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No, There's Fifteen Francs Somewhere, Which Nobody Gives A Damn About Anymore And Which Nobody Is Going To Get In The End Anyhow, But The Fifteen Francs Is Like The Primal Cause Of Things And Rather Than Listen To One's Own Voice, Rather Than Walk Out On The Primal Cause, One Surrenders To The Situation, One Goes On Butchering And Butchering And The More Cowardly One Feels The More Heroically Does He Behave, Until A Day When The Bottom Drops Out And Suddenly All The Guns Are Silenced And The Stretcher-bearers Pick Up The Maimed And Bleeding Heroes And Pin Medals On Their Chest.

-Henry Miller

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No, There's Fifteen Francs

Henry Miller

...

No, There's Fifteen Francs Somewhere, Which Nobody Gives A Damn About Anymore And Which Nobody Is Going To Get In The End Anyhow, But The Fifteen Francs Is Like The Primal Cause Of Things And Rather Than Listen To One's Own Voice, Rather Than Walk Out On The Primal Cause, One Surrenders To The Situation, One Goes On Butchering And Butchering And The More Cowardly One Feels The More Heroically Does He Behave, Until A Day When The Bottom Drops Out And Suddenly All The Guns Are Silenced And The Stretcher-bearers Pick Up The Maimed And Bleeding Heroes And Pin Medals On Their Chest.

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The Learning We Received Only Tended To Obscure Our Vision. From The Day We Went To School We Learned Nothing; On The Contrary, We Were Made Obtuse, We Were Wrapped In A Fog Of Words And Abstractions.

Until It Is Kindled By A Spirit As Flamingly Alive As The One Which Gave It Birth A Book Is Dead To Us. Words Divested Of Their Magic Are But Dead Hieroglyphs.

There Are No "facts"- There Is Only The Fact That Man, Every Man Everywhere In The World, Is On His Way To Ordination. Some Men Take The Long Route And Some Take The Short Route. Every Man Is Working Out His Own Way And Nobody Can Be Of Help Except By Being Kind, Generous, And Patient.

Human Beings Make A Strange Fauna And Flora. From A Distance They Appear Negligible; Close Up They Are Apt To Appear Ugly And Malicious. More Than Anything They Need To Be Surrounded With Sufficient Space―space Even More Than Time.

Paint What You Like And Die Happy

To Know Paris Is To Know A Great Deal.

The Dreamer Whose Dreams Are Non-utilitarian Has No Place In This World. In This World The Poet Is Anathema, The Thinker A Fool, The Artist An Escapist, The Man Of Vision A Criminal.

Plots And Character Don't Make Life. Life Is Here And Now, Anytime You Say The Word, Anytime You Let Her Rip.

Back Of Every Creation, Supporting It Like An Arch, Is Faith. Enthusiasm Is Nothing: It Comes And Goes. But If One Believes, Then Miracles Occur.

Somewhere Along The Way One Discovers That What One Has To Tell Is Not Nearly So Important As The Telling Itself.

The Moment One Is On The Side Of Life; Peace And Security Drop Out Of Consciousness. The Only Peace, The Only Security, Is In Fulfillment.

The Word Which Gives The Key To The National Vice Is Waste. And People Who Are Wasteful Are Not Wise, Neither Can They Remain Young And Vigorous. In Order To Transmute Energy To Higher And More Subtle Levels One Must First Conserve It.

We Have Been Educated To Such A Fine - Or Dull - Point That We Are Incapable Of Enjoying Something New, Something Different, Until We Are First Told What It's All About. We Don't Trust Our Five Senses; We Rely On Our Critics And Educators, All Of Whom Are Failures In The Realm Of Creation. In Short, The Blind Lead The Blind. It's The Democratic Way.

I Am Thinking Of One Woman And The Rest Is Blotto. I Say I Am Thinking Of Her, But The Truth Is I Am Dying A Stellar Death. I Am Lying There Like A Sick Star Waiting For The Light To Go Out. Years Ago I Lay On This Same Bed And I Waited And Waited To Be Born. Nothing Happened. Except That My Mother, In Her Lutheran Rage, Threw A Bucket Of Water Over Me. My Mother, Poor Imbecile That She Was, Thought I Was Lazy. She Didn't Know That I Had Gotten Caught In The Stellar Drift, That I Was Being Pulverized To A Black Extinction Out There In The Farthest Rim Of The Universe.

Have You Ever Seen A Genius Out There Looking For A Job? It's The Saddest Thing In The World. No One Will Hire Him. There Is Only One Place Where He Is Always Welcome- At The Bottom.

For A Hundred Years Or More The World, Our World, Has Been Dying. And Not One Man, In These Last Hundred Years Or So, Has Been Crazy Enough To Put A Bomb Up The Asshole Of Creation And Set It Off. The World Is Rotting Away, Dying Piecemeal. But It Needs The Coup De Grace, It Needs To Be Blown To Smithereens. Not One Of Us Is Intact, And Yet We Have In Us All The Continents And The Seas Between The Continents And The Birds Of The Air. We Are Going To Put It Down ― The Evolution Of This World Which Has Died But Which Has Not Been Buried.

