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With A Secret Smile, Not Unlike That Of A Healthy Child,he Walked Along, Peacefully, Quietly. He Wore His Gown And Walked Along Exactly Like The Other Monks, But His Face And His Step, His Peaceful Downward Glance, His Peaceful Downward-hanging Hand, And Every Finger Of His Hand Spoke Of Peace, Spoke Of Completeness, Sought Nothing, Imitated Nothing, Reflected A Continuous Quiet, An Unfading Light, An Invulnerable Peace.

-Hermann Hesse

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With A Secret Smile,

Hermann Hesse

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With A Secret Smile, Not Unlike That Of A Healthy Child,he Walked Along, Peacefully, Quietly. He Wore His Gown And Walked Along Exactly Like The Other Monks, But His Face And His Step, His Peaceful Downward Glance, His Peaceful Downward-hanging Hand, And Every Finger Of His Hand Spoke Of Peace, Spoke Of Completeness, Sought Nothing, Imitated Nothing, Reflected A Continuous Quiet, An Unfading Light, An Invulnerable Peace.

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They Slept Profoundly, Desperately, Greedily, As Though For The Last Time, As Though They Had Been Condemned To Stay Awake Forever And Had To Drink In All The Sleep In The World During These Last Hours.

Slowly Blossomed, Slowly Ripened In Siddhartha The Realisation, The Knowledge, What Wisdom Actually Was, What The Goal Of His Long Search Was. It Was Nothing But A Readiness Of The Soul, An Ability, A Secret Art, To Think Every Moment, While Living His Life, The Thought Of Oneness, To Be Able To Feel And Inhale The Oneness.

How Foolish To Wear Oneself Out In Vain Longing For Warmth! Solitude Is Independence.

If What Matters In A Person's Existence Is To Accept The Inevitable Consciously, To Taste The Good And Bad To The Full And To Make For Oneself A More Individual, Unaccidental And Inward Destiny Alongside One's External Fate, Then My Life Has Been Neither Empty Nor Worthless.

Only Within Yourself Exists The Other Reality For Which You Long. I Can Give You Nothing That Has Not Already Its Being Within Yourself. I Can Throw Open To You No Picture Gallery But Your Own Soul.

Each Man's Life Represents A Road Toward Himself.

He Has Robbed Me, Yet He Has Given Me Something Of Greater Value . . . He Has Given To Me Myself.

So She Thoroughly Taught Him That One Cannot Take Pleasure Without Giving Pleasure, And That Every Gesture, Every Caress, Every Touch, Every Glance, Every Last Bit Of The Body Has Its Secret, Which Brings Happiness To The Person Who Knows How To Wake It. She Taught Him That After A Celebration Of Love The Lovers Should Not Part Without Admiring Each Other, Without Being Conquered Or Having Conquered, So That Neither Is Bleak Or Glutted Or Has The Bad Feeling Of Being Used Or Misused.

When Dealing With The Insane, The Best Method Is To Pretend To Be Sane.

Alas, Siddhartha, I See You Suffering, But You're Suffering A Pain At Which One Would Like To Laugh, At Which You'll Soon Laugh For Yourself.

Each Man's Life Represents A Road Toward Himself, An Attempt At Such A Road, The Intimation Of A Path... But Each Of Us - Experiments Of The Depths - Strives Toward His Own Destiny. We Can Understand One Another; But Each Of Us Is Able To Interpret Himself To Himself Alone.

Art Is The Contemplation Of The World In A State Of Grace.

Have You Also Learned That Secret From The River; That There Is No Such Thing As Time?" That The River Is Everywhere At The Same Time, At The Source And At The Mouth, At The Waterfall, At The Ferry, At The Current, In The Ocean And In The Mountains, Everywhere And That The Present Only Exists For It, Not The Shadow Of The Past Nor The Shadow Of The Future.

I Am Much Inclined To Live From My Rucksack, And Let My Trousers Fray As They Like.

I Am A Star In The Firmament That Observe The World, Despises The World And Consumed In Its Heat. I Am The Sea By Night In A Storm The Sea Shouting That Accumulates New Sins And To The Ancient Makes Recompense. I Am Exiled From Your World Of Pride Polite, By Pride Defrauded, I Am The King Without Crown. I Am The Passion Without Words Without Stones Of The Hearth, Without Weapons In The War, Is My Same Force That Make Me Sick

Therefore, I See Whatever Exists As Good, Death Is To Me Like Life, Sin Like Holiness, Wisdom Like Foolishness, Everything Has To Be As It Is, Everything Only Requires My Consent, Only My Willingness, My Loving Agreement, To Be Good For Me, To Do Nothing But Work For My Benefit, To Be Unable To Ever Harm Me.

Loneliness Is The Way By Which Destiny Endeavors To Lead Man To Himself.

...haller's Sickness Of The Soul, As I Now Know, Is Not The Eccentricity Of A Single Individual, But The Sickness Of The Times Themselves, The Neurosis Of That Generation To Which Haller Belongs, A Sickness, It Seems, That By No Means Attacks The Weak And Worthless Only But, Rather, Precisely Those Who Are Strongest In Spirit And Richest In Gifts.

