quotations about the soul
The fire that burns in the soul is of the same essential nature as the stars.
GEORG LUKACS
attributed, "Can Poetry Change Your Life?", The New Yorker, July 31, 2017
How absurd it must seem for an immortal soul to be destined for Heaven or Hell, and yet be sitting in a kitchen, as a maid, or to see oneself objectified as a mechanic! how falsely the usual sunrise waked us, the clock dial, the city street the job! How wrongfully people find themselves in these systems--our time isn't there, our space isn't there, our space isn't even here, not even our name is there--the addressee for whom the alarm clock rings is identical to only a few, and the whole social story of waking, and certainly the day of the mechanic, is false.
ERNST BLOCH
Traces
The soul that has conceived one wickedness can nurse no good thereafter.
SOPHOCLES
Philoctetes
Trouble is, most times, when you go looking to sell your soul, nobody's buying.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE
Radiance
The soul ties its shoe; the mind washes its hands in a basin. All is incongruous.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
The soul is the human being considered as having a value in itself.
SIMONE WEIL
Gravity and Grace
The soul is the connecting link between God and man, and between the spirit and the flesh, and has its earthly abode in the blood or life.
VAN BRUNT WYCKOFF
attributed, Day's Collacon
I'm a lost soul. We do wail.
ROGER ZELAZNY
Jack of Shadows
The living soul of man, once conscious of its power, cannot be quelled.
HORACE MANN
Thoughts
Art is a microscope which the artist fixes on the secrets of his soul, and shows to people these secrets which are common to all.
LEO TOLSTOY
Diary
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
"A Psalm of Life"
Negativity is an addiction to the bleak shadow that lingers around every human form ... you can transfigure negativity by turning it toward the light of your soul.
JOHN O'DONOHUE
Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
The wealth of a soul is measured by how much it can feel; its poverty, by how little.
WILLIAM ROUNSEVILLE ALGER
The Solitudes of Nature and of Man: Or, The Loneliness of Human Life
I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam: I looked into the soul of another boy.
WOODY ALLEN
Annie Hall
The eyes ... are the windows of the soul.
PLATO
Phaedrus
No soul that aspires can ever fail to rise; no heart that loves can ever be abandoned. Difficulties exist only that in overcoming them we may grow strong, and only those who have suffered are able to save.
ANNIE BESANT
Some Problems of Life
To sell your soul is the easiest thing in the world. That's what everybody does every hour of his life. If I asked you to keep your soul -- would you understand why that's much harder?
AYN RAND
The Fