A man without passion is only a latent force, only a possibility, like a stone waiting for the blow from the iron to give forth sparks.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
A thousand things advance; nine hundred and ninety-nine retreat: that is progress.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
An error is the more dangerous in proportion to the degree of truth it contains.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Analysis kills spontaneity. The grain once ground into flour springs and germinates no more.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Clever men will recognize and tolerate nothing but cleverness; every authority rouses their ridicule, every superstition amuses them, every convention moves them to contradiction.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Common sense is the measure of the possible; it is composed of experience and prevision; it is calculation applied to life.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Destiny has two ways of crushing us- by refusing our wishes and by fulfilling them.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Doing easily what others find difficult is talent; doing what is impossible for talent is genius.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Dreams are excursions into the limbo of things, a semi-deliverance from the human prison.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
If man was what he ought to be he would be adored by the animals.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
If nationality is consent, the state is compulsion.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
It is truth alone- scientific, established, proved, and rational truth- which is capable of satisfying nowadays the awakened minds of all classes. We may still say perhaps, 'faith governs the world,'- but the faith of the present is no longer in revelation or in the priest- it is in reason and in science.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Life is short, and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are traveling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Melancholy is at the bottom of everything, just as at the end of all rivers is the sea. Can it be otherwise in a world where nothing lasts, where all that we have loved or shall love must die? Is death, then, the secret of life?
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Our duty is to be useful, not according to our desires, but according to our powers.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Pure truth cannot be assimilated by the crowd; it must be communicated by contagion.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Scratch the green rind of a sapling, or wantonly twist it in the soil, and a scarred or crooked oak will tell of the act for centuries to come. So it is with the teachings of youth, which make impressions on the mind and heart that are to last forever.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Society lives by faith, develops by science.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The great artist is the simplifier.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The highest function of the teacher consists not so much in imparting knowledge as in stimulating the pupil in its love and pursuit. To know how to suggest is the art of teaching.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The man who has no inner life is the slave of his surroundings.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides. Accept life, and you must accept regret.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The stationary condition is the beginning of the end.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
The test of every religious, political, or educational system, is the man which it forms. If a system injures the intelligence it is bad. If it injures the character it is vicious. If it injures the conscience it is criminal.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
There is no curing a sick man who believes himself to be in health.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
To know how to grow old is the master-work of wisdom, and one of the most difficult chapters in the great art of living.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
To shun one's cross is to make it heavier.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be outraged by silence.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Will localizes us, thought universalizes us.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Women wish to be loved not because they are pretty, or good, or well bred, or graceful, or intelligent, but because they are themselves.
--Henri Frédéric Amiel
Found 30 occurence(s) in 52,450 quotation(s).