During Deep Meditation It Is Possible To Dispel Time, To See Simultaneously All The Past, Present, And Future, And Then Everything Is Good, Everything Is Perfect, Everything Is Brahman.

Those Who Cannot Think Or Take Responsibility For Themselves Need, And Clamor For, A Leader.

But Peace, Too, Is A Living Thing And Like All Life It Must Wax And Wane, Accommodate, Withstand Trials, And Undergo Changes.

I Cannot Tell My Story Without Reaching A Long Way Back.

When Someone Is Seeking, It Happens Quite Easily That He Only Sees The Thing That He Is Seeking; That He Is Unable To Find Anything, Unable To Absorb Anything, Because He Is Only Thinking Of The Thing He Is Seeking, Because He Has A Goal, Because He Is Obsessed With His Goal. Seeking Means: To Have A Goal; But Finding Means: To Be Free, To Be Receptive, To Have No Goal. You, O Worthy One, Are Perhaps Indeed A Seeker, For In Striving Towards Your Goal, You Do Not See Many Things That Are Under Your Nose.

We Create Gods And Struggle With Them, And They Bless Us.

Every Path Leads Homeward, Every Step Is Birth, Every Step Is Death, Every Grave Is Mother.

I Can Think. I Can Wait. I Can Fast.

The Deity Is Within You, Not In Ideas And Books. Truth Is Lived, Not Taught.

The Truth Is Lived, Not Taught.

He Had Loved And He Had Found Himself. Most People Love To Lose Themselves.

I Have Been And Still Am A Seeker, But I Have Ceased To Question Stars And Books; I Have Begun To Listen To The Teaching My Blood Whispers To Me.

Your Soul Is The Whole World.

When Trying To Remember My Share In The Glow Of The Eternal Present, In The Smile Of God, I Return To My Childhood, Too, For That Is Where The Most Significant Discoveries Turn Up.

Faith Is Stronger Than So-called Reality.

A Tree Has Something To Say To Us: Be Still! Be Still! Look At Me!... Home Is Within You, Or Home Is Nowhere At All.

If A Night-moth Were To Concentrate Its Will On Flying To A Star Or Some Equally Unattainable Object, It Wouldn't Succeed. Only, It Wouldn't Even Try In The First Place. A Moth Confines Its Search To What Has Sense And Value For It, What It Needs, What Is Indispensable To Its Life... If I Imagined That I Wanted Under All Circumstances To Get To The North Pole, Then To Achieve It I Would Have To Desire It Strongly Enough That My Whole Being Was Ruled By It. But If I Were To Decide To Will That The Pastor Should Stop Wearing His Glasses, It Would Be Useless. That Would Be Making A Game Of It.

I Am In Truth The Steppenwolf That I Often Call Myself; That Beast Astray That Finds Neither Home Nor Joy Nor Nourishment In A World That Is Strange And Incomprehensible To Him.

It Is Not Our Purpose To Become Each Other; It Is To Recognize Each Other, To Learn To See The Other And Honor Him For What He Is: Each The Other's Opposite And Complement.

She Stood A Moment Before My Eyes, Clearly And Painfully, Loved And Deeply Woven Into My Destiny; Then Fell Away Again In A Deep Oblivion, At A Half Regretted Distance.

For A While I Shall Still Be Leaving, Looking Back At You As You Slip Away Into The Magic Islands Of The Mind. But For A While Now All Are Alive, Believing That In A Single Poignant Hour We Did Say All That We Could Ever Say In A Great Flowing Out Of Radiant Power. It Was Like Seeing And Then Going Blind.

Siddhartha Stopped Fighting His Fate This Very Hour, And He Stopped Suffering.

As A Body Everyone Is Single, As A Soul Never.

Yes, I Am Going Into The Woods; I Am Going Into The Unity Of All Things.

I Do Not Consider Myself Less Ignorant Than Most People. I Have Been And Still Am A Seeker, But I Have Ceased To Question Stars And Books. I Have Begun To Listen To The Teachings My Blood Whispers To Me. My Story Is Not A Pleasant One; It Is Neither Sweet Nor Harmonious, As Invented Stories Are; It Has The Taste Of Nonsense And Chaos, Of Madness And Dreams -- Like The Lives Of All Men Who Stop Deceiving Themselves.

The Opposite Of Every Truth Is Just As True.

All Birth Means Separation From The All, The Confinement Within Limitation, The Separation From God, The Pangs Of Being Born Ever Anew. The Return Into The All, The Dissolution Of Painful Individuation, The Reunion With God Means The Expansion Of The Soul Until It Is Able Once More To Embrace The All.

The Man Of Power Is Ruined By Power, The Man Of Money By Money, The Submissive Man By Subservience, The Pleasure Seeker By Pleasure.

