LIFE QUOTES XXIX

quotations about life

Ah! what is human life?
How, like the dial's tardy-moving shade,
Day after day slides from us unperceiv'd!
The cunning fugitive is swift by stealth;
Too subtle is the movement to be seen;
Yet soon the hour is up--and we are gone.

EDWARD YOUNG

Busiris, King of Egypt: A Tragedy

Tags: Edward Young


Life is the tamer of the wild beast of humanity.

EDWIN LEIBFREED

"Childhood", A Soliloquy of Life

Tags: Edwin Leibfreed


Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

preface, Autobiography


While there's life, there's hope.

ENGLISH PROVERB


Life, in my estimation, is a biological misadventure that we terminate on the shoulders of six strange men whose only objective is to make a hole in one with you.

FRED ALLEN

Fred Allen's Letters

Tags: Fred Allen


Life is an arrow, therefore you must know
What mark to aim at, how to use the bow--
Then draw it to the head and let it go!

HENRY VAN DYKE

"Epigrams and Greetings"

Tags: Henry Van Dyke


Though life's tuition is always ruinous, inexorably we learn.

JOHN BARTH

The Last Voyage of Somebody the Sailor

Tags: John Barth


I know that life is a journey I must accept and that pain and confusion are temporary. I know that if I follow my heart, it will lead me where I belong.

JOSH GROBAN

O Magazine, Jan. 2007

Tags: Josh Groban


Life is one long struggle in the dark.

LUCRETIUS

De Rerum Natura

Tags: Lucretius


Behind every man's external life, which he leads in company, there is another which he leads alone, and which he carries with him apart. We see but one aspect of our neighbor, as we see but one side of the moon; in either case there is also a dark half, which is unknown to us.

WALTER BAGEHOT

Literary Studies

Tags: Walter Bagehot


The life most of us live are lives we are forced to live by immediate needs, influences, and pressures.

WALTER MOSLEY

Black Genius

Tags: Walter Mosley


So life discloses--
Howe'er the pathway curve or turn--
New hopes that rise, new stars that burn
In changing splendor night or day;
New joys that drive old griefs away.

ANDREW DOWNING

"Among the Roses"

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I have not wasted life, but life hath wasted me.

BHARTRHARI

"Against the Desire of Worldly Things"

Tags: Bhartrhari


How strange a checker-work of Providence is the life of man!

DANIEL DEFOE

Robinson Crusoe

Tags: Daniel Defoe


If we could live for a million years, then maybe it would be worthwhile to create some problems. But our life is short. Now you see, we are guests here on this planet, visitors who have come for a short time, so we need to use our days wisely, to make our world a little better for everyone.

DOUGLAS CARLTON ABRAMS

The Book of Joy

Tags: Douglas Carlton Abrams


I accept that life is uncertain--that the goal is not to become more certain about anything but to relax more into the mystery of not knowing what will come next. And then, miracle of miracles, out there in the deep and uncertain water, I come into a peaceful knowing--a faithful wisdom that surpasses control and certainty.

ELIZABETH LESSER

Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow

Tags: Elizabeth Lesser


Life cannot find reasons to sustain it, cannot be a source of decent mutual regard, unless each of us resolves to breathe such qualities into it.

FRANK HERBERT

Heretics of Dune


Just because life's meaningless doesn't mean we can't experience it meaningfully.

GLEN DUNCAN

The Last Werewolf

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Do you know the only value life has is what life puts upon itself? And it is of course overestimated, for it is of necessity prejudiced in its own favour.

JACK LONDON

The Sea Wolf

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Some moments in a life, and they needn't be very long or seem very important, can make up for so much in that life; can redeem, justify, that pain, that bewilderment, with which one lives, and invest one with the courage not only to endure it, but to profit from it; some moments teach one the price of the human connection: if one can live with one's own pain, then one respects the pain of others, and so, briefly, but transcendentally, we can release each other from pain.

JAMES BALDWIN

Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone

Tags: James Baldwin