Think Only What Is Right There, What Is Right Under Your Nose To Do. It's Such A Simple Thing - That's Why People Can't Do It.

Life Moves On, Whether We Act As Cowards Or Heroes. Life Has No Other Discipline To Impose, If We Would But Realize It, Than To Accept Life Unquestioningly. Everything We Shut Our Eyes To, Everything We Run Away From, Everything We Deny, Denigrate Or Despise, Serves To Defeat Us In The End. What Seems Nasty, Painful, Evil, Can Become A Source Of Beauty, Joy, And Strength, If Faced With An Open Mind. Every Moment Is A Golden One For Him Who Has The Vision To Recognize It As Such

The History Of The World Is The History Of The Privileged Few.

Music Is The Can-opener Of The Soul.

At The Bottom Of Every Frozen Heart There Is A Drop Or Two Of Love―just Enough To Feed The Birds.

Greece Is The Home Of The Gods; They May Have Died But Their Presence Still Makes Itself Felt. The Gods Were Of Human Proportion: They Were Created Out Of The Human Spirit.

Man, As Man, Has Never Realized Himself. The Greater Part Of Him, His Potential Being, Has Always Been Submerged. What Is History If Not The Endless Story Of His Repeated Failures?

I'm A Bit Retarded, Like Most Americans.

If There Is To Be Any Peace It Will Come Through Being, Not Having.

To The Man Whose Senses Are Alive And Alert There Is Not Even The Need To Stir From One's Threshold.

To Sing You Must First Open Your Mouth. You Must Have A Pair Of Lungs, And A Little Knowledge Of Music. It Is Not Necessary To Have An Accordion, Or A Guitar. The Essential Thing Is To Want To Sing. This Then Is A Song. I Am Singing.

Every Moment Is A Golden One For Him Who Has The Vision To Recognize It As Such.

I Like The One About The Little Soulworms That Fly Out Of The Nest For The Resurrection.

My Understanding Of The Meaning Of A Book Is That The Book Itself Disappears From Sight, That It Is Chewed Alive, Digested And Incorporated Into The System As Flesh And Blood Which In Turn Creates New Spirit And Reshapes The World.

I Have No Money, No Resources, No Hopes. I Am The Happiest Man Alive.

Day By Day. No Yesterdays And No Tomorrows. The Barometer Never Changes, The Flag Is Always At Half-mast.

And For That One Moment Of Freedom You Have To Listen To All That Love Crap... It Drive Me Nuts Sometimes... I Want To Kick Them Out Immediately... I Do Now And Then. But That Doesn't Keep Them Away. They Like It, In Fact. The Less You Notice Them The More They Chase After You. There's Something Perverse About Women... They're All Masochists At Heart.

History Is The Myth, The True Myth, Of Man's Fall Made Manifest In Time.

The Purpose Of Life Is To Remember.

Life, As We All Know, Is Conflict, And Man, Being Part Of Life, Is Himself An Expression Of Conflict. If He Recognizes The Fact And Accepts It, He Is Apt, Despite The Conflict, To Know Peace And To Enjoy It. But To Arrive At This End, Which Is Only A Beginning (for We Haven’t Begun To Live Yet!), A Man Has Got To Learn The Doctrine Of Acceptance, That Is, Of Unconditional Surrender, Which Is Love.

We Should Not Stop To Reflect, Compare, Analyze, Possess, But Flow On And Through, Endlessly, Like Music.

Either You Take In Believing In Miracles Or You Stand Still Like The Hummingbird.

I Didn't Dare To Think Of Anything Then Except The "facts." To Get Beneath The Facts I Would Have Had To Be An Artist, And One Doesn't Become An Artist Overnight. First You Have To Be Crushed, To Have Your Conflicting Points Of View Annihilated. You Have To Be Wiped Out As A Human Being In Order To Be Born Again An Individual. You Have To Be Carbonized And Mineralized In Order To Work Upwards From The Last Common Denominator Of The Self. You Have To Get Beyond Pity In Order To Feel From The Very Roots Of Your Being.

The Essential Thing Is To Want To Sing. This Then Is A Song. I Am Singing.

Every Man Has His Own Destiny: The Only Imperative Is To Follow It, To Accept It, No Matter Where It Leads Him.

Reality Is Not Protected Or Defended By Laws, Proclamations, Ukases, Cannons And Armadas. Reality Is That Which Is Sprouting All The Time Out Of Death And Disintegration.

A Book Is A Part Of Life, A Manifestation Of Life, Just As Much As A Tree Or A Horse Or A Star. It Obeys Its Own Rhythms, Its Own Laws, Whether It Be A Novel, A Play, Or A Diary. The Deep, Hidden Rhythm Of Life Is Always There - That Of The Pulse, The Heart Beat.

