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Existence Quotes

Browse 6829 quotes about Existence.

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Existence Quotes

“Nearly everyone underestimates how powerful the touch of another person's hand can be. The need to be touched is something so primal, so fundamentally a part of our existence as human beings that its true impact upon us can be difficult to put into words. That power doesn't necessarily have anything to do with sex, either. From the time we are infants, we learn to associate the touch of a human hand with safety, with comfort, with love.”

NeedsHumansPersonsHandsSexDifficultHuman BeingsPowerfulExistenceComfortSafetyImpactTouchedAssociatesUnderestimateInfantPrimalHuman Hands
Book:Dead Beat: A Novel of The Dresden Files
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“There is only one inborn erroneous notion ... that we exist in order to be happy ... So long as we persist in this inborn error ... the world seems to us full of contradictions. For at every step, in great things and small, we are bound to experience that the world and life are certainly not arranged for the purpose of maintaining a happy existence ... hence the countenances of almost all elderly persons wear the expression of ... disappointment.”

WorldPersonsLongSeemsPurposeOrderExistenceStepsExpressionErrorsNotionBoundsDisappointmentInsightGreat ThingsContradictionPersistMaintainingElderlyEvery StepCountenanceWorld And Life
Author:Arthur Schopenhauer
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“In a world where God does not exist, any reasonable person must see that the propensity toward selfishness should be the most venerated of all human traits. From this it stands to reason that any man, knowing the total expanse of his existence to be finite, who does not devote every moment of his life to acts of pure selfishness, must be seen as nothing more than a fool.”

MenWorldLifeShouldHumansPersonsDoeReasonMomentsExistenceKnowingFoolPureSelfishnessReasonableTraitsFinitePropensityExpanse
Author:Derek R. Audette
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“A person is not a democrat thanks to his ignorance of literature and the arts, nor an elitist because he or she has cultivated them. The possession of knowledge makes for unjust power over others only if used for that very purpose: a physician or lawyer or clergyman can exploit or humiliate others, or he can be a humanitarian and a benefactor. In any case, it is absurd to conjure up behind anybody who exploits his educated status the existence of an "elite" scheming to oppress the rest of us.”

IfsPersonsArtUsedPurposeLiteratureBehindsExistenceCasesIgnoranceDemocratPossessionHumanitarianLawyerAbsurdEducatedThanksElitesPhysiciansUnjustExploitsElitistHumiliateClergymenBenefactorsPower Over Others
Author:Jacques Barzun
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“When I was a boy, I choked on a piece of candy outside the kitchen window for a few minutes while watching my parents making dinner. I thought I was going to die, but I didn't want to scare them. Our existence was so separate, a dying and a doing well, an outside and an inside. Trey Moody's poems hover in that cold, wet, refrigerator-lit place between the dying and the doing well, the outside and the inside. His poems are the thoughts of the person you love who is always standing behind you, slowly and silently suffocating. But they're not afraid to say hello, and please, and I'm scared.”

WantWellsPersonsDiesParentBehindsExistenceBoysPiecesMinutesDyingColdPleaseStandingWindowScaredDinnerKitchenScareNot AfraidWetHelloCandyLitBehind YouRefrigeratorsMoodySuffocating
Author:Zachary Schomburg
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“It seems that it is impossible to live without discovering the purpose of your life. And the first thing which a person should do is to understand the meaning of life. But the majority of people who consider themselves to be educated are proud that they have reached such great height that they cease to care about the meaning of existence.”

PeopleShouldFirstsPersonsSeemsCarePurposeExistenceImpossibleProudMajorityCeaseEducatedHeightMeaning Of LifeDiscoveringGreat Heights
Author:Leo Tolstoy
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“The offence is what is improperly called the death of an infant, who has ceased to be, before knowing what existence is, a result of a nature not to give the slightest inquietude to the most timid imagination; and which can cause no regrets but to the very person who, through a sentiment of shame and pity, has refused to prolong a life begun under the auspices of misery.”

GivingPersonsCausesImaginationResultsExistenceKnowingRegretShameMiseryPitySentimentsInfantNo RegretsOffence
Book:Theory of Legislation
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“For me, spirituality includes the belief in things larger than ourselves, an appreciation of nature and beauty, a sensitivity to the world, a feeling of shared connection with other living things, a desire to help people less fortunate than ourselves. All of these things can occur with or without God. I do not believe in the existence of God, but I consider myself a spiritual person in the manner I have just described. I call myself a spiritual atheist. I would imagine that many people are spiritual atheists.”