It Is Remarkable, All That Men Can Swallow. For A Good Ten Minutes I Read A Newspaper. I Allowed The Spirit Of An Irresponsible Man Who Chews And Munches Another's Words In His Mouth, And Gives Them Out Again Undigested, To Enter Into Me Through My Eyes.

A Longing To Wander Tears My Heart When I Hear Trees Rustling In The Wind At Evening...

No, I'm Not Religious, I'm Sorry To Say. But I Was Once And Shall Be Again. There Is No Time Now To Be Religious." "no Time. Does It Need Time To Be Religious?" "oh, Yes. To Be Religious You Must Have Time And, Even More, Independence Of Time. You Can't Be Religious In Earnest And At The Same Time Live In Actual Things And Still Take Them Seriously, Time And Money And The Odéon Bar And All That.

To Hold Our Tongues When Everyone Is Gossiping, To Smile Without Hostility At People And Institutions, To Compensate For The Shortage Of Love In The World With More Love In Small, Private Matters; To Be More Faithful In Our Work, To Show Greater Patience, To Forgo The Cheap Revenge Obtainable From Mockery And Criticism: All These Are Things We Can Do.

Sentimentality Is A Basking In Feelings That In Reality You Don't Take Seriously Enough To Make The Slightest Sacrifice To Or Ever Translate Into Action.

And All The Voices, All The Goals, All The Yearnings, All The Sorrows, All The Pleasures, All The Good And Evil, All Of Them Together Was The World. All Of Them Together Was The Stream Of Events, The Music Of Life.

A Game Master Or Teacher Who Was Primarily Concerned With Being Close Enough To The "innermost Meaning" Would Be A Very Bad Teacher. To Be Candid, I Myself, For Example, Have Never In My Life Said A Word To My Pupils About The "meaning" Of Music; If There Is One It Does Not Need My Explanations. On The Other Hand I Have Always Made A Great Point Of Having My Pupils Count Their Eighths And Sixteenths Nicely. Whatever You Become, Teacher, Scholar, Or Musician, Have Respect For The "meaning" But Do Not Imagine That It Can Be Taught.

It Was Still Quiet In The House, And Not A Sound Was Heard From Outside, Either. Were It Not For This Silence, My Reverie Would Probably Have Been Disrupted By Reminders Of Daily Duties, Of Getting Up And Going To School.

As Every Flower Fades And As All Youth Departs, So Life At Every Stage, So Every Virtue, So Our Grasp Of Truth Blooms In Its Day And May Not Last Forever. Since Life May Summon Us At Every Age, Be Ready, Heart, For Parting, New Endeavour, Be Ready Bravely And Without Remorse To Find New Light That Old Ties Cannot Give. In All Beginnings Dwells A Magic Force For Guarding Us And Helping Us To Live.

What Could I Say To You That Would Be Of Value, Except That Perhaps You Seek Too Much, That As A Result Of Your Seeking You Cannot Find.

Everything That Was Not Suffered To The End And Finally Concluded, Recurred, And The Same Sorrows Were Undergone.

When I Have Neither Pleasure Nor Pain And Have Been Breathing For A While The Lukewarm Insipid Air Of These So-called Good And Tolerable Days, I Feel So Bad In My Childish Soul That I Smash My Rusty Lyre Of Thanksgiving In The Face Of The Slumbering God Of Contentment And Would Rather Feel The Most Devilish Pain Burn In Me Than This Warmth Of A Well-heated Room. - Harry Haller

To Nobody Can You Communicate In Words And Teachings, What Happened To You In Your Hour Of Enlightenment.

Nothing Was, Nothing Will Be, Everything Has Reality And Presence

The Day Had Gone By Just As Days Go By. I Had Killed It In Accordance With My Primitive And Retiring Way Of Life.

A Girl Had Bidden Me Eat And Drink And Sleep, And Had Shown Me Friendship And Had Laughed At Me And Had Called Me A Silly Little Boy. And This Wonderful Friend Had Talked To Me Of The Saints And Shown Me That Even When I Had Outdone Myself In Absurdity I Was Not Alone.

Knowledge Can Be Communicated, But Not Wisdom.

For Me, Trees Have Always Been The Most Penetrating Preachers. I Revere Them When They Live In Tribes And Families, In Forests And Groves. And Even More I Revere Them When They Stand Alone. They Are Like Lonely Persons. Not Like Hermits Who Have Stolen Away Out Of Some Weakness, But Like Great, Solitary Men, Like Beethoven And Nietzsche.

You Will Become Tired, Siddhartha." "i Will Become Tired." "you Will Fall Asleep, Siddhartha." "i Will Not Fall Asleep." "you Will Die, Siddhartha." "i Will Die.

To Achieve The Possible, We Must Attempt The Impossible Again And Again.

Again And Again

I Have No Desire To Walk On Water," Said Siddhartha. "let The Old Shamans Satisfy Themselves With Such Skills".

Only The Ideas That We Really Live Have Any Value.