I Wanted To Feel The Blood Running Back Into My Veins, Even At The Cost Of Annihilation. I Wanted To Shake The Stone And Light Out Of My System. I Wanted The Dark Fecundity Of Nature, The Deep Well Of The Womb, Silence, Or Else The Lapping Of The Black Waters Of Death. I Wanted To Be That Night Which The Remorseless Eye Illuminated, A Night Diapered With Stars And Trailing Comets. To Be Of Night So Frighteningly Silent, So Utterly Incomprehensible And Eloquent At The Same Time. Never More To Speak Or To Listen Or To Think.

Man Has Demonstrated That He Is Master Of Everything - Except His Own Nature.

I Wanted To Die; I Wanted To Surrender Because I Saw No Sense In Struggling. I Felt That Nothing Would Be Proved, Substantiated, Added Or Subtracted By Continuing An Existence Which I Had Not Asked For.

Los Angeles Gives One The Feeling Of The Future More Strongly Than Any City I Know Of. A Bad Future, Too, Like Something Out Of Fritz Lang's Feeble Imagination.

To Walk In Money Through The Night Crowd, Protected By Money, Lulled By Money, Dulled By Money, The Crowd Itself A Money, The Breath Money, No Least Single Object Anywhere That Is Not Money. Money, Money Everywhere And Still Not Enough! And Then No Money, Or A Little Money, Or Less Money, Or More Money But Money Always Money. And If You Have Money, Or You Don't Have Money, It Is The Money That Counts, And Money Makes Money, But What Makes Money Make Money?

Everything Remains Unsettled Forever, Depend On It

Cluster Together Like Stars!

The Poet Speaks Adequately Only When He Speaks Somewhat Wildly... Not With Intellect Alone, But With Intellect Inebriated By Nectar.

Even If It Doesn't Work, There Is Something Healthy And Invigorating About Direct Action

Life Moves On, Whether We Act As Cowards Or Heroes.

There Is Only One Thing Which Interests Me Vitally Now, And That Is The Recording Of All That Which Is Omitted In Books

Whatever Needs To Be Maintained Through Force Is Doomed.

How Different The New Order Would Be If We Could Consult The Veteran Instead Of The Politician.

There's Nothing Wrong With The World. What's Wrong Is Our Way Of Looking At It.

I Am Living At The Villa Borghese. There Is Not A Crumb Of Dirt Anywhere, Nor A Chair Misplaced. We Are All Alone Here And We Are Dead.

In Every Man's Heart There Is Anchored A Little Schooner.

Every Man, When He Gets Quiet, When He Becomes Desperately Honest With Himself, Is Capable Of Uttering Profound Truths. We All Derive From The Same Source. There Is No Mystery About The Origin Of Things. We Are All Part Of Creation, All Kings, All Poets, All Musicians; We Have Only To Open Up, Only To Discover What Is Already There.

Any Genuine Philosophy Leads To Action And From Action Back Again To Wonder, To The Enduring Fact Of Mystery.

To Paint Is To Love Again, And To Love Is To Live Life To The Fullest.

Why Are We So Full Of Restraint? Why Do We Not Give In All Directions? Is It Fear Of Losing Ourselves? Until We Do Lose Ourselves There Is No Hope Of Finding Ourselves.

When Spring Comes To Paris The Humblest Mortal Alive Must Feel That He Dwells In Paradise.

I Struggled In The Beginning. I Said I Was Going To Write The Truth, So Help Me God. And I Thought I Was. I Found I Couldn't. Nobody Can Write The Absolute Truth.

To Be Joyous Is To Be A Madman In A World Of Sad Ghosts.

My One Thought Is To Get Out Of New York, To Experience Something Genuinely American.

You Make Me Tremendously Happy To Hold Me Undivided - To Let Me Be The Artist, As It Were, And Yet Not Forgo The Man, The Animal, The Hungry, Insatiable Lover. No Woman Has Ever Granted Me All The Privileges I Need - And You, Why You Sing Out So Blithely, So Boldly, With A Laugh Even - Yes, You Invite Me To Go Ahead, Be Myself, Benture Anything. I Adore You For That. That Is Where You Are Truly Regal, A Woman Extraordinary. What A Woman You Are! I Laugh To Myself Now When I Think Of You. I Have No Fear Of Your Femaleness.

Each Man Has His Own Way Of Being Himself And Of Saying It So Ultimately That He Can't Be Denied.

When You Know What Men Are Capable Of You Marvel Neither At Their Sublimity Nor Their Baseness. There Are No Limits In Either Direction Apparently.

When You Come, Please Be So Kind As To Check Your Neuroses And Psychoses At The Gate... Fans And Other Obnoxious Pests Would Do Well To Maintain Silence.

Topographically The Country Is Magnificent - And Terrifying. Why Terrifying? Because Nowhere Else In The World Is The Divorce Between Man And Nature So Complete. Nowhere Have I Encountered Such A Dull, Monotonous Fabric Of Life As Here In America. Here Boredom Reaches Its Peak.

The Stabbing Horror Of Life Is Not Contained In Calamities And Disasters, Because These Things Wake One Up And One Gets Very Familiar And Intimate With Them And Finally They Become Tame Again. No, It Is More Like Being In A Hotel Room In Hoboken Let Us Say, And Just Enough Money In One's Pocket For Another Meal.

To Be Cured, We Must Rise From Our Graves And Throw Off The Cerements Of The Dead. Nobody Can Do It For Another - It Is A Private Affair Which Is Best Done Collectively. We Must Die As Egos And Be Born Again In The Swarm, Not Separated And Self-hypnotized, But Individual And Related.

Everything We Shut Our Eyes To, Everything We Run Away From, Everything We Deny, Denigrate, Or Despise, Serves To Defeat Us In The End.

The American White Man (not To Speak Of The Indian, The Negro, The Mexican) Hasn't A Ghost Of A Chance. If He Has Any Talent He's Doomed To Have It Crushed One Way Or Another. The American Way Is To Seduce A Man By Bribery And Make A Prostitute Of Him. Or Else To Ignore Him, Starve Him Into Submission And Make A Hack Of Him.

The Art Of Living Is Based On Rhythm - On Give & Take, Ebb & Flow, Light & Dark, Life & Death. By Acceptance Of All Aspects Of Life, Good & Bad, Right & Wrong, Yours & Mine, The Static, Defensive Life, Which Is What Most People Are Cursed With, Is Converted Into A Dance, 'the Dance Of Life,' Metamorphosis.

For The Moment I Can Think Of Nothing— Except That I Am A Sentient Being Stabbed By The Miracle Of These Waters That Reflect A Forgotten World.

The One Thing We Can Never Get Enough Of Is Love. And The One Thing We Never Give Enough Is Love.

The Waking Mind, You See, Is The Least Serviceable In The Arts.

I Have Found God, But He Is Insufficient.

You Start Out With The Sublime And You End Up In An Alley Jerking Away For Dear Life.

Once I Thought That To Be Human Was The Highest Aim A Man Could Have, But I See Now That It Was Meant To Destroy Me. To-day I Am Proud To Say That I Am Inhuman, That I Belong Not To Men And Governments, That I Have Nothing To Do With Creeds And Principles. I Have Nothing To Do With The Creaking Machinery Of Humanity - I Belong To The Earth!

The Study Of Crime Begins With The Knowledge Of Oneself. All That You Despise, All That You Loathe, All That You Reject, All That You Condemn And Seek To Convert By Punishment Springs From You.

Confusion Is A Word We Have Invented For An Order Which Is Not Understood.

I Didn't Have To Think Up So Much As A Comma Or A Semicolon; It Was All Given, Straight From The Celestial Recording Room. Weary, I Would Beg For A Break, An Intermission, Time Enough, Let's Say, To Go To The Toilet Or Take A Breath Of Fresh Air On The Balcony. Nothing Doing!

A Man Writes To Throw Off The Poison Which He Has Accumulated Because Of His False Way Of Life. He Is Trying To Recapture His Innocence, Yet All He Succeeds In Doing (by Writing) Is To Inoculate The World With A Virus Of His Disillusionment. No Man Would Set A Word Down On Paper If He Had The Courage To Live Out What He Believed In.

The Teutons Have Been Singing The Swan Song Ever Since They Entered The Ranks Of History. They Have Always Confounded Truth With Death.

I Am Positively Against All This Crap Which Is Carried On First In The Name Of This Thing, Then In The Name Of That. I Believe Only In What Is Active, Immediate, And Personal.

It Is The American Vice, The Democratic Disease Which Expresses Its Tyranny By Reducing Everything Unique To The Level Of The Herd.

When You Travel Often, You Will Be Addicted To It Forever.

Words, Sentences, Ideas, No Matter How Subtle Or Ingenious, The Maddest Flights Of Poetry, The Most Profound Dreams, The Most Hallucinating Visions, Are But Crude Hieroglyphs Chiseled In Pain And Sorrow To Commemorate An Event Which Is Untransmissible.

The Legal System Is Often A Mystery, And We, Its Priests, Preside Over Rituals Baffling To Everyday Citizens.

We Must Get Going. Tomorrow, Tomorrow.

Tomorrow You May Bring About The Destruction Of Your World. Tomorrow You May Sing In Paradise Above The Smoking Ruins Of Your World-cities. But Tonight I Would Like To Think Of One Man, A Lone Individual, A Man Without Name Or Country, A Man Whom I Respect Because He Has Absolutely Nothing In Common With You - Myself. Tonight I Shall Meditate Upon That Which I Am.

Words Are Loneliness.