PeopleWorldBelievePersonsHelpingFeelingsSpiritualDesireSpiritualityBeliefExistenceImagineConnectionsAtheistAppreciationFortunateImagine ThatSensitivityLiving ThingsWithout GodExistence Of GodLess FortunateNature And Beauty
Author:Alan Lightman
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“The university is well structured, well tooled, to turn out people with all the sharp edges worn off, the well-rounded person. The university is well equipped to produce that sort of person, and this means that the best among the people who enter must for four years wander aimlessly much of the time questioning why they are on campus at all, doubting whether there is any point in what they are doing, and looking toward a very bleak existence afterward in a game in which all of the rules have been made up, which one cannot really amend.”

PeopleYearsWellsMeanPersonsHas BeensMadeTurnsGamesExistenceDoubtFourProduceUniversityEdgesWanderFour YearsQuestioningWornCampusBleakWell RoundedSharp EdgesQuestioning Why
Author:Mario Savio
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“In reality, a person questioning the existence of the Satanic conspiracy is merely pointing out that the emperor is wearing no clothes. In that case, one can understand why the emperor's tailors get upset and suggest the person doing the pointing is a tool of the devil. Then the question comes down to one of whether the crowd will believe the evidence they have before them, or if they will buy into the tailors' fantasies.”

IfsBelievePersonsRealityExistenceCasesFantasyClothesDevilEvidenceToolsCrowdsUpsetConspiracyQuestioningPointingEmperorSatanicTailors
Author:Michael A. Stackpole
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“Atheists are often charged with blasphemy, but it is a crime they cannot commit... When the Atheist examines, denounces, or satirises the gods, he is not dealing with persons but with ideas. He is incapable of insulting God, for he does not admit the existence of any such being... We attack not a person but a belief, not a binge but an idea, not a fact but a fancy.”

PersonsDoeIdeasFactsBeliefExistenceAtheismCrimeAtheistPositive AtheismCommitFancyIncapableInsultingBlasphemyBinge
Author:George William Foote
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“Plain experience and common sense inform us that no abstract Person can have made us as we are without also wishing to delete us and start over (Gen. 8:21; Zeph. 1:2). Therefore, the existence of cruel and arbitrary nature, together with the universality of human sin, prevents us from beginning the theological enterprise with any concept of God that is distinct from revelation. All theologies of a cosmic harmonic principle shipwreck on the truths of tragedy, catastrophe, and injustice.”

HumansPersonsMadeTogetherWishSinCommonExistencePrinciplesConceptsTragedyInjusticeTheologyCommon SenseAbstractRevelationsEnterpriseCosmicCatastropheArbitraryStarting OverTheologicalShipwreckUniversality
Author:Paul F. M. Zahl
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“A dandy is a clothes-wearing man--a man whose trade, office, and existence consist in the wearing of clothes. Every faculty of his soul, spirit, person and purse is heroically consecrated to this one object--the wearing of clothes, wisely and well; so that, as others dress to live, he lives to dress.”

MenWellsPersonsSoulSpiritExistenceObjectsOfficeClothesDressesTradeFacultyPursesDandy
Book:The Collected Works of Thomas Carlyle
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“Do you realize you can actually listen a person's soul into existence? Your fervent interest in the inner life of those you care for can awaken their dormant powers. The teacher Richard Moss says 'The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention.' Offer this gift.”

LifeGivingPersonsSoulCareInterestRealizingExistenceAttentionTeacherOffersPurityGreatest GiftsInner LifeMossDormantFervent
Book:Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How the Whole World Is Conspiring to Shower You with Blessings
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“Secretly in my heart, I believe food is a doorway to almost every dimension of our existence. ... Food never was just food. From the time a cave person first came out from under a rock, food has been a little bit of everything: who we are spiritually as well as what keeps us alive. It's a gathering place, and in the best of all worlds it's possible that when people of one country sit down to eat another culture's food it will open their minds to the culture itself. Food is a doorway to understanding, and it can be as profound or as facile as you would like it to be.”

PeopleWorldMindFirstsBelieveWellsHeartLittlesPersonsHas BeensCountryCultureI BelieveBitsUnderstandingExistenceAliveRocksFoodMy HeartLittle BitProfoundWho We AreDimensionsCavesGatheringDoorwaysGathering Places
Author:Lynne Rossetto Kasper
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“In proportion to the development of his individuality, each person becomes more valuable to others. There is a greater fullness of life about his own existence, and when there is more life in the units there is more in the mass which is composed of them.”

PersonsIndividualExistenceGreaterDevelopmentMassIndividualityValuableProportionUnitsFullnessFullness Of Life
Book:On Liberty: Representative Government ; The Subjection of Women : Three Essays
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“The most significant change wrought by adolescence is the taming of the ideals by which a person measures himself. . . . Love of oneself becomes love of the species. Conscience is pointed to the future, whispering permission to reach beyond the safety net of our ordinary and finite human existence.”

