Kahlil Gibran

“Del sufrimiento han surgido las almas más fuertes: los más grandes caracteres están cubiertos de cicatrices”

“Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;”

“Shall the nightingale offend the stillness of the night, or the firefly the stars? And shall your flame or your smoke burden the wind?”

“And to both, bee and flower, the giving and the receiving of pleasure is a need and an ecstasy.”

“No lower can a man descend than to interpret his dreams into gold and silver”

“Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never spent the darksome hours Weeping, and watching for the morrow,-- He knows ye not, ye gloomy Powers.”

“Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.”

“That which sings and contemplates in you is still dwelling within the bounds of that first moment which scattered the stars into space”

“You are good when you are fully awake in your speech.”

“You are good when you are one with yourself.”

“And look into space; you shall see Him walking in the cloud, outstretching His arms in the lightning and descending in rain.”

“Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.”

“Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.”

“Love is a magic rayemitted from the burning coreof the souland illuminatingthe surrounding earth.It enables usto perceive lifeas a beautiful dreambetween one awakeningand another.”

“soul.”

“Peri kemanusiaan itu roh Maha Agung di muka bumi, dan roh itu menebar getaran cinta kasih dan niat mulia.”

“Kami ini anak Derita, Kalian anak Sukacita,Kami anak Dukacita, Dan Duka itu bayangan TuhanYang tidak menempati wilayah hati dengki”

“Och när ni krossar ett äpple med era tänder, säg då till ert hjärta: >> Dina frön skall leva i min kropp, Och dina morgondagars knoppar skall blomma i mitt hjärta, Och din väldoft skall vara min andedräkt, Och tillsammans ska vi glädjas genom varje årstid.<<”

“Jesus was not sent here to teach the people to build magnificent churches and temples amidst the cold wretched huts and dismal hovels. He came to make the human heart a temple, and the soul an altar, and the mind a priest.”

“Long were the days of pain I have spent within its walls, and long were the nights of aloneness; and who can depart from his pain and his aloneness without regret?”

“Yet in truth you spoke not of her but of needs unsatisfied,”

“And beauty is not a need but an ecstasy.”

“Man’s needs change, but not his love, nor his desire that his love should satisfy his needs.”

“Pity the nation that is full of beliefs and empty of religion. Pity the nation that wears a cloth it does not weave and eats a bread it does not harvest. Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero, and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful. Pity a nation that despises a passion in its dream, yet submits in its awakening. Pity the nation that raises not its voice save when it walks in a funeral, boasts not except among its ruins, and will rebel not save when its neck is laid between the sword and the block. Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpeting, and farewells him with hooting, only to welcome another with trumpeting again. Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strongmen are yet in the cradle. Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.”

“Say not, “I have found the path of the soul.” Say rather, “I have met the soul walking upon my path.”

“When you see a man led to prison say in your heart, "Mayhap he is escaping from a narrower prison." And when you see a man drunken say in your heart, "Mayhap he sought escape from something still more unbeautiful.”

“Follow your heart. Your heart is the right guide in everything big”

“Dig anywhere in the earth and you will find a treasure, only you must dig with the faith of a peasant.”

“If this is my day of harvest, in what fields have I sowed the seed, and in what unremembered seasons?”

“We often sing lullabyes to our children that we ourselves may sleep.”

“THEN Almitra spoke again and said, And what of Marriage, master?”

“The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.”

“And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;”

“And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.”

“Like a procession you walk together towards your god-self.You are the way and the wayfarers.And when one of you falls down he falls for those behind him, a caution against the stumbling stone.Ay, and he falls for those ahead of him, who though faster and surer of foot, yet removed not the stumbling stone.”

“And if you would know God, be not therefore a solver of riddles.Rather look about you and you shall see Him playing with your children.And look into space; you shall see Him walking in the cloud, outstretching His arms in the lightning and descending in rain.You shall see Him smiling in flowers, then rising and waving His hands in trees.”

“For if you should enter the temple for no other purpose than asking you shall not receive:”

“Have you beauty, that leads the heart from things fashioned of wood and stone to the holy mountain? Tell me, have you these in your houses? Or have you only comfort, and the lust for comfort, that stealthy thing that enters the house a guest, and becomes a host, and then a master? Ay, and it becomes a tamer, and with hook and scourge makes puppets of your larger desires. Though its hands are silken, its heart is of iron. It lulls you to sleep only to stand by your bed and jeer at the dignity of the flesh. It makes mock of your sound senses, and lays them in thistledown like fragile vessels. Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral. But you, children of space, you restless in rest, you shall not be trapped nor tamed. Your house shall be not an anchor but a mast. It shall not be a glistening film that covers a wound, but an eyelid that guards the eye. You shall not fold your wings that you may pass through doors, nor bend your heads that they strike not against a ceiling, nor fear to breathe lest walls should crack and fall down. You shall not dwell in tombs made by the dead for the living. And though of magnificence and splendour, your house shall not hold your secret nor shelter your longing. For that which is boundless in you abides in the mansion of the sky, whose door is the morning mist, and whose windows are the songs and the silences of night.”

