Consolation Quotes - Page 4

• The ready availability of suicide, like sex and alcohol, is one of life's basic consolations.

  Edward Abbey

  Suicide, Sex, Availability

  Edward Abbey (2015). “A Voice Crying in the Wilderness”, p.24, RosettaBooks

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• There is no greater consolation for mediocrity than that the genius is not immortal.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Genius, Mediocrity, Immortal

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (2015). “Maxims and Reflections”, p.111, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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• Livability has always struck me as a consolation prize.

  Jonathan Raymond

  Consolation Prize, Prize

  "Q&A | Portland author Jon Raymond". Interview with Michael Upchurch, www.seattletimes.com. January 14, 2009.

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• I do not at all believe in human freedom in the philosophical sense... Schopenhauer’s saying, ‘A man can do what he wants, but not will what he wants,’ has been a very real inspiration to me since my youth; it has been a continual consolation in the face of life’s hardships, my own and others’, and an unfailing wellspring of tolerance. This realization mercifully mitigates the easily paralyzing sense of responsibility and prevents us from taking ourselves and other people too seriously; it is conducive to a view of life which, in part, gives humour its due.

  Albert Einstein

  Real, Believe, Philosophical

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• It is a relief to read some true book, wherein all are equally dead,--equally alive. I think the best parts of Shakespeare would only be enhanced by the most thrilling and affecting events. I have found it so. And so much the more, as they are not intended for consolation.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Book, Reading, Thinking

  Henry David Thoreau (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau (Illustrated)”, p.1633, Delphi Classics

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• I don't go to church any more, but I think that Catholicism is rather like the brand they use on cattle: I feel so formed in that Catholic mould that I don't think I could adopt any other form of spirituality. I still get feelings of consolation about churches.

  Rachel Cusk

  Thinking, Catholic, Feelings

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• [N]othing is as surprising as life. Except for writing. Except for writing. Yes, of course, except for writing, the only consolation.

  Orhan Pamuk

  Writing, Surprising, Courses

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• My chief consolation in this year of living dyingly has been the presence of friends.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Years, Chiefs, Has Beens

  Christopher Hitchens (2012). “Mortality”, p.35, Atlantic Books Ltd

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• Self-admiration giveth much consolation.

  Gertrude Atherton

  Healing, Self, Admiration

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• but it is also true, if this brings her any consolation, that if, before every action, we were to begin weighing up the consequences, thinking about them in earnest, first the immediate consequences, then the probably, then the possible, then the imaginable ones, we should never move beyond the point where our first thought brought us to a halt.

  Jose Saramago

  Moving, Thinking, Firsts

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• Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Uplifting, Strong, Atheist

  Christopher Hitchens (2011). “God is Not Great”, p.51, Atlantic Books Ltd

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• There is just this for consolation: an hour here or there, when our lives seem, against all odds and expectations, to burst open and give us everything we've ever imagined , though everyone but children (and perhaps even they) knows these hours will inevitably be followed by others, far darker and more difficult. Still, we cherish the city, the morning, we hope, more than anything, for more. Heaven only knows why we love it so.

  Michael Cunningham

  Morning, Children, Odds

  Michael Cunningham (1998). “The Hours: A Novel”, p.225, Farrar, Straus, and Giroux

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• I've thought many times, 'I can't write this,' but on my own little planet I found the courage to write it because it was true. I put aside fear of Father being angry with me. It's hard though; the world pales in comparison with the stature of a parent. In some small-consolation way, my parents feel I'm helping people by giving them something to identify with. They feel proud in a sort of reverse way. My mom's proud of the fact that lots of kids look up to me.

  Billy Corgan

  Mom, Father, Writing

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• Solitude was my only consolation - deep, dark, deathlike solitude.

  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

  Loneliness, Dark, Solitude

  Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (2009). “Frankenstein: Or the Modern Prometheus”, p.127, The Floating Press

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• And yet, even so, there is a way to find happiness. That is to be curious about all of the interlocking events that add up to our lives. To notice connections. To be amused or perhaps frightened by the ways things work out. If the universe is indifferent, what a consolation that we are not.

  Roger Ebert

  Work Out, Events, Connections

  Roger Ebert (2004). “Roger Ebert's Movie Yearbook 2005”, p.680, Andrews McMeel Publishing

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• When riding my old Harley a ninety per at midnight down the Via Roma in Naples, I kept one consolation firmly in mind: If anything goes wrong, I'll never have time to regret it.

  Edward Abbey

  Regret, Mind, Midnight

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• Integrity and firmness is all I can promise; these, be the voyage long or short, never shall forsake me though I be deserted by all men. For of the consolations which are to be derived from these (under any circumstances) the world cannot deprive me.

  George Washington

  Integrity, Men, Long

  George Washington (1989). “Maxims of George Washington: Political, Military, Social, Moral, and Religious”, Mount Vernon Ladies Assn of the

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• I write what I call 'novels of consolation' for people who are bright and sophisticated.

  Alan Furst

  Writing, People, Sophisticated

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• Sex is one's consolation when love is not enough

  Gabriel Garcia Marquez

  Love, Sex, Enough

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• But resurrection is not just consolation — it is restoration. We get it all back — the love, the loved ones, the goods, the beauties of this life — but in new, unimaginable degrees of glory and joy and strength.

  Timothy Keller

  God, Pain, Joy

  Timothy Keller (2013). “Walking with God through Pain and Suffering”, p.47, Penguin

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• A world in which time is absolute is a world of consolation. For while the movements of people are unpredictable, the movement of time is predictable. While people can be doubted, time cannot be doubted. While people brood, time skips ahead without looking back.

  Alan Lightman

  Time, People, Movement

  Alan Lightman (2011). “Einstein's Dreams”, p.27, Vintage

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• The world's religions, for all their parochialism, did supply a kind of consolation for this great ache. This shattering recognition of our mortality is at the root of far more mental illness than I suspect even psychiatrists are aware.

  Stanley Kubrick

  Depression, Roots, World

  Interview with Eric Nordern, Playboy, September 1968.

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• In old age the consolation of hope is reserved for the tenderness of parents, who commence a new life in their children, the faith of enthusiasts, who sing hallelujahs above the clouds; and the vanity of authors, who presume the immortality of their name and writings.

  Edward Gibbon

  Hope, Children, Writing

  Edward Gibbon (1827). “Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Edward Gibbon, 1”, p.258

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• No scene in sacred history ever gladdens the soul like the scene on Calvary. Nowhere does the soul find such consolation as on that very spot where misery reigned, where woe triumphed, where agony reached its climax.

  Charles Spurgeon

  Easter, Agony, Soul

  Charles H. Spurgeon (2012). “The Spurgeon Series 1857 & 1858: Unabridged Sermons In Modern Language”, p.234, New Leaf Publishing Group

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• Poverty cannot deprive us of many consolations. It cannot rob us of the affection we have for each other, or degrade us in our own opinion, of in that of any person, whose opinion we ought to value.

  Ann Radcliffe

  Inspirational, Poverty, Opinion

  Ann Radcliffe (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ann Radcliffe (Illustrated)”, p.632, Delphi Classics

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