Civilization Is Drugs, Alcohol, Engines Of War, Prostitution, Machines And Machine Slaves, Low Wages, Bad Food, Bad Taste, Prisons, Reformatories, Lunatic Asylums, Divorce, Perversion, Brutal Sports, Suicides, Infanticide, Cinema, Quackery, Demagogy, Strikes, Lockouts, Revolutions, Putsches, Colonization, Electric Chairs, Guillotines, Sabotage, Floods, Famine, Disease, Gangsters, Money Barons, Horse Racing, Fashion Shows, Poodle Dogs, Chow Dogs, Siamese Cats, Condoms, Peccaries, Syphilis, Gonorrhea, Insanity, Neuroses, Etc., Etc.

Destiny Is What You Are Supposed To Do In Life. Fate Is What Kicks You In The Ass To Make You Do It.

It Is Silly To Go On Pretending That Under The Skin We Are Brothers. The Truth Is More Likely That Under The Skin We Are All Cannibals, Assassins, Traitors, Liars And Hypocrites.

I'm An Egotist, But I'm Not Selfish. There's A Difference. I'm A Neurotic, I Guess. I Can't Stop Thinking About Myself. It Isn't That I Think Myself So Important. I Simply Can't Think About Anything Else, That's All.

Falling In Love

It Is Now The Fall Of My Second Year In Paris. I Was Sent Here For A Reason I Have Not Yet Been Able To Fathom. I Have No Money, No Resources, No Hopes. I Am The Happiest Man Alive. A Year Ago, Six Months Ago, I Thought I Was An Artist. I No Longer Think About It. I Am. There Are No More Books To Be Written, Thank God.

But You Can’t Put Fight Into A Man’s Guts If He Hasn’t Any Fight In Him. There Are Some Of Us So Cowardly That You Can’t Ever Make Heroes Of Us, Not Even If You Frighten Us To Death. We Know Too Much, Maybe. There Are Some Of Us Who Don’t Live In The Moment, Who Live A Little Ahead, Or A Little Behind.

The Cradles Of Civilization Are The Putrid Sinks Of The World.

The Man Who Looks For Security, Even In The Mind, Is Like A Man Who Would Chop Off His Limbs In Order To Have Artificial Ones Which Will Give Him No Pain Or Trouble.

The Cancer Of Time Is Eating Us Away

I Read To Be Taken Out Of Myself, To Become Ecstatic.

Certainly Paradise, Whatever, Wherever It Be, Contains Flaws. (paradisical Flaws, If You Like.) If It Did Not, It Would Be Incapable Of Drawing The Hearts Of Men Or Angels.

As Far As History Goes I Am Dead. If There Is Something Beyond I Shall Have To Bounce Back. I Have Found God, But He Is Insufficient. I Am Only Spiritually Dead. Physically I Am Alive. Morally I Am Free. The World Which I Have Departed Is A Menagerie.

The World Is The Mirror Of Myself Dying.

What Holds The World Together, As I Have Learned From Bitter Experience, Is Sexual Intercourse.

The Real Leader Has No Need To Lead - He Is Content To Point The Way.

Hell Is Probably Quite Similar To Most Paris Bistros ... A Bit Overheated, Somewhat Too Crowded, And A Little Too Noisy For My Tastes. The Waiters Will Surely Treat You Rudely And The Cashiers Will Always Add A Few Extra Francs To Your Bill But ... And This Is The Important Part ... The Food Will Be Marvelous.

Surely Every One Realizes, At Some Point Along The Way, That He Is Capable Of Living A Far Better Life Than The One He Has Chosen.

All Growth Is A Leap In The Dark.

Honest Criticism Means Nothing: What One Wants Is Unrestrained Passion, Fire For Fire.

We Live At The Edge Of The Miraculous.

Once You Have Given Up The Ghost, Everything Follows With Dead Certainty, Even In The Midst Of Chaos.

There Is Something Else To Be Said About This Immediate, Spontaneous Way Of Working, And That Is This: In Such Moments, One Is Playing At The Game Of Creation.

The Earth Is Not A Lair, Neither Is It A Prison. The Earth Is A Paradise, The Only One We'll Ever Know. We Will Realize It The Moment We Open Our Eyes. We Don't Have To Make It A Paradise-it Is One. We Have Only To Make Ourselves Fit To Inhabit It. The Man With The Gun, The Man With Murder In His Heart, Cannot Possibly Recognize Paradise Even When He Is Shown It.

Leave Out The Parts That Readers Tend To Skip.

Keep Your Libraries, Your Penal Institutions, Your Insaneasylums... Give Me Beer.you Think Man Needs Rule, He Needs Beer. The World Does Not Need Morals, It Needs Beer... The Souls Of Men Have Been Fed With Indigestibles, But The Soul Could Make Use Of Beer.

America Is No Place For An Artist: To Be An Artist Is To Be A Moral Leper, An Economic Misfit, A Social Liability. A Corn-fed Hog Enjoys A Better Life Than A Creative Writer, Painter Or Musician. To Be A Rabbit Is Better Still.

Art Teaches Nothing, Except The Significance Of Life.

