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D. H. Lawrence

D. H. Lawrence Quotes

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Famous D. H. Lawrence Quotes

“It seems to me absolutely true, that our world, which appears to us the surface of all things, is really the bottom of a deep ocean: all our trees are submarine growths, and we are weird, scaly-clad submarine fauna, feeding ourselves on offal like shrimps. Only occasionally the soul rises gasping through the fathomless fathoms under which we live, far up to the surface of the ether, where there is true air.”

WorldSoulSeemsGrowthAirTreeOceanAll ThingsBottomSurfaceOur WorldFeedingFathomSubmarinesShrimpDeep OceanOffal
Book:Delphi Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence (Illustrated)
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“The great crime which the moneyed classes and promoters of industry committed in the palmy Victorian days was the condemning of the workers to ugliness, ugliness, ugliness: meanness and formless and ugly surroundings, ugly ideals, ugly religion, ugly hope, ugly love, ugly clothes, ugly furniture, ugly houses, ugly relationship between workers and employers. The human soul needs actual beauty more than bread.”

NeedsHumansSoulHouseClassCrimeIndustryClothesIdealsWorkersCommittedUglyBreadFurnitureSurroundingsUglinessEmployersHuman SoulMeannessVictorianCondemningPromoters
Book:Phoenix: the Posthumous Papers of D. H. Lawrence by D. H. Lawrence (Illustrated)
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“One must learn to love, and go through a good deal of suffering to get to it, like any knight of the grail, and the journey is always towards the other soul, not away from it. . . . To love you have to learn to understand the other, more than she understands herself, and to submit to her understanding of you. It is damnably difficult and painful, but it is the only thing which endures.”

SoulSufferingDifficultUnderstandingDealsJourneyLove YouEndurePainfulSubmitKnights
Author:D. H. Lawrence
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“This is what I believe: That I am I. That my soul is a dark forest. That my known self will never be more than a little clearing in the forest. That gods, strange gods, come forth from the forest into the clearing of my known self, and then go back. That I must have the courage to let them come and go. That I will never let mankind put anything over me, but that I will try always to recognize and submit to the gods in me and the gods in other men and women. There is my creed.”

MenTryingBelieveLittlesSoulSelfI BelieveDarkKnownMankindStrangeMen And WomenForestsMy SoulSubmitCreedsComes And GoesClearingSelf Will
Author:D. H. Lawrence
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“no form of love is wrong, so long as it is love, and you yourself honour what you are doing. Love has an extraordinary variety of forms! And that is all there is in life, it seems to me. But I grant you, if you deny the variety of love you deny love altogether. If you try to specialize love into one set of accepted feelings, you wound the very soul of love. Love must be multi-form, else it is just tyranny, just death”

IfsTryingLongSoulFeelingsSeemsFormLove IsLove YouExtraordinaryDenyAcceptedWoundsTyrannyVarietyGrantsHonourForms Of Love
Book:Delphi Works of D.H. Lawrence (Illustrated)
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“When the emotional soul receives a wounding shock, the soul seems to recover as the body recovers. But this is only in appearance. Slowly, slowly the wound to the soul begins to make itself felt, like a bruise, which only slowly deepens its terrible ache, till it fills all the psyche. And when we think we have recovered and forgotten, it is then that the terrible after-effects have to be encountered at their worst.”

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Author:D. H. Lawrence
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“Men are free when they are obeying some deep, inward voice of religious belief. Obeying from within. Men are free when they belong to a living, organic, believing community, active in fulfilling some unfulfilled, perhaps unrealized purpose. Not when they are escaping to some wild west. The most unfree souls go west, and shout of freedom.”

MenBelieveSoulPurposeBeliefVoiceCommunityReligiousWestActiveObedienceInwardFulfillingEscapingReligious BeliefObeyingWild WestUnfree
Book:Delphi Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence (Illustrated)
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“There was a warmth of fury in his last phrases. He meant she loved him more than he her. Perhaps he could not love her. Perhaps she had not in herself that which he wanted. It was the deepest motive of her soul, this self-mistrust. It was so deep she dared neither realise nor acknowledge. Perhaps she was deficient. Like an infinitely subtle shame, it kept her always back. If it were so, she would do without him. She would never let herself want him. She would merely see.”

