Amiel's Journal: The Journal Intime of Henri-Frédéric Amiel, Volume 2 |
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Page 7
I have been a witness of griefs without hope , of loneliness that claimed one's pity . I have listened to pleasantries on the subject of madness , and to the merry songs of the birds . And everything has had the same message for me ...
I have been a witness of griefs without hope , of loneliness that claimed one's pity . I have listened to pleasantries on the subject of madness , and to the merry songs of the birds . And everything has had the same message for me ...
Page 9
We must give up the hope of happi- ness once for all ! Immolation of the self death to self , this is the only suicide which is either useful or permitted . In my present mood of indifference and disinter- estedness , there is some ...
We must give up the hope of happi- ness once for all ! Immolation of the self death to self , this is the only suicide which is either useful or permitted . In my present mood of indifference and disinter- estedness , there is some ...
Page 25
From regret to disenchantment I floated on to Buddhism , to universal weari- -Ah , the hope of a blessed immor- tality would be better worth having ! ness . — With what different eyes one looks at life at ten , at twenty , at thirty ...
From regret to disenchantment I floated on to Buddhism , to universal weari- -Ah , the hope of a blessed immor- tality would be better worth having ! ness . — With what different eyes one looks at life at ten , at twenty , at thirty ...
Page 26
Each one unwinds his own special reel of hope , and as soon as he has come to the end of it he sits him down to die , and lets his sons and his grandsons begin the same experience over again . We all pursue happiness , and happiness ...
Each one unwinds his own special reel of hope , and as soon as he has come to the end of it he sits him down to die , and lets his sons and his grandsons begin the same experience over again . We all pursue happiness , and happiness ...
Page 41
What duty or what hope appeals to thee ? But My longing , my search is for love , for peace , for something to fill my heart ; an idea to defend ; a work to which I might devote the rest of my strength ; an affection which might quench ...
What duty or what hope appeals to thee ? But My longing , my search is for love , for peace , for something to fill my heart ; an idea to defend ; a work to which I might devote the rest of my strength ; an affection which might quench ...
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able action beauty become beginning believe better bring called Christianity Church clear comes common conscience consciousness critic death desire divine doubt dream duty effect equality eternal everything evil existence experience expression eyes fact faith feel force give happiness harmony heart hope human idea ideal illusion imagination impression individual infinite intellectual interest judge justice kind leaves less liberty living look March matter means mind moral nature ness never object once one's oneself original passes passion peace perfection perhaps philosophy possess possible principle pure race reality reason religion religious rest result seems sense side society soul speak spirit suffering things thought tion true truth turn understand universal whole wisdom wish
Popular passages
Page 64 - there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth, than over ninety and nine just persons that need no repentance.
Page 234 - Chacun se réveille à ce son, Les Brebis, le Chien, le Garçon. Le pauvre Loup, dans cet esclandre, Empêché par son hoqueton, Ne put ni fuir ni se défendre. Toujours par quelque endroit fourbes se laissent prendre. Quiconque est Loup agisse en Loup : C'est le plus certain de beaucoup.
Page 362 - Entre toutes les différentes expressions qui peuvent rendre une seule de nos pensées, il n'y en a qu'une qui soit la bonne. On ne la rencontre pas toujours en parlant ou en écrivant ; il est vrai néanmoins qu'elle existe, que tout ce qui ne l'est point est faible, et ne satisfait point un homme d'esprit qui veut se faire entendre.
Page 360 - M'a dessillé les yeux, et me les vient d'ouvrir. Je vois, je sais, je crois, je suis désabusée...
Page 191 - We must treat our subject brutally and not be always trembling lest we should be doing it a wrong. We must be able to transmute and absorb it into our own substance. This sort of confident effrontery is beyond me ; my whole nature tends to that impersonality which respects and subordinates itself to the object; it is love of truth which holds me back from concluding and deciding.
Page 359 - The courses of nature, and the prodigious injustices of man in society, affect him with neither horror nor awe. He will see no monster if he can help it.
Page 348 - March 21, 1881. — This invalid life is too Epicurean. For five or six weeks now I have done nothing else but wait, nurse myself, and amuse myself, and how weary one gets of it ! What I want is work. It is work which gives flavor to life. Mere existence without object and without effort is a poor thing. Idleness leads to languor, and languor to disgust.
Page 216 - I have been thinking a great deal of Victor Cherbuliez. Perhaps his novels make up the most disputable part of his work, — they are so much wanting in simplicity, feeling, reality. And yet what knowledge, style, wit, and subtlety — how much thought everywhere, and what mastery of language ! He astonishes one ; I cannot but admire him. Cherbuliez's mind is of immense range, clear-sighted, keen, full of resource ; he is an Alexandrian exquisite, substituting for the feeling which makes men earnest...
Page 117 - The mind must have for ballast the clear conception of duty, if it is not to fluctuate between levity and despair. Before giving advice we must have secured its acceptance, or rather, have made it desired. If we begin by overrating the being we love, we shall end by treating it with wholesale injustice. It is dangerous to abandon oneself to the luxury of grief ; it deprives one of courage, and even of the wish for recovery.