Simone Weil Quotes - Page 4

Quotes about:

• There is one, and only one, thing in modern society more hideous than crime namely, repressive justice.

  Simone Weil

  Wisdom, Justice, Modern

  Simone Weil (2015). “Selected Essays, 1934-1943: Historical, Political, and Moral Writings”, p.31, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  80 Copy quote

• Beauty captivates the flesh in order to obtain permission to pass right through to the soul. . . . When the feeling for beauty happens to be associated with the sight of some human being, the transference of love is made possible, at any rate in an illusory manner. But it is all the beauty of the world, it is universal beauty, for which we yearn.

  Simone Weil

  Beauty, Love Is, Sight

  30 Copy quote

• The great error of nearly all studies of war, an error into which all socialists have fallen, has been to consider war as an episode in foreign politics when it is especially an act of internal politics and the most atrocious act of all . . . Since the directing apparatus has no other way of fighting the enemy than by sending its own soldiers, under compulsion, to their death-the war of one state against another state resolves itself into a war of the state and the military apparatus against its own people.

  Simone Weil

  Military, War, Fighting

  73 Copy quote

• The beauty of the world is Christ's tender smile for us coming through matter.

  Simone Weil

  Environmental, World, Matter

  Simone Weil (2009). “Waiting on God (Routledge Revivals)”, p.60, Routledge

  24 Copy quote

• Fire destroys that which feeds it.

  Simone Weil

  Fire, Challenges

  Simone Weil (2013). “The Notebooks of Simone Weil”, p.132, Routledge

  12 Copy quote

• The vulnerability of precious things is beautiful because vulnerability is a mark of existence. The destruction of Troy. The fall of the petals from fruit trees in blossom. To know that what is most precious is not rooted in existence - that is beautiful.

  Simone Weil

  Beautiful, Fall, Tree

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.108, Psychology Press

  60 Copy quote

• The extreme greatness of Christianity lies in the fact that it does not seek a supernatural remedy for suffering but a supernatural use for it.

  Simone Weil

  Lying, Greatness, Suffering

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.81, Psychology Press

  13 Copy quote

• A beautiful woman looking at her image in the mirror may very well believe the image is herself. An ugly woman knows it is not.

  Simone Weil

  Beautiful, Believe, Mirrors

  Simone Weil (1973). “Waiting for God”

  8 Copy quote

• Human existence is so fragile a thing and exposed to such dangers that I cannot love without trembling.

  Simone Weil

  Danger, Trembling, Existence

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.13, Psychology Press

  37 Copy quote

• The poet produces the beautiful by fixing his attention on something real.

  Simone Weil

  Beautiful, Real, Work

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.119, Psychology Press

  4 Copy quote

• Modern life is given over to immoderation. Immoderation invades everything: actions and thought, public and private life.

  Simone Weil

  Modern Life, Action, Life Is

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.153, Psychology Press

  5 Copy quote

• The afflicted are not listened to. They are like someone whose tongue has been cut out and who occasionally forgets the fact. When they move their lips no ear perceives any sound. And they themselves soon sink into impotence in the use of language, because of the certainty of not being heard.

  Simone Weil

  Moving, Cutting, Suffering

  Simone Weil (2015). “Selected Essays, 1934-1943: Historical, Political, and Moral Writings”, p.28, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  71 Copy quote

• It is not my business to think about myself. My business is to think about God. It is for God to think about me.

  Simone Weil

  Thinking, Self

  Simone Weil (2009). “Waiting on God (Routledge Revivals)”, p.4, Routledge

  11 Copy quote

• When a contradiction is impossible to resolve except by a lie, then we know that it is really a door.

  Simone Weil

  Lying, Insomnia, Doors

  9 Copy quote

• Never react to an evil in such a way as to augment it.

  Simone Weil

  Evil, Way

  Simone Weil (2015). “First and Last Notebooks: Supernatural Knowledge”, p.5, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  17 Copy quote

• Patriotism is idolatry of the self.

  Simone Weil

  Responsibility, Self, Self Responsibility

  21 Copy quote

• A man thinks he is dying for his country," said Anatole France, "but he is dying for a few industrialists." But even that is saying too much. What one dies for is not even so substantial and tangible as an industrialist.

  Simone Weil

  Country, Thinking, Men

  Simone Weil (1962). “Selected Essays: 1934-1943”, London, Oxford U.P

  45 Copy quote

• The apprehension of necessity is an imitation of creation.

  Simone Weil

  Creation, Imitation, Apprehension

  Simone Weil, Arthur Wills (1956). “The Notebooks of Simone Weil”, p.480, Psychology Press

  7 Copy quote

• To die for God is not a proof of faith in God. To die for an unknown and repulsive convict who is a victim of injustice, that is a proof of faith in God.

  Simone Weil

  Faith In God, Injustice, Victim

  Simone Weil (2015). “First and Last Notebooks: Supernatural Knowledge”, p.144, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  32 Copy quote

• We do injury to a child if we bring it up in a narrow Christianity, which prevents it from ever becoming capable of perceiving that there are treasures of purest gold to be found in non-Christian civilizations. Laical education does an even greater injury to children. It covers up those treasures, and those of Christianity as well.

  Simone Weil

  Christian, Children, Civilization

  Simone Weil (2003). “The Need for Roots: Prelude to a Declaration of Duties Towards Mankind”, p.91, Routledge

  28 Copy quote

• A mind enclosed in language is in prison.

  Simone Weil

  Mind, Language, Prison

  Simone Weil (2015). “Selected Essays, 1934-1943: Historical, Political, and Moral Writings”, p.26, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  15 Copy quote

• To be a hero or a heroine, one must give an order to oneself.

  Simone Weil

  Women, Hero, Order

  24 Copy quote

• All the tragedies which we can imagine return in the end to the one and only tragedy: the passage of time.

  Simone Weil

  Tragedy, Return, Imagine

  Simone Weil (1978). “Lectures on Philosophy”, p.197, Cambridge University Press

  5 Copy quote

• To wish to escape from solitude is cowardice. Friendship is not to be sought, not to be dreamed, not to be desired; it is to be exercised (it is a virtue).

  Simone Weil

  Solitude, Wish, Virtue

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.67, Psychology Press

  9 Copy quote

• Nothing is worse than extreme affliction which destroys the "I" from the outside, because after that we can no longer destroy it ourselves.

  Simone Weil

  Wisdom, Fun, Affliction

  Simone Weil (2002). “Gravity and Grace”, p.26, Psychology Press

  6 Copy quote

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