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Aldous Huxley

Aldous Huxley Quotes

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Famous Aldous Huxley Quotes

“It is only when it takes the form of physical addiction that sex is evil. It is also evil when it manifests itself as a way of satisfying the lust for power or the climber's craving for position and social distinction.”

WayFormEvilSocialSexPositionAddictionLustDistinctionSatisfyingCravingClimbersLust For Power
Book:Ends and Means: An Inquiry Into the Nature of Ideals and Into the Methods Employed for Their Realization
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“In the days before machinery men and women who wanted to amuse themselves were compelled, in their humble way, to be artists. Now they sit still and permit professionals to entertain them by the aid of machinery. It is difficult to believe that general artistic culture can flourish in this atmosphere of passivity.”

MenWayBelieveStillsWantedArtistCultureDifficultMen And WomenHumbleAidsArtisticAtmospherePermitCompelledMachineryPassivity
Book:Complete Essays: 1930-1935
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“If the men of the Middle Ages... lived in filth and discomfort, it was not for any lack of ability to change their mode of life; it was because they chose to live this way, because filth and discomfort fitted in with their principles and prejudices, political, moral, and religious.... It was in the power of medieval... craftsmen to create armchairs and sofas that might have rivaled in comfort those of today”

IfsMenWayMightAgeTodayPoliticalReligiousAbilityMoralPrinciplesMiddleHe ManComfortPrejudiceMiddle AgesDiscomfortMedievalFilthSofasCraftsmanArmchairsAbility To Change
Author:Aldous Huxley
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“One of the great triumphs of the nineteenth century was to limit the connotation of the word "immoral" in such a way that, for practical purposes, only those were immoral who drank too much or made too copious love. Those who indulged in any or all of the other deadly sins could look down in righteous indignation on the lascivious and the gluttonous.... In the name of all lechers and boozers I most solemnly protest against the invidious distinction made to our prejudice.”

WayLooksMadePurposeNamesSinToo MuchCenturyLimitsPrejudicePracticalsReputationTriumphDistinctionProtestRighteousImmoralDrankNineteenth CenturyIndignationConnotationDeadly SinsRighteous Indignation
Author:Aldous Huxley
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“Asceticism, it is evident, has a double motivation. If men and women torment their bodies, it is not only because they hope in this way to atone for past sins and avoid future punishments; it is also because they long to visit the mind's antipodes and do some visionary sightseeing.”

IfsMenWayMindLongBodyPastMotivationSinMen And WomenPunishmentEvidentTormentVisionariesAsceticismSightseeingAntipodes
Book:Complete Essays: 1956-1963, and supplement, 1920-1948
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“Chronic remorse, as all the moralists are agreed, is a most undesirable sentiment. If you have behaved badly, repent, make what amends you can and address yourself to the task of behaving better next time. On no account brood over your wrongdoing. Rolling in the muck is not the best way of getting clean.”

IfsWayLifeTimeNextForgivenessTasksAccountsGuiltCleanBest WayAddressesRepentanceSentimentsRollingNext TimeRepentRemorseBroodingWrongdoingMoralistUndesirableAmendsBrave New WorldNot GuiltyBrave New World HappinessBrave New World FreedomFeeling GuiltyMaking Amends
Book:The Collected Works of Aldous Huxley: Brave new world
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“Human beings act in a great variety of irrational ways, but all of them seem to be capable, if given a fair chance, of making a reasonable choice in the light of available evidence. Democratic institutions can be made to work only if all concerned do their best to impart knowledge and to encourage rationality. But today, in the world's most powerful democracy, the politicians and the propagandists prefer to make nonsense of democratic procedures by appealing almost exclusively to the ignorance and irrationality of the electors.”

IfsWorldWayHumansMadeLightSeemsTodayActionPoliticalChoicesGivenChanceHuman BeingsPowerfulKnowledgeDemocracySocietyIgnorancePoliticianCapableEvidenceConcernedFairsElectionInstitutionsDemocraticAvailableVarietyAppealsNovelistsReasonableVotingNonsenseMost PowerfulIrrationalRationalityProceduresImpartCivil SocietyIrrationalityFreedom To ChooseChoose WiselyPolitical IdeologyPropagandist
Book:Complete Essays: 1956-1963, and supplement, 1920-1948
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“Katy was neither a Methodist nor a Masochist. She was a goddess and the silence of goddesses is genuinely golden. None of your superficial plating. A solid, twenty-two-carat silence all the way through. The Olympian's trap is kept shut, not by an act of willed discretion, but because there's really nothing to say. Goddesses are all of one piece. There's no internal conflict in them. Whereas the lives of people like you and me are one long argument. Desires on one side, woodpeckers on the other. Never a moment of real silence.”

PeopleWayLongTwoRealMomentsDesireSidesSilencePiecesLike YouConflictArgumentTwentiesGoldenInternalsGoddessTrapsSuperficialDiscretionOne PieceOlympianMethodistsTwenty TwoInternal ConflictWoodpeckers
Author:Aldous Huxley
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“It is because we don't know who we are, because we are unaware that the Kingdom of Heaven is within us, that we behave in the generally silly, the often insane, the sometimes criminal ways that are so characteristically human. We are saved, we are liberated and enlightened, by perceiving the hitherto unperceived good that is already within us, by returning to our eternal ground and remaining where, without knowing it, we have always been.”

KnowsWayHumansSometimesLightHeavenKnowingEternalCriminalsSavedSillyKingdomsInsaneBehaveWho We AreEnlightenedLiberatedKingdom Of Heaven
Book:The Perennial Philosophy: An Interpretation of the Great Mystics, East and West
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“The surest way to work up a crusade in favor of some good cause is to promise people they will have a chance of maltreating someone. To be able to destroy with good conscience, to be able to behave badly and call your bad behavior 'righteous indignation' — this is the height of psychological luxury, the most delicious of moral treats.”

PeopleWayAbleCausesChanceMoralAtheismPromiseBehaviorConscienceTreatsPositive AtheismFavorsPsychologicalLuxuryHeightBehaveRighteousDeliciousIndignationCrusadesGood CausesBad BehaviorRighteous Indignation
Author:Aldous Huxley
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“Our business is to wake up. We have to find ways in which to detect the whole of reality in the one illusory part which our self-centered consciousness permits us to see. We must not live thoughtlessly, taking our illusion for the complete reality, but at the same time we must not live too thoughtfully in the sense of trying to escape from the dream state. We must be continuously on watch for ways in which we may enlarge our consciousness.”

WayTryingMaySelfStatesWholeDreamRealityConsciousnessWatchesIllusionWake UpAwakeningPermitSelf CenteredIllusory
Book:Complete Essays: 1956-1963, and supplement, 1920-1948
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“The poet is born with the capacity of arranging words in such a way that something of the quality of the graces and inspirations he has received can make itself felt to other human beings in the white spaces, so to speak, between the lines of his verse. This is a great and precious gift; but if the poet remains content with his gift, if he persists in worshipping the beauty in art and nature without going on to make himself capable, through selflessness, of apprehending Beauty as it is in the divine Ground, then he is only an idolater.”

IfsWayHumansArtInspirationPoetrySpeakFeltBornLinesHuman BeingsSpaceWhiteQualityGraceDivinePoetCapableCapacityRemainsVersesPersistSelflessnessArrangingPrecious GiftsBetween The LinesWhite Space
Author:Aldous Huxley
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