The World Itself Is Pregnant With Failure, Is The Perfect Manifestation Of Imperfection, Of The Consciousness Of Failure.

All My Good Reading, You Might Say, Was Done In The Toilet.

Real Love Is Never Perplexed, Never Qualifies, Never Rejects, Never Demands. It Replenishes, By Grace Of Restoring Unlimited Circulation. It Burns, Because It Knows The True Meaning Of Sacrifice. It Is Life Illuminated.

Often, When Following The Trail Which Meanders Over The Hills, I Pull Myself Up In An Effort To Encompass The Glory And The Grandeur Which Envelops The Whole Horizon. Often, When The Clouds Pile Up In The North And The Sea Is Churned With White Caps, I Say To Myself: "this Is The California That Men Dreamed Of Years Ago, This Is The Pacific That Balboa Looked Out On From The Peak Of Darien, This Is The Face Of The Earth As The Creator Intended It To Look.

We Have Two American Flags Always: One For The Rich And One For The Poor. When The Rich Fly It Means That Things Are Under Control; When The Poor Fly It Means Danger, Revolution, Anarchy.

People Used To Envy Me My Inspiration. I Hate Inspiration. It Takes You Over Completely. I Could Never Wait Until It Passed And I Got Rid Of It.

Everybody Says Sex Is Obscene. The Only True Obscenity Is War.

I Wanted A Metamorphosis, A Change To Fish, To Leviathan, To Destroyer. I Wanted The Earth To Open Up, To Swallow Everything In One Engulfing Yawn. I Wanted To See The City Buried Fathoms Deep In The Bosom Of The Sea. I Wanted To Sit In A Cave And Read By Candlelight. I Wanted That Eye Extinguished So That I Might Have A Chance To Know My Own Body, My Own Desires. I Wanted To Be Alone For A Thousand Years In Order To Reflect On What I Had Seen And Heard - And In Order To Forget.

Who Hates The Jews More Than The Jew?

If The Poet Can No Longer Speak For Society, But Only For Himself, Then We Are At The Last Ditch.

I Saw Through To The Last Sign And Symbol, But I Could Not Read Her Face. I Could See Only The Eyes Shining Through, Huge, Fleshy-like Luminous Beasts, As Though I Were Swimming Behind Them In The Electric Effluvia Of Her Incandescent Vision.

Whenever A Taboo Is Broken, Something Good Happens, Something Vitalizing. Taboos After All Are Only Hangovers, The Product Of Diseased Minds, You Might Say, Of Fearsome People Who Hadn't The Courage To Live And Who Under The Guise Of Morality And Religion Have Imposed These Things Upon Us.

A World Without Hope, But No Despair

All The Lies And Evasions By Which Man Has Nourished Himself Civilization, In A Word Is The Fruits Of The Creative Artist. It Is The Creative Nature Of Man Which Has Refused To Let Him Lapse Back Into That Unconscious Unity With Life Which Characterizes The Animal World From Which He Made His Escape.

I Used To Think A Bird Couldn't Fly If Its Wings Got Wet.

I Believe That Today More Than Ever A Book Should Be Sought After Even If It Has Only One Great Page In It. We Must Search For Fragments, Splinters, Toenails, Anything That Has Ore In It, Anything That Is Capable Of Resuscitating The Body And The Soul.

And What Is The Potential Man, After All? Is He Not The Sum Of All That Is Human? Divine, In Other Words?

Understanding Is Not A Piercing Of The Mystery, But An Acceptance Of It, A Living Blissfully With It, In It, Through And By It.

A New World Is Not Made Simply By Trying To Forget The Old. A New World Is Made With A New Spirit, With New Values. Our World May Have Begun That Way, But Today It Is Caricature. Our World Is A World Of Things. What We Dread Most, In The Face Of The Impending Debacle, Is That We Shall Be Obliged To Give Up Our Gewgaws, Our Gadgets, All The Little Comforts That Have Made Us So Uncomfortable. We Are Not Peaceful Souls; We Are Smug, Timid, Queasy And Quaky.

There Is No Salvation In Becoming Adapted To A World Which Is Crazy.

For One Crime Which Is Expiated In Prison Ten Thousand Are Committed Thoughtlessly By Those Who Condemn.

You Can Look At Things All Your Life And Not See Them Really. This ‘seeing’ Is, In A Way, A ‘not Seeing,’ If You Follow Me. It Is More Of A Search For Something, In Which, Being Blindfolded, You Develop The Tactile, The Olfactory, The Auditory Senses —and Thus See For The First Time.

Writing, Like Life Itself, Is A Voyage Of Discovery. The Adventure Is A Metaphysical One: It Is A Way Of Approaching Life Indirectly, Of Acquiring A Total Rather Than A Partial View Of The Universe. The Writer Lives Between The Upper And Lower Worlds: He Takes The Path In Order Eventually To Become The Path Himself.

The Ordinary Man Is Involved In Action, The Hero Acts. An Immense Difference.

