50 Books to Read Before You Die

words to inspire before you expire

Category: Quite Quotable (Page 11 of 23)

January 11, 2018 /

“‘I possessed nearly 5000 volumes in my library at Rome, but after reading them over many times, I found out that with 150 well-chosen books a man possesses a complete analysis of all human knowledge, or at least all that is either useful or desirable to be acquainted with. I devoted three years of my life to reading and studying these volumes, till I knew them nearly by heart; so that since I have been in prison, a very slight effort of memory has enabled me to recall their contents as readily as though the pages were open before me.'”

—from The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

January 8, 2018 /

“Dantès had exhausted all human resources; and he then turned to God.

All the pious ideas that had been so long forgotten returned; he recollected the prayers his mother had taught him, and discovered a new meaning in every word. For in prosperity prayers seem but a mere assemblage of words until the day when misfortune comes to explain to the unhappy sufferer the sublime language by which he invokes the pity of Heaven! He prayed, and prayed aloud, no longer terrified at the sound of his voice; for he fell into a species of ecstasy. He laid every action of his life before the Almighty, proposed tasks to accomplish, and at the end of every prayer introduced the entreaty oftener addressed to man than to God, ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us.’ Yet in spite of his earnest prayers, Dantès remained a prisoner.”

—from The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

January 1, 2018 /

“And what I now must tell has never been
Reported by a voice, inscribed by ink,
Never conceived by the imagination . . .”

—from Canto XIX of Dante’s Paradiso by Dante Alighieri

December 28, 2017 /

“‘I clearly see . . .
How time is hurrying towards me in order
To deal me such a blow as would be most
Grievous for him who is not set for it;
Thus, it is right to arm myself with foresight,
That if I lose the place most dear, I may
Not lose the rest through what my poems say.'”

—from Canto XVII of Dante’s Paradiso by Dante Alighieri

December 25, 2017 /

[Virgil speaking to Dante]:

“‘My son, there’s no Creator and no creature
Who ever was without love—natural
Or mental; and you know that,’ he began.
‘The natural is always without error,
But mental love may choose an evil object
Or err through too much or too little vigor.
As long as it’s directed toward the First Good
And tends toward secondary goods with measure,
It cannot be the cause of evil pleasure;
But when it twists toward evil, or attends
To good with more or less care than it should,
Those whom He made have worked against their Maker.
From this you see that—of necessity—
Love is the seed in you of every virtue
And of all acts deserving punishment.'”

—from Canto XVII Dante’s Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri

December 18, 2017 /

“Despite the Church’s curse, there is no one
So lost that the eternal love cannot
Return—as long as hope shows something green.”

—from Canto III of Dante’s Purgatorio by Dante Alighieri

December 11, 2017 /

“Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straightforward pathway had been lost.”

—from Canto I of Dante’s Inferno by Dante Alighieri

December 4, 2017 /

“Adversity is like a strong wind. I don’t mean just that it holds us back from places we might otherwise go. It also tears away from us all but the things that cannot be torn, so that afterward we see ourselves as we really are, and not merely as we might like to be.

. . .

Because I’d lived through adversity once before, what I learned about myself was like a reminder of something I’d once known but had nearly forgotten—namely, that beneath the elegant clothing, and the accomplished dancing, and the clever conversation, my life had no complexity at all, but was as simple as a stone falling toward the ground.”

—from Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

November 30, 2017 /

“Grief is a most peculiar thing; we’re so helpless in the face of it. It’s like a window that will simply open of its own accord. The room grows cold, and we can do nothing but shiver. But it opens a little less each time, and a little less; and one day we wonder what has become of it.”

—from Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

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