HumansPersonsExistenceSelf LoveFutureOrdinaryConscienceIdealsSafetySpeciesOneselfSignificantPermissionAdolescenceFiniteHuman ExistenceWhisperingSafety NetTamingSignificant Change
Author:Louise J. Kaplan
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“Whoever considers morality the main objective of human existence, seems to me like a person who defines the purpose of a clock asnot going wrong. The first objective for a clock, is, however, that it does run; not going wrong is an additional regulative function. If not a watch's greatest accomplishment were not going wrong, unwound watches might be the best.”

IfsFirstsHumansPersonsDoeSeemsMightRunningPurposeExistenceWatchesMoralityFunctionPrioritiesObjectivesClockAccomplishmentBeing The BestHuman ExistenceGreatest Accomplishment
Author:Franz Grillparzer
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“New York was a new and strange world. Vast, impersonal, merciless.... Always before I had felt like a person, an individual, hopeful that I could mold my life according to some desire of my own. But here in New York I was ignorant, insignificant, unimportant--one in millions whose destiny concerned no one. New York did not even know of my existence. Nor did it care.”

KnowsWorldPersonsCareDesireIndividualFeltMy OwnExistenceDestinyMillionsNew YorkStrangeConcernedIgnorantHopefulInsignificantMoldUnimportantStrange World
Book:Daughter of Earth
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“Love is about feeling that there is something bigger than just ourselves and our own worries and existence. Whether it is love of another person, of country, of God, of an idea, love is fundamentally an intense devotion to this notion that something is bigger than us. Love is ultimately larger than friendship, comfort, ceremony, knowledge, or joy. Indeed, as the Four Wise Ones once said, it may be all you need.”

NeedsMayPersonsSaidIdeasCountryFeelingsJoyLove IsExistenceWorryWiseFourComfortBiggerNotionDevotionIntenseCeremony
Author:Daniel Levitin
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“From a personal perspective, because I'm on a watchlist and went through years of trying to find out why, of having the government refuse to confirm or deny the very existence of such a list, it's so meaningful to have its existence brought into the open so that the public knows there is a watchlist, and so that the courts can now address the legality of it. I mean, the person who revealed this has done a huge public service and I'm personally thankful.”

KnowsTryingYearsMeanPersonsDoneGovernmentExistenceHugePerspectiveCourtRefuseDenyListsMeaningfulAddressesPublic ServiceThrough The YearsLegality
Author:Laura Poitras
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“Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven skull, and long, magnetic eyes of the true cat-green. Invest him with all the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race, accumulated in one giant intellect, with all the resources of science past and present, with all the resources, if you will, of a wealthy government--which, however, already has denied all knowledge of his existence. Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man.”

IfsMenPersonsLongGovernmentEyePastFacesRaceExistenceImagineResourcesCatGreenIntellectAwfulSatanGiantsWealthyOne ManTallYellowDeniedImagine ThatDrsEasternCunningPerilSkullsBrowsMagneticPast And PresentFeline
Book:Fu Manchu
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“Religion of every kind involves the promise that the misery and futility of existence can be overcome or even transfigured. One might suppose that the possession of such a magnificent formula, combined with the tremendous assurance of a benevolent God, would make a person happy. But such appears not to be the case.: unease and insecurity and rage seem to keep up with blissful certainty, and even to outpace it.”

KindPersonsSeemsMightExistenceCasesPromiseOvercomingMiseryPossessionRageCertaintyInsecurityFormulasMagnificentAssuranceFutilityBenevolent
Author:Christopher Hitchens
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“Even dramatically how you position some person, the depth, the existence [in 3D] is different than a flat image even though by itself it has depth, we create the illusion of depth. For example, some of the shots I have to stay closer to the actor because it's a young actor, I like it closer for some of the shots. I watch 2D scenes next to the camera, then when I go back to my station and watch it in 3D I have to go back and reduce his acting, he has to shrink a little bit because he peeks out more.”

LittlesPersonsDifferentYoungNextActorsBitsActingExistenceWatchesExamplePositionSceneLittle BitIllusionShotsCamerasDepthFlatsStationsShrinksYoung Actors
Author:Ang Lee
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“It was true that there was no such person as Comrade Oglivy, but a few lines of print and a couple of faked photographs would soon bring him into existence... Comrade Oglivy, who had never existed in the present, now existed in the past, and when once the act of forgery was forgotten, he would exist just as authentically, and upon the same evidence, as Charlemagne or Julius Caesar.”

PersonsPastLinesExistenceCoupleEvidencePhotographForgottenPrintComradeJuliusForgery
Author:George Orwell
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