But It's Just Because The Chances Are All Against You, Just Because There Is So Little Hope, That Life Is Sweet Over Here.

Everyman, When He Gets Quiet, When He Becomes Desperately Honest With Himself, Is Capable Of Uttering Profound Truths.

The Tragedy Of It Is That Nobody Sees The Look Of Desperation On My Face. Thousands And Thousands Of Us, And We're Passing One Another Without A Look Of Recognition.

I Felt Free And Chained At The Same Time - Like One Feels Just Before Election, When All The Crooks Have Been Nominated And You Are Beseeched To Vote For The Right Man.

It's Good To Be Just Plain Happy, It's A Little Better To Know That You're Happy; But To Understand That You're Happy And To Know Why And How And Still Be Happy, Be Happy In The Being And The Knowing, Well That Is Beyond Happiness, That Is Bliss.

I Am A Free Man―and I Need My Freedom. I Need To Be Alone. I Need To Ponder My Shame And My Despair In Seclusion; I Need The Sunshine And The Paving Stones Of The Streets Without Companions, Without Conversation, Face To Face With Myself, With Only The Music Of My Heart For Company. What Do You Want Of Me? When I Have Something To Say, I Put It In Print. When I Have Something To Give, I Give It. Your Prying Curiosity Turns My Stomach! Your Compliments Humiliate Me! Your Tea Poisons Me! I Owe Nothing To Any One. I Would Be Responsible To God Alone―if He Existed!

Everyone Has His Own Reality In Which, If One Is Not Too Cautious, Timid Or Frightened, One Swims. This Is The Only Reality There Is.

The Loss Of Sex Polarity Is Part And Parcel Of The Larger Disintegration, The Reflex Of The Soul's Death, And Coincident With The Disappearance Of Great Men, Great Deeds, Great Causes, Great Wars, Etc.

It's The Pleasure Of Picking Up The Brush And Seeing What Happens.

Even The Idiot May Have A Message For Us

Through Endless Night The Earth Whirls Toward A Creation Unknown.

When I Reflect That The Task Which The Artist Implicitly Sets Himself Is To Overthrow Existing Values, To Make Of The Chaos About Him An Order Which Is His Own, To Sow Strife And Ferment So That By The Emotional Release Those Who Are Dead May Be Restored To Life, Then It Is That I Run With Joy To The Great And Imperfect Ones, Their Confusion Nourishes Me, Their Stuttering Is Like Divine Music To My Ears.

Of Course You Don't Die. Nobody Dies. Death Doesn't Exist. You Only Reach A New Level Of Vision, A New Realm Of Consciousness, A New Unknown World.

Every Man With A Bellyful Of The Classics Is An Enemy To The Human Race.

The Real Enemy Can Always Be Met And Conquered, Or Won Over. Real Antagonism Is Based On Love, A Love Which Has Not Recognized Itself.

Don't Look For Miracles. You Yourself Are The Miracle.

In The Attempt To Defeat Death Man Has Been Inevitably Obliged To Defeat Life, For The Two Are Inextricably Related. Life Moves On To Death, And To Deny One Is To Deny The Other.

The Full And Joyful Acceptance Of The Worst In Oneself May Be The Only Sure Way Of Transforming It.

Example Moves The World More Than Doctrine.

Madness Is Tonic And Invigorating. It Makes The Sane More Sane. The Only Ones Who Are Unable To Profit By It Are The Insane.

I Think Someday You're Going To Be A Great Writer," He Said. "but" He Added Maliciously, "first You'll Have To Suffer A Bit. I Mean Really Suffer, Because You Don't Know What The Word Means Yet. You Only Think You've Suffered. You've Got To Fall In Love First.

Falling In Love

By Choosing To Live Above The Ordinary Level We Create Extraordinary Problems For Ourselves.

I Believe In Saying The Truth, Coming Out With It Cold, Shocking If Necessary, Not Disguising It.

Next To Love Friendship, In My Opinion, Is The Most Valuable Thing Life Has To Offer.

Friendship Love

The Enchanting, And Sometimes Terrifying, Thing Is That The World Can Be So Many Things To So Many Different Souls. That It Can Be, And Is, All These Things At Once And The Same Time.

Everyday We Slaughter Our Finest Impulses. That Is Why We Get A Heartache When We Read The Lines Written By The Hand Of A Master And Recognize Them As Our Own, As The Tender Shoots Which We Stifled Because We Lacked The Faith To Believe In Our Own Powers, Our Own Criterion Of Truth And Beauty. Everyman, When He Gets Quiet, When He Becomes Desperately Honest With Himself, Is Capable Of Uttering Profound Truths.

Example Moves The World More Than Doctrine. The Great Exemplars Are The Poets Of Action, And It Makes Little Difference Whether They Be Forces For Good Or Forces For Evil.

