memory is a great catacomb, and that below my actual standing-ground there is layer after layer of historical ashes. Is the life of mind something like that of great trees of immemorial growth? Is the living layer of consciousness super-imposed upon hundreds of dead layers? Dead? No doubt this is too much to say, but still, when memory is slack the past becomes almost as though it had never been. To remember that we did know once is not a sign of possession but a sign of loss; it is like the number of an engraving which is no longer on its nail, the title of a volume no longer to be found on its shelf. My mind is the empty frame of a thousand vanished images.”

“Man becomes man only by his intelligence, but he is man only by his heart.”

“What is it which has always come between real life and me? What glass screen has, as it were, interposed itself between me and the enjoyment, the possession, the contact of things, leaving me only the role of the looker-on?”

“Time is but the space between our memories; as soon as we cease to perceive this space, time has disappeared.”

“At the bottom of the modern man there is always a great thirst for self-forgetfulness, self-distraction; he has a secret horror of all which makes him feel his own littleness; the eternal, the infinite, perfection, therefore scare and terrify him. He wishes to approve himself, to admire and congratulate himself; and therefore he turns away from all those problems and abysses which might recall to him his own nothingness.”

“Feebleness of will brings about weakness of head, and the abyss, in spite of its horror, comes to fascinate us, as though it were a place of refuge. Terrible danger! For this abyss is within us; this gulf, open like the vast jaws of an infernal serpent bent on devouring us, is in the depth of our own being, and our liberty floats over this void, which is always seeking to swallow it up.”

“In these moments of tête-à-tête with the infinite, how different life looks! How all that usually occupies and excites us becomes suddenly puerile, frivolous, and vain. We seem to ourselves mere puppets, marionettes, strutting seriously through a fantastic show, and mistaking gewgaws for things of great price.”

“A belief is not true because it is useful”

“Dare to be what you are, and learn to resign with a good grace all that you are not and to believe in your own individuality.”

“all appears to change when we change”

“I sogni sono la domenica dei pensieri.”

“Society lives by faith, and develops by science.”

“Sacrifice still exists everywhere, and everywhere the elect of each generation suffers for the salvation of the rest.”

“Our duty is to be useful, not according to our desires but according to our powers.”

“What we do not understand we have no right to judge”

“Life is short. We don't have much time to gladden the hearts of those who walk this way with us. So, be swift to love and make haste to be kind.”

“The stationary condition is the beginning of the end”

“If nationality is consent, the state is compulsion.”

“A thousand things advance; nine hundred and ninety nine retreat; That is progress.”

“Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are travelling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind.”

“Charm is the quality in others that makes us more satisfied with ourselves.”

“Any landscape is a condition of the spirit.”

“Learn to... be what you are, and learn to resign with a good grace all that you are not. ”

“Doing easily what others find difficult is talent; doing what is impossible for talent is genius.”

“Music is harmony, harmony is perfection, perfection is our dream, and our dream is heaven. ”

“I'm not interested in age. People who tell me their age are silly. You're as old as you feel.”

“It is by teaching that we teach ourselves.”

“It is not what he has, nor even what he does, which directly expresses the worth of a man, but what he is.”

“He who floats with the current, who does not guide himself according to higher principles, who has no ideal, no convictions – such a man is a mere article of the worlds furniture – a thing moved, instead of a living and moving being – an echo, not a voice.”

“Life is short. Be swift to love! Make haste to be kind!”

“To know how to suggest is the art of teaching.”

“An error is the more dangerous the more truth it contains.”

“Conquering any difficulty always gives one a secret joy, for it means pushing back a boundary line and adding to one's liberty.”

“Women wish to be loved not because they are pretty, or good, or well bred, or graceful, or intelligent, but because they are themselves.”

“Hope is only the love of life.”

“The man who has no inner life is the slave of his surroundings.”

“Work while you have the light. You are responsible for the talent that has been entrusted to you.”

“The man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides. Accept life, and you must accept regret.”

“You desire to know the art of living, my friend? It is contained in one phrase: make use of suffering.”

“Almost everything comes from almost nothing.”

“Life is short and we never have enough time for the hearts of those who travel the way with us. O, be swift to love! Make haste to be kind.”

“Truth is not only violated by falsehood;it may be outraged by silence.”

“A modest garden contains, for those who know how to look and to wait, more instruction than a library.”