Marveling Quotes

• As an example of just how useless these philosophers are for any practice in life there is Socrates himself, the one and only wise man, according to the Delphic Oracle. Whenever he tried to do anything in public he had to break off amid general laughter. While he was philosophizing about clouds and ideas, measuring a flea's foot and marveling at a midge's humming, he learned nothing about the affairs of ordinary life.

  Desiderius Erasmus

  Life, Wise, Laughter

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• Man is always marveling at what he has blown apart, never at what the universe has put together, and this is his limitation.

  Loren Eiseley

  Men, Together, Universe

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• We must open our eyes to admire God who hides and at the same time reveals himself in things and introduces us into the realms of mystery... we must be pure and simple like children, capable of admiring, being astonished, of marveling, and being enchanted by the divine gestures of love and closeness we witness.

  Pope John Paul II

  Faith, Children, Inspiration

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• I remember being in Hollywood at the age of 16 and marveling at the stars. The idea of being part of it never entered my mind. It was too far-fetched.

  Bryan Adams

  Stars, Ideas, Mind

  "Bryan Adams Gets a Star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame". Agence France-Presse Article, nationalpost.com. March 23, 2011.

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• The Sage of Toronto... spent several decades marveling at the numerous freedoms created by a "global village" instantly and effortlessly accessible to all. Villages, unlike towns, have always been ruled by conformism, isolation, petty surveillance, boredom and repetitive malicious gossip about the same families. Which is a precise enough description of the global spectacle's present vulgarity.

  Guy Debord

  Gossip, Boredom, Sage

  "Comments on the Society of the Spectacle". Book by Guy Debord, 1988.

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• Too often we argue about Christianity instead of marveling at Jesus.

  John Ortberg

  Christian, Jesus, Arguing

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• I'm sorry," Laila says, marveling at how every Afghan story is marked by death and loss and unimaginable grief. And yet, she sees, people find a way to survive, to go on.

  Khaled Hosseini

  Sorry, Grief, Loss

  Khaled Hosseini (2009). “A Thousand Splendid Suns”, p.249, Bloomsbury Publishing

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• It constantly amazes me that men and women wander the earth marveling at the highest mountains, the deepest ocean, the whitest sands, the most exotic islands, the most intriguing birds of the air and fish of the sea - and all the time never stop to marvel at themselves and realize their infinite potential as human beings.

  Matthew Kelly

  Ocean, Men, Sea

  Matthew Kelly (2015). “The Rhythm of Life: Living Everyday With Passion and Purpose”, p.16, BookBaby

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• As evolutionary time is measured, we have only just turned up and have hardly had time to catch breath, still marveling at our thumbs, still learning to use the brand-new gift of language. Being so young, we can be excused all sorts of folly and can permit ourselves the hope that someday, as a species, we will begin to grow up.

  Lewis Thomas

  Growing Up, Learning, Science

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• She squeezed my hand, and I drew a shaky breath, marveling at the fact that while on an ordinary leave in an ordinary place, I'd somehow fallen in love with an extraordinary girl named Savannaah Lynn Curtis.

  Nicholas Sparks

  Girl, Hands, Ordinary

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• I just thought that a naked pregnant woman checking herself out would be so funny. I actually wish there was more of it. An actually, it was my idea to put it in, because I just remember being pregnant and just marveling at the hugeness of my body, like looking in the mirror from all angles. But that's something you do privately.

  Jennifer Lopez

  Mirrors, Ideas, Wish

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• The hossanas of the multitude can never bring satisfaction to the discerning. Yet there exist those chamaleons of popularity who find their joy, not in the sweet breath of Apollo, but in the smell of the crowd. And not in mind: Do not be taken in by what are miracles to the populace, for the ignorant do not rise above marveling. Thus the stupidity of a crowd is lost in admiration, even as the brain of an individual uncovers the trick.

  Baltasar Gracian

  Sweet, Taken, Smell

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• When we were children, letters were like fun toys. We played with them through our building blocks. We colored them in books. We danced and sang along with TV puppets while learning C was for “cookie.” Soon, letters turned into words. Words turned into sentences. Sentences turned into thoughts. And along the way, we stopped playing with them and stopped marveling at A through Z.

  Ji Lee

  Children, Fun, Block

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• From without, no wonderful effect is wrought within ourselves, unless some interior, responding wonder meets it. That the starry vault shall surcharge the heart with all rapturous marvelings, is only because we ourselves are greater miracles, and superber trophies than all the stars in universal space.

  Herman Melville

  Stars, Heart, Space

  Herman Melville (1852). “Pierre; Or, The Ambiguities”, p.67

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• As someone who has spent many years marveling at the brilliant and painstaking work of the doctors, scientists and researchers at St. Jude, I can attest firsthand to the bone-deep commitment these men and women have made in their fight against disease. They are at it around the clock - every hour of the day, every day of the year.

  Marlo Thomas

  Commitment, Fighting, Doctors

  "What You Don’t Know About Cancer — Hope on the Horizon" by Marlo Thomas, www.huffingtonpost.com. April 23, 2012.

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• Marveling at his own boldness, he said softly, "I would enter your sleep if I could, and guard you there, and slay the thing that hounds you, as I would if it had the courage to face me in fair daylight. But I cannot come in unless you dream of me.

  Peter S. Beagle

  Dream, Sleep, Daylight

  Peter S. Beagle (2003). “A fine and private place: The last unicorn”

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• I calmed myself by walking into my nearby bookstore and marveling at all the books other people had written. So many people had finished and published novels; it couldn’t be so hard, right?

  Heidi Julavits

  Book, People, Novel

  "How To Write Your First Book". Interview with Sandra Allen, www.buzzfeed.com. November 21, 2013.

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• Floating in the void free of gravity I made my way along the side of the ship. I listened to my own breaths. It was so dark and I was so weightless that I had to look for my bubbles to be sure which way was up. I swam backward a little away from the boat and into outer space and waved my arm through the water. Sure enough the phosphorescents appeared trailing my movement like the tail of a shooting star. I let myself tip upside down and floated there watching the gentle snowstorm marveling that a world of such strangeness existed here all the time just under the surface.

  Elisabeth Eaves

  Stars, Dark, Space

  Elisabeth Eaves (2011). “Wanderlust: A Love Affair with Five Continents”, p.208, Seal Press

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• If you will cling to Nature, to the simple in Nature, to the little things that hardly anyone sees, and that can so unexpectedly become big and beyond measuring; if you have this love of inconsiderable things and seek quite simply, as one who serves, to win the confidence of what seems poor: then everything will become easier, more coherent and somehow more conciliatory for you, not in your intellect, perhaps, which lags marveling behind, but in your inmost consciousness, waking and cognizance.

  Rainer Maria Rilke

  Nature, Winning, Simple

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