Every Man Is More Than Just Himself; He Also Represents The Unique, The Very Special And Always Significant And Remarkable Point At Which The World's Phenomena Intersect, Only Once In This Way, And Never Again.

It Is A Pity That You Students Aren't Fully Aware Of The Luxury And Abundance In Which You Live.

A Thousand Times I Was Ready To Regret And Take Back My Rash Statement - Yet It Had Been The Truth.

I Have Always Thirsted For Knowledge, I Have Always Been Full Of Questions.

All Higher Humor Begins With Ceasing To Take Oneself Seriously.

Painting Is Marvelous; It Makes You Happier And More Patient. Afterwards You Do Not Have Black Fingers As With Writing, But Blue And Red Ones.

You Can Ride, You Can Travel With A Friend Of Your Own; The Final Step You Must Take Alone. No Wisdom Is Better Than This When Known: That Every Hard Thing Is Done Alone.

The World Was Beautiful When Looked At In This Way-without Any Seeking, So Simple, So Childlike.

When We Are Stricken And Cannot Bear Our Lives Any Longer, Then A Tree Has Something To Say To Us: Be Still! Be Still! Look At Me! Life Is Not Easy, Life Is Not Difficult. Those Are Childish Thoughts. . . . Home Is Neither Here Nor There. Home Is Within You, Or Home Is Nowhere At All.

In Every Truth, The Opposite Is Equally True. For Example, A Truth Can Only Be Expressed And Enveloped In Words If It Is Onesided.

Everyone Can Reach His Goal, If He Can Think, Wait And Fast.

Wisdom Is Not Communicable. The Wisdom Which A Wise Man Tries To Communicate Always Sounds Foolish.

Perhaps People Like Us Cannot Love. Ordinary People Can - That Is Their Secret.

I Have Always Believed, And I Still Believe, That Whatever Good Or Bad Fortune May Come Our Way We Can Always Give It Meaning And Transform It Into Something Of Value.

So You Can't Dance? Not At All? Not Even One Step? How Can You Say That You've Taken Any Trouble To Live When You Won't Even Dance?

Every Important Cultural Gesture Comes Down To A Morality, A Model For Human Behavior Concentrated Into A Gesture.

Fortunately, Like Most Children, I Had Learned What Is Most Valuable, Most Indispensable For Life Before School Years Began, Taught By Apple Trees, By Rain And Sun, River And Woods.

Within Us There Is Someone Who Knows Everything, Wills Everything, Does Everything Better Than We Ourselves.

It Is Good To Taste For Yourself Everything You Need To Know. That Worldly Pleasures And Wealth Are Not Good Things, I Learned Even As A Child. I Knew It For A Long Time, But Only Now Have I Experienced It.

It Was The First Rent In The Holy Image Of My Father, It Was The First Fissure In The Columns That Had Upheld My Childhood, Which Every Individual Must Destroy Before He Can Become Himself.

It Was Morning; Through The High Window I Saw The Pure, Bright Blue Of The Sky As It Hovered Cheerfully Over The Long Roofs Of The Neighboring Houses. It Too Seemed Full Of Joy, As If It Had Special Plans, And Had Put On Its Finest Clothes For The Occasion.

Beauty Does Not Bring Happiness To The One Who Possesses It, But To The One Who Loves And Admires It.

Every Natural Form Is Latent Within Us, Originates In The Soul Whose Essence Is Eternity, Whose Essence We Cannot Know But Which Most Often Intimates Itself To Us As The Power To Love And Create.

Only Within Yourself Exists That Other Reality For Which You Long.

Words Can Not Express The Joy Of New Life.

To Such Men The Desperate And Horrible Thought Has Come That Perhaps The Whole Of Human Life Is But A Bad Joke, A Violent And Ill-fated Abortion Of The Primal Mother, A Savage And Dismal Catastophe Of Nature.

I Believe That The Struggle Against Death, The Unconditional And Self-willed Determination To Live, Is The Mode Of Power Behind The Lives And Activities Of All Outstanding Men.

Gaze Into The Fire, Into The Clouds, And As Soon As The Inner Voices Begin To Speak... Surrender To Them. Don't Ask First Whether It's Permitted, Or Would Please Your Teachers Or Father Or Some God. You Will Ruin Yourself If You Do That.

I Realize Today That Nothing In The World Is More Distasteful To A Man Than To Take The Path That Leads To Himself.

There Is No Reality Except The One Contained Within Us.

The Call Of Death Is A Call Of Love. Death Can Be Sweet If We Answer It In The Affirmative, If We Accept It As One Of The Great Eternal Forms Of Life And Transformation.

A Soul That Is Ruined In The Bud Will Frequently Return To The Springtime Of Its Beginning And Its Promise-filled Childhood, As Though It Could Discover New Hopes There And Retie The Broken Threads Of Life. The Shoots Grow Rapidly And Eagerly, But It Is Only A Sham Life That Will Never Be A Genuine Tree.

Each Man's Life Represents A Road Toward Himself, An Attempt At Such A Road, The Intimation Of A Path. No Man Has Ever Been Entirely And Completely Himself.