“In the depths of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond;And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.”

“Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and not your inheritors’.”

“And what is fear of need but need itself?”

“How often have you sailed in my dreams. And now you come in my awakening, which is my deeper dream.”

“THE ROBINO Robin, sing! for the secret of eternity is in song.I wish I were as you, free from prisons and chains.I wish I were as you; a soul flying over the valleys,Sipping the light as wine is sipped from ethereal cups.I wish I were asyou, innocent, contented and happyIgnoring the future and forgetting the past.I wish I were as you in beauty, grace and eleganceWith the wind spreading my wings for adornment by the dew.I wish I were as you in beauty, a thought floating above the landPouring out my songs between the forest and the sky.O Robin, sing! and disperse my anxiety.I listen to the voice within your voicethat whispers in my inner ear;”

“I abstain from the people who consider insolence bravery and tenderness cowardice. And I abstain from those who consider chatter wisdom and silence ignorance.”

“Life is an island in an ocean of solitude and seclusion.Life is an island, rocks are its desires, trees its dreams, and flowers its loneliness, and it is in the middle of an ocean of solitude and seclusion.Your life, my friend, is an island separated from all other islands and continents. Regardless of how many boats you send to other shores, you yourself are an island separated by its own pains,secluded its happiness and far away in its compassion and hidden in its secrets and mysteries.I saw you, my friend, sitting upon a mound of gold, happy in your wealth and great in your riches and believing that a handful of gold is the secret chain that links the thoughts of the people with your own thoughts and links their feeling with your own.I saw you as a great conqueror leading a conquering army toward the fortress, then destroying and capturing it.On second glance I found beyond the wall of your treasures a heart trembling in its solitude and seclusion like the trembling of a thirsty man within a cage of gold and jewels, but without water.I saw you, my friend, sitting on a throne of glory surrounded by people extolling your charity, enumerating your gifts, gazing upon you as if they were in the presence of a prophet lifting their souls up into the planets and stars. I saw you looking at them, contentment and strength upon your face, as if you were to them as the soul is to the body.On the second look I saw your secluded self standing beside your throne, suffering in its seclusion and quaking in its loneliness. I saw that self stretching its hands as if begging from unseen ghosts. I saw it looking above the shoulders of the people to a far horizon, empty of everything except its solitude and seclusion.I saw you, my friend, passionately in love with a beautiful woman, filling her palms with your kisses as she looked at you with sympathy and affection in her eyes and sweetness of motherhood on her lips; I said, secretly, that love has erased his solitude and removed his seclusion and he is now within the eternal soul which draws toward itself, with love, those who were separated by solitude and seclusion.On the second look I saw behind your soul another lonely soul, like a fog, trying in vain to become a drop of tears in the palm of that woman.Your life, my friend, is a residence far away from any other residence and neighbors.Your inner soul is a home far away from other homes named after you. If this residence is dark, you cannot light it with your neighbor's lamp; if it is empty you cannot fill it with the riches of your neighbor; were it in the middle of a desert, you could not move it to a garden planted by someone else.Your inner soul, my friend, is surrounded with solitude and seclusion. Were it not for this solitude and this seclusion you would not be you and I would not be I. If it were not for that solitude and seclusion, I would, if I heard your voice, think myself to be speaking; yet, if I saw your face, i would imagine that I were looking into a mirror.”

“Our world is so complex that we take for granted engineering processes that would dwarf any of the ancient Seven Wonders of the World; we ride railroad tracks that do not follow faithfully the curvature of the earth, for the train would jump the tracks if they were level. We pass skyscrapers whose stress and strain are figured to the millionth of an inch, yet take for granted that the Empire State Building actually sways constantly many feet. If we are religiously inclined, we take going to the church of our choice for granted; if we are non believers, we give no second thought to the fact that we do not have to attend religious services if we do not choose. Yet the very privilege of non-belief represents the victory of philosophy; otherwise the non-churchgoer would still face the lions or the stake.”

“If you sing of beauty though alone in the heart of the desert you will have an audience.”

“The things which the child loves remain in the domain of the heart until old age. The most beautiful thing in life is that our souls remain hovering over the places where we once enjoyed ourselves. I am one of those who remembers those places regardless of distance or time.”

“De même que la valeur de la vie n'est pas en sa surface mais dans ses profondeurs, les choses vues ne sont pas dans leur écorce mais dans leur noyau, et les hommes ne sont pas dans leur visage mais dans leur coeur.”

“A traveller I am, and a navigator, and everyday I discover a new region within my soul.”