If You Are Well Off And Can Afford To Spend Ten Or Twenty-five Dollars A Day To Hire Some Patient Soul To Listen To Your Troubles You Can Be Readjusted To The Crazy Scheme Of Things And Spare Yourself The Humiliation Of Becoming A Christian Scientist. You Can Have Your Ego Trimmed Or Removed, As You Wish, Just Like A Wart Or Bunion.

I Am Of The Order Whose Purpose Is Not To Teach The World A Lesson But To Explain That School Is Over.

Until We Lose Ourselves There Is No Hope Of Finding Ourselves.

We Are All Guilty Of Crime The Great Crime Of Not Living Life To The Full. But We Are All Potentially Free. We Can Stop Thinking Of What We Have Failed To Do And Do Whatever Lies Within Our Power. What Those Powers That Are In Us May Be No One Has Truly Dared To Imagine. That They Are Infinite We Will Realize The Day We Admit To Ourselves That Imagination Is Everything. Imagination Is The Voice Of Daring.

I Found That What I Had Desired All My Life Was Not To Live - If What Others Are Doing Is Called Living - But To Express Myself.

The World Isn't Kept Running Because It's A Paying Proposition. (god Doesn't Make A Cent On The Deal.) The World Goes On Because A Few Men In Every Generation Believe In It Utterly, Accept It Unquestioningly; They Underwrite It With Their Lives.

I Have Always Looked Upon Decay As Being Just As Wonderful And Rich An Expression Of Life As Growth.

No One Asks You To Throw Mozart Out Of The Window. Keep Mozart. Cherish Him. Keep Moses Too, And Buddha And Lao Tzu And Christ. Keep Them In Your Heart. But Make Room For The Others, The Coming Ones, The Ones Who Are Already Scratching On The Window-panes.

I See Myself Forever And Ever As The Ridiculous Man, The Lonely Soul, The Wanderer, The Restless Frustrated Artist, The Man In Love With Love, Always In Search Of The Absolute, Always Seeking The Unattainable

Your Whole Past Is Like A Long Sleep Which Would Have Been Forgotten Had There Been No Memory, But Remembrance Is There In The Blood And The Blood Is Like An Ocean In Which Everything Is Washed Away But That Which Is New And More Substantial Even Than Life - Reality.

It Is Our Destiny To Live With The Wrong As Well As The Right Kind Of Citizens, And To Learn From Them, The Wrong-minded Ones, As Much Or More As From Others. If We Have Not Yet Succeeded -after How Many Centuries?- In Eliminating From Life The Elements Which Plague Us Perhaps We Need To Question Life More Closely. Perhaps Our Refusal To Face Reality Is The Only Ill We Suffer From, And All The Rest But Illusion And Delusion. (p.26)

Life Is 440 Horsepower In A 2-cylinder Engine.

It Is No Accident That Propels People Like Us To Paris.

The More I Wrote, The More I Became A Human Being. The Writing May Have Seemed Monstrous (to Some) For It Was A Violation, But I Became A More Human Individual Because Of It. I Was Getting The Poison Out Of My System.

That We Cannot Rise Equal To Situations When We Are In Them — That Is The Tragedy Of Life.

Our Own Physical Body Possesses A Wisdom Which We Who Inhabit The Body Lack. We Give It Orders Which Make No Sense.

Let Me Be, Was All I Wanted. Be What I Am, No Matter How I Am.

Do Not Be Duped By Little Duties. Do Not Be A Chore Man All Your Days.

Living Apart And At Peace With Myself,i Came To Realize More Vividly The Meaning Of The Doctrine Of Acceptance. To Refrain From Giving Advice, To Refrain From Meddling In The Affairs Of Others, To Refrain Even Though The Motives Be The Highest, From Tampering With Anothers Way Of Life-so Simple, Yet So Difficult For An Active Spirit. Hands Off.

One Thing Is Certain, That When You Die And Are Resurrected You Belong To The Earth And Whatever Is Of The Earth Is Yours Inalienably. You Become An Anomaly Of Nature, A Being Without Shadow; You Will Never Die Again But Only Pass Away Like The Phenomena About You.

The City Grows Like A Cancer; I Must Grow Like A Sun. The City Eats Deeper And Deeper Into The Red; It Is An Insatiable White Louse Which Must Die Eventually Of Inanition. I Am Going To Starve The White Louse Which Is Eating Me Up. I Am Going To Die As A City In Order To Become Again A Man. Therefore I Close My Ears, My Eyes, My Mouth.

When One Is Trying To Do Something Beyond His Known Powers It Is Useless To Seek The Approval Of Friends. Friends Are At Their Best In Moments Of Defeat.

An Artist Earns The Right To Call Himself A Creator Only When He Admits To Himself That He Is But An Instrument.

We Live In The Mind, In Ideas, In Fragments. We No Longer Drink In The Wild Outer Music Of The Streets - We Remember Only.

Prayers Are Offered Up Daily - Without Charge... Refreshments Are Served When Demanded.

The Poem Is The Dream Made Flesh, In A Two-fold Sense: As Work Of Art, And As Life, Which Is A Work Of Art.

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