IfsWantSoulSelfWantedLastsShameAcknowledgePhrasesMotiveSubtleRealisingWarmthFuryMistrustWant Him
Book:The Essential D.H. Lawrence
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“I am not a mechanism, an assembly of various sections. and it is not because the mechanism is working wrongly, that I am ill. I am ill because of wounds to the soul, to the deep emotional self, and the wounds to the soul take a long, long time, only time can help and patience, and a certain difficult repentance long difficult repentance, realization of life’s mistake, and the freeing oneself from the endless repetition of the mistake which mankind at large has chosen to sanctify.”

LongSoulSelfHelpingCertainDifficultMistakeMankindEmotionalLong TimeIllOneselfVariousWoundsEndlessChosenRealizationRepentanceMechanismRepetitionSectionsOnly TimeAssemblySanctifyDeep Emotional
Book:Complete Poems by Lawrence: Easyread Super Large 24pt Edition
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“I want relations which are not purely personal, based on purely personal qualities; but relations based upon some unanimous accord in truth or belief, and a harmony of purpose, rather than of personality. I am weary of personality. Let us be easy and impersonal, not forever fingering over our own souls, and the souls of our acquaintances, but trying to create a new life, a new common life, a new complete tree of life from the roots that are within us.”

WantLifeTryingSoulPurposeBeliefEasyCommonQualityForeverRelationshipTreePersonalityRootsRelationHarmonyWearyNew LifeAcquaintanceAccordTree Of LifeCommon LifePersonal Qualities
Author:D. H. Lawrence
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“It seems to me that the chief thing about a woman - who is much of a woman - is that in the long run she is not to be had... She is not to be caught by any of the catch-words, love, beauty, honor, duty, worth, work, salvation - none of them - not in the long run. In the long run she only says Am I satisfied, or is there some beastly dissatisfaction gnawing and gnawing inside me. And if there is some dissatisfaction, it is physical, at least as much as psychic, sex as much as soul.”

IfsLoveLongSoulRunningSexWomenLove IsDutyHonorSalvationCaughtSatisfiedChiefsLong RunsPsychicsDissatisfactionWords LoveBeastly
Author:D. H. Lawrence
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“I am part of the sun as my eye is part of me. That I am part of the earth my feet know perfectly, and my blood is part of the sea. My soul knows that I am part of the human race, my soul is an organic part of the great human race, as my spirit is part of my nation. In my own very self, I am part of my family.”

KnowsHumansSoulSelfEyeEarthSpiritNationsMy OwnRaceFamilySunBloodSeaFeetMy FamilyMy SoulHuman Race
Book:Apocalypse and the Writings on Revelation
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“Go deeper than love, for the soul has greater depths, love is like the grass, but the heart is deep wild rock molten, yet dense and permanent. Go down to your deep old heart, and lose sight of yourself. And lose sight of me, the me whom you turbulently loved. Let us lose sight of ourselves, and break the mirrors. For the fierce curve of our lives is moving again to the depths out of sight, in the deep living heart.”

HeartSoulMovingLife IsLosesLove IsBreakGreaterOur LivesRocksSightMirrorsDepthDeeperPermanentGrassFierceCurvesLove Is LikeDense
Book:Complete Poems by Lawrence: Easyread Edition
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“Let man only approach his own self with a deep respect, even reverence for all that the creative soul, the God-mystery within us, puts forth. Then we shall all be sound and free. Lewdness is hateful because it impairs our integrity and our proud being. The creative, spontaneous soul sends forth its promptings of desire and aspiration in us. These promptings are our true fate, which is our business to fulfill. A fate dictated from outside, from theory or from circumstance, is a false fate.”

PersonsSoulSelfSpiritDesireSoundCreativeFateMysteryTheoryCircumstancesApproachAspirationReverenceSpontaneous
Author:D. H. Lawrence
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