The River Is Everywhere At The Same Time . . . Everywhere And The Present Only Exists For It, Not The Shadow Of The Past, Nor The Shadow Of The Future.

It May Be Important To Great Thinkers To Examine The World, To Explain And Despise It. But I Think It Is Only Important To Love The World, Not To Despise It, Not For Us To Hate Each Other, But To Be Able To Regard The World And Ourselves And All Beings With Love, Admiration And Respect.

Faith And Doubt Go Hand In Hand, They Are Complementaries. One Who Never Doubts Will Never Truly Believe.

I Have Had To Experience So Much Stupidity, So Many Vices, So Much Error, So Much Nausea, Disillusionment And Sorrow, Just In Order To Become A Child Again And Begin Anew. I Had To Experience Despair, I Had To Sink To The Greatest Mental Depths, To Thoughts Of Suicide, In Order To Experience Grace.

That Life Is Difficult, I Have Often Bitterly Realized.

Life Is Difficult

One Of The Aphorisms Occurred To Me Now And I Wrote It Under The Picture: "fate And Temperament Are Two Words For One And The Same Concept." That Was Clear To Me Now.

Did All This Make Sense?

When The Suffering Becomes Acute Enough, One Goes Forward.

Among Mathematicians, Even In Those Days, The Reputation Of Being A Good Glass Bead Game Player Meant A Great Deal; It Was Equivalent To Being A Very Good Mathematician.

When A Tree Is Cut Down And Reveals Its Naked Death-wound To The Sun, One Can Read Its Whole History In The Luminous, Inscribed Disk Of Its Trunk: In The Rings Of Its Years, Its Scars, All The Struggle, All The Suffering, All The Sickness, All The Happiness And Prosperity Stand Truly Written, The Narrow Years And The Luxurious Years, The Attacks Withstood, The Storms Endured.

I Shall Begin My Story With An Experience I Had When I Was Ten And Attended Our Small Town's Latin School.

And What Is Called History At School, And All We Learn By Heart There About Heroes And Geniuses And Great Deeds And Fine Emotions, Is All Nothing But A Swindle Invented By The Schoolmasters For Educational Reasons To Keep Children Occupied For A Given Number Of Years. It Has Always Been So And Always Will Be.

Were Not The Gods Forms Created Like Me And You, Mortal, Transient?

A Mere Nothing Suffices — And The Lightning Strikes.

Making Music Together Is The Best Way For Two People To Become Friends.

What Should I Possibly Have To Tell You, Oh Venerable One? Perhaps That You're Searching Far Too Much? That In All That Searching, You Don't Find The Time For Finding?

How Could I Fail To Be A Lone Wolf, And An Uncouth Hermit, As I Did Not Share One Of Its Aims Nor Understand One Of Its Pleasures?

Whoever Wants Music Instead Of Noise, Joy Instead Of Pleasure, Soul Instead Of Gold, Creative Work Instead Of Business, Passion Instead Of Foolery, Finds No Home In This Trivial World Of Ours.

One Cannot Apologize For Something Fundamental, And A Child Feels And Knows This As Well And As Deeply As Any Sage.

I Live In My Dreams — That's What You Sense. Other People Live In Dreams, But Not In Their Own. That's The Difference.

That Is Where My Dearest And Brightest Dreams Have Ranged — To Hear For The Duration Of A Heartbeat The Universe And The Totality Of Life In Its Mysterious, Innate Harmony.

When All The Self Was Conquered And Dead, When All Passions And Desires Were Silent, Then The Last Must Awaken, The Innermost Of Being That Is No Longer Self - The Great Secret!

I Sped Through Heaven And Saw God At Work. I Suffered Holy Pains. I Dropped All My Defenses And Was Afraid Of Nothing In The World. I Accepted All Things And To All Things I Gave Up My Heart.

Everyone Gives What He Has. The Soldier Gives Strength, The Merchant Goods, The Teacher Instruction, The Farmer Rice, The Fisherman Fish.

Good That You Ask. You Should Always Ask, Always Have Doubts.

Madness, In A Higher Sense, Is The Beginning Of All Wisdom

We Have To Stumble Through So Much Dirt And Humbug Before We Reach Home. And We Have No One To Guide Us. Our Only Guide Is Our Homesickness.

I Have Known It For A Long Time But I Have Only Just Experienced It. Now I Know It Not Only With My Intellect, But With My Eyes, With My Heart, With My Stomach.

You Have No Doubt Guessed Long Since That The Conquest Of Time And The Escape From Reality, Or However Else It May Be That You Choose To Describe Your Longing, Means Simply The Wish To Be Relieved Of Your So-called Personality. That Is The Prison Where You Lie.

To Recognize Causes Is To Think, And Through Thought Alone Feelings Become Knowledge And Are Not Lost, But Become Real And Begin To Mature.

But Of All The Water's Secrets, He Saw Today Only A Single One-one That Struck His Soul. He Saw That This Water Flowed And Flowed, It Was Constantly Flowing, And Yet It Was Always There; It Was Always Eternally The Same And Yet New At Every Moment! Oh, To Be Able To Grasp This, To Understand This!

The Cup Was Emptied And Would Never Be Filled Again.

Man Is Not By Any Means Of Fixed And Enduring Form (this, In Spite Of Suspicions To The Contrary On The Part Of Their Wise Men, Was The Ideal Of The Ancients). He Is Nothing Else Than The Narrow And Perilous Bridge Between Nature And Spirit. His Innermost Destiny Drives Him On To The Spirit And To God. His Innermost Longing Draws Him Back To Nature, The Mother. Between The Two Forces His Life Hangs Tremulous And Irresolute.

For Me, Trees Have Always Been The Most Penetrating Preachers. I Revere Them When They Live In Tribes And Families, In Forests And Groves.

If I Know What Love Is, It Is Because Of You.

Eternity Is A Mere Moment, Just Long Enough For A Joke.

All It Has Experienced, Tasted, Suffered: The Course Of Years, Generations Of Animals, Oppression, Recovery, Friendship Of Sun And - Wind Will Pour Forth Each Day In The Song Of Its Rustling Foliage, In The Friendly Gesture Of Its Gently Swaying Crown, In The Delicate Sweet Scent Of Resinous Sap Moistening The Sleep-glued Buds, And The Eternal Game Of Lights And Shadows It Plays With Itself, Content.

There Are Always A Few Such People Who Demand The Utmost Of Life And Yet Cannot Come To Terms With Its Stupidity And Crudeness.

Youth Ends When Egotism Does; Maturity Begins When One Lives For Others.

Live For Others

Every Healthy Person Must Have A Goal In Life And That Life Must Have Content.

I Want To Learn From Myself, Want To Be My Student, Want To Get To Know Myself, The Secret Of Siddhartha.

This Day Will Never Come Again And Anyone Who Fails To Eat And Drink And Taste And Smell It Will Never Have It Offered To Him Again In All Eternity. The Sun Will Never Shine As It Does Today...but You Must Play Your Part And Sing A Song, One Of Your Best.

When We Have Learned How To Listen To Trees, Then The Brevity And The Quickness And The Childlike Hastiness Of Our Thoughts Achieve An Incomparable Joy. Whoever Has Learned How To Listen To Trees No Longer Wants To Be A Tree. He Wants To Be Nothing Except What He Is. That Is Home. That Is Happiness.

Yes, What We Are Doing Is Probably Mad, And Probably It Is Good And Necessary All The Same. It Is Not A Good Thing When Man Overstrains His Reason And Tries To Reduce To Rational Order Matters That Are Susceptible Of Rational Treatment. Then There Arise Ideals Such As Those Of The Americans Or Of The Bolsheviks. Both Are Extraordinarily Rational, And Both Lead To A Frightful Oppression And Impoverishment Of Life, Because They Simplify It So Crudely. The Likeness Of Man, Once A High Ideal, Is In Process Of Becoming A Machine-made Article. It Is For Madmen Like Us, Perhaps, To Ennoble It Again.

I Have Always Been A Great Dreamer; In Dreams I Am More Active Than In My Real Life, And These Shadows Sapped Me Of Health And Energy.

The Judge Who Sits Over The Murderer And Looks Into His Face, And At One Moment Recognizes All The Emotions And Potentialities And Possibilities Of The Murderer In His Own Soul And Hears The Murderer's Voice As His Own, Is At The Next Moment One And Indivisible As The Judge, And Scuttles Back Into The Shell Of His Cultivated Self And Does His Duty And Condemns The Murderer To Death.

Toward Seven O'clock Every Morning, I Leave My Study And Step Out On The Bright Terrace; The Sun Already Burns Resplendent Between The Shadows Of The Fig Tree, Makes The Low Wall Of Coarse Granite Warm To The Touch. Here My Tools Lie Ready And Waiting, Each One An Intimate, An Ally: The Round Basket For Weeds: The Zappetta, The Small Hoe With A Short Haft . . . There's A Rake Here As Well, At At Times A Mattock And Spade, Or Two Watering Cans Filled With Water Warmed By The Sun. With My Basket And Small Hoe In Hand, Facing The Sun, I Go Out For My Morning Walk.

His Life Oscillates, As Everyone's Does, Not Merely Between Two Poles, Such As The Body And The Spirit, The Saint And The Sinner, But Between Thousands And Thousands.

The Way To Innocence, To The Uncreated And To God Leads On, Not Back, Not Back To The Wolf Or To The Child, But Ever Further Into Sin, Ever Deeper Into Human Life.

Every Man Is More Than Just Himself; He Also Represents The Unique, The Very Special And Always Significant And Remarkable Point At Which The World's Phenomena Intersect, Only Once In This Way, And Never Again. That Is Why Every Man's Story Is Important, Eternal, Sacred; That Is Why Every Man, As Long As He Lives And Fulfills The Will Of Nature, Is Wondrous, And Worthy Of Consideration. In Each Individual The Spirit Has Become Flesh, In Each Man The Creation Suffers, Within Each One A Redeemer Is Nailed To The Cross.

