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The injustice of defeat lies in the fact that its most innocent victims are made to look like heartless accomplices. It is impossible to see behind defeat, the sacrifices, the austere performance of duty, the self-discipline and the vigilance that are there -- those things the god of battle does not take account of. (defeat)
A civilization is built on what is required of men, not on that which is provided for them. (civilization)
Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures --in this century as in others our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together. (communication)
Commonly, people believe that defeat is characterized by a general bustle and a feverish rush. Bustle and rush are the signs of victory, not of defeat. Victory is a thing of action. It is a house in the act of being built. Every participant in victory sweats and puffs, carrying the stones for the building of the house. But defeat is a thing of weariness, of incoherence, of boredom. And above all of futility. (defeat)
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A civilization is a heritage of beliefs, customs, and knowledge slowly accumulated in the course of centuries, elements difficult at times to justify by logic, but justifying themselves as paths when they lead somewhere, since they open up for man his inner distance. (civilization)
Charity never humiliated him who profited from it, nor ever bound him by the chains of gratitude, since it was not to him but to God that the gift was made. (charity)
When the body sinks into death, the essence of man is revealed. Man is a knot, a web, a mesh into which relationships are tied. Only those relationships matter. The body is an old crock that nobody will miss. I have never known a man to think of himself when dying. Never. (death and dying)
It is in the compelling zest of high adventure and of victory, and in creative action, that man finds his supreme joys. (happiness)
Whoever loves above all the approach of love will never know the joy of attaining it. (flirting)
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye. (faith)
I know but one freedom and that is the freedom of the mind. (freedom)
For true love is inexhaustible; the more you give, the more you have. And if you go to draw at the true fountainhead, the more water you draw, the more abundant is its flow. (giving)
When you give yourself, you receive more than you give. (giving)
There is a cheap literature that speaks to us of the need of escape. It is true that when we travel we are in search of distance. But distance is not to be found. It melts away. And escape has never led anywhere. The moment a man finds that he must play the races, go the Arctic, or make war in order to feel himself alive, that man has begin to spin the strands that bind him to other men and to the world. But what wretched strands! A civilization that is really strong fills man to the brim, though he never stir. What are we worth when motionless, is the question. (escapism)
True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new. (happiness)
Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction. (love)
What do we mean by setting a man free? You cannot free a man who dwells in a desert and is an unfeeling brute. There is no liberty except the liberty of some one making his way towards something. Such a man can be set free if you will teach him the meaning of thirst, and how to trace a path to a well. Only then will he embark upon a course of action that will not be without significance. You could not liberate a stone if there were no law of gravity -- for where will the stone go, once it is quarried? (liberty)
Each man must look to himself to teach him the meaning of life. It is not something discovered: it is something molded. (life and living)
A pile of rocks ceases to be a rock when somebody contemplates it with the idea of a cathedral in mind. (ideas)
We say nothing essential about the cathedral when we speak of its stones. We say nothing essential about Man when we seek to define him by the qualities of men. (humankind)
The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them. (machinery)
Night, the beloved. Night, when words fade and things come alive. When the destructive analysis of day is done, and all that is truly important becomes whole and sound again. When man reassembles his fragmentary self and grows with the calm of a tree. (night)
How could drops of water know themselves to be a river? Yet the river flows on. (meaning of life)
One can be a brother only in something. Where there is no tie that binds men, men are not united but merely lined up. (human fellowship)
Perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add but when there is no longer anything to take away, when a body has been stripped down to its nakedness. (perfection)
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