I Shall No Longer Be Instructed By The Yoga Veda Or The Aharva Veda, Or The Ascetics, Or Any Other Doctrine Whatsoever. I Shall Learn From Myself, Be A Pupil Of Myself; I Shall Get To Know Myself, The Mystery Of Siddhartha." He Looked Around As If He Were Seeing The World For The First Time.

Life Is Waiting Everywhere, The Future Is Flowering Everywhere, But We Only See A Small Part Of It And Step On Much Of It With Our Feet

Our God's Name Is Abraxas And He Is God And Satan And He Contains Both The Luminous And The Dark World.

You Must Find Your Dream, Then The Way Becomes Easy.

At One Time I Had Given Much Thought To Why Men Were So Very Rarely Capable Of Living For An Ideal. Now I Saw That Many, No, All Men Were Capable Of Dying For One.

Lovers Should Not Separate From Each Other After Making Love Without Admiring Each Other, Without Being Conquered As Well As Conquering, So That No Feeling Of Satiation Or Desolation Arises Nor The Horrid Feeling Of Misusing Or Having Been Misused.

Our Mind Is Capable Of Passing Beyond The Dividing Line We Have Drawn For It. Beyond The Pairs Of Opposites Of Which The World Consists, Other, New Insights Begin.

You Knew All Along That Your Sanctioned World Was Only Half The World, And You Tried To Suppress The Other Half The Same Way The Priests And Teachers Do. You Won't Succeed. No One Succeeds In This Once He Has Begun To Think.

Writing Is Good, Thinking Is Better. Cleverness Is Good, Patience Is Better.

Every Politician In The World Is All For Revolution, Reason, And Disarmament-but Only In Enemy Countries, Not In His Own.

Every Man's Story Is Important, Eternal And Sacred. That Is Why Every Man, As Long As He Lives And Fulfills The Will Of Nature, Is Wondrous And Worthy Of Every Consideration.

Solitude Is Independence.

A Magic Dwells In Each Beginning, Protecting Us, Telling Us How To Live.

You've Never Lived What You Are Thinking, And That Isn't Good. Only The Ideas We Actually Live Are Of Any Value.

I Began To Understand That Suffering And Disappointments And Melancholy Are There Not To Vex Us Or Cheapen Us Or Deprive Us Of Our Dignity But To Mature And Transfigure Us.

Was It Not His Self, His Small, Fearful And Proud Self, With Which He Had Wrestled For So Many Years, But Which Had Always Conquered Him Again, Which Appeared Each Time Again And Again, Which Robbed Him Of Happiness And Filled Him With Fear?

It Was All A Lie, It All Stank, Stank Of Lies, It All Gave The Illusion Of Meaning And Happiness And Beauty, And All Of It Was Just Putrefaction That No One Would Admit To. Bitter Was The Taste Of The World. Life Was A Torment.

I Realize That Some People Will Not Believe That A Child Of Little More Than Ten Years Is Capable Of Having Such Feelings. My Story Is Not Intended For Them. I Am Telling It To Those Who Have A Better Knowledge Of Man. The Adult Who Has Learned To Translate A Part Of His Feelings Into Thoughts Notices The Absence Of These Thoughts In A Child, And Therefore Comes To Believe That The Child Lacks These Experiences, Too. Yet Rarely In My Life Have I Felt And Suffered As Deeply As At That Time.

Despair Is The Result Of Each Earnest Attempt To Go Through Life With Virtue, Justice And Understanding, And To Fulfill Their Requirements. Children Live On One Side Of Despair, The Awakened On The Other Side.

But It's A Poor Fellow Who Can't Take His Pleasure Without Asking Other People's Permission.

Remember This: One Can Be A Strict Logician Or Grammarian And At The Same Time Full Of Imagination And Music.

All This Had Always Been And He Had Never Seen It; He Was Never Present. Now He Was Present And Belonged To It. Through His Eyes He Saw Light And Shadows; Through His Mind He Was Aware Of Moon And Stars.

No Permanence Is Ours, We Are A Wave That Flows To Fit Whatever Form It Finds.

All Men Of Goodwill Have This In Common - That Our Works Put Us To Shame.

... Let Us Recall The Well-known Statement Of A University Professor In The Republic Of The Massagetes: 'not The Faculty But His Excellency The General Can Properly Determine The Sum Of Two And Two.'

University Professors

For Mountain And Stream, Tree And Leaf, Root And Blossom, Every Form In Nature Is Echoed In Us And Originates In The Soul Whose Being Is Eternity And Is Hidden From Us But None The Less Gives Itself To Us For The Most Part In The Power Of Love And Creation.

Most People...are Like A Falling Leaf That Drifts And Turns In The Air, Flutters, And Falls To The Ground. But A Few Others Are Like Stars Which Travel One Defined Path: No Wind Reaches Them, They Have Within Themselves Their Guide And Path.

There Is, So I Believe, In The Essence Of Everything, Something That We Cannot Call Learning. There Is, My Friend, Only A Knowledge - That Is Everywhere.

The Only Reality Is The One We Have Inside Us. What Makes Most People’s Lives So Artificial And Unworthy Is That They Falsely Regard Outside Images As Reality And They Never Allow Their Own Inner World To Speak.

Love Is Like Death. It Is Fulfillment And An Evening After Which Nothing More May Follow.

One Day I Would Be A Better Hand At The Game. One Day I Would Learn How To Laugh. Pablo Was Waiting For Me, And Mozart Too.

All Suicides Have The Responsibility Of Fighting Against The Temptation Of Suicide. Every One Of Them Knows Very Well In Some Corner Of His Soul That Suicide, Though A Way Out, Is Rather A Mean And Shabby One, And That It Is Nobler And Finer To Be Conquered By Life Than To Fall By One's Own Hand.

He Had Thought More Than Other Men, And In Matters Of The Intellect He Had That Calm Objectivity, That Certainty Of Thought And Knowledge, Such As Only Really Intellectual Men Have, Who Have No Axe To Grind, Who Never Wish To Shine, Or To Talk Others Down, Or To Appear Always In The Right.

Whither Will My Path Yet Lead Me? This Path Is Stupid, It Goes In Spirals, Perhaps In Circles, But Whichever Way It Goes, I Will Follow It.

Our Friendship Has No Other Purpose, No Other Reason, Than To Show You How Utterly Unlike Me You Are.

He Was Taught By The River. Incessantly, He Learned From It. Most Of All, He Learned From It To Listen, To Pay Close Attention With A Quiet Heart, With A Waiting, Opened Soul, Without Passion, Without A Wish, Without Judgement, Without An Opinion.

Most Men Will Not Swim Before They Are Able To.' Is Not That Witty? Naturally, They Won't Swim! They Are Born For The Solid Earth, Not For The Water. And Naturally They Won't Think. They Are Made For Life, Not For Thought. Yes, And He Who Thinks, What's More, He Who Makes Thought His Business, He May Go Far In It, But He Has Bartered The Solid Earth For The Water All The Same, And One Day He Will Drown.

Rain Soft Rain, Summer Rain Whispers From Bushes, Whispers From Trees. Oh, How Lovely And Full Of Blessing To Dream And Be Satisfied. I Was So Long In The Outer Brightness, I Am Not Used To This Upheaval: Being At Home In My Own Soul, Never To Be Led Elsewhere. I Want Nothing, I Long For Nothing, I Hum Gently The Sounds Of Childhood, And I Reach Home Astounded In The Warm Beauty Of Dreams. Heart, How Torn You Are, How Blessed To Plow Down Blindly, To Think Nothing, To Know Nothing, Only To Breathe, Only To Feel.

Wisdom Is Nothing But A Preparation Of The Soul, A Capacity, A Secret Art Of Thinking, Feeling And Breathing Thoughts Of Unity At Every Moment Of Life.

Oh, If I Had Had A Friend At This Moment, A Friend In An Attic Room, Dreaming By Candlelight And With A Violin Lying Ready At His Hand! How I Should Have Slipped Up To Him In His Quiet Hour, Noiselessly Climbing The Winding Stair To Take Him By Surprise, And Then With Talk And Music We Should Have Held Heavenly Festival Throughout The Night!

You Are Willing To Die, You Coward, But Not To Live.

The Old Man Slowly Raised Himself From The Piano Stool, Fixed Those Cheerful Blue Eyes Piercingly And At The Same Time With Unimaginable Friendliness Upon Him, And Said: "making Music Together Is The Best Way For Two People To Become Friends. There Is None Easier. That Is A Fine Thing. I Hope You And I Shall Remain Friends. Perhaps You Too Will Learn How To Make Fugues, Joseph.

Meaning And Reality Were Not Hidden Somewhere Behind Things, They Were In Them, In All Of Them.

I Have Begun To Listen To The Teachings My Blood Whispers To Me.

The Best Weapons Against The Infamies Of Life Are Courage, Wilfulness And Patience. Courage Strenthens, Wilfulness Is Fun And Patience Provides Tranquility.

What Isn't Part Of Ourselves Doesn't Disturb Us.

No, A True Seeker, One Who Truly Wished To Find, Could Accept No Doctrine. But The Man Who Has Found What He Sought, Such A Man Could Approve Of Every Doctrine, Each And Every One, Every Path, Every Goal; Nothing Separated Him Any Longer From All Those Thousands Of Others Who Lived In The Eternal, Who Breathed The Divine.

He Saw That The Water Continually Flowed And Flowed And Yet It Was Always There; It Was Always The Same And Yet Every Moment It Was New.

In Fear I Hurried This Way And That. I Had The Taste Of Blood And Chocolate In My Mouth, The One As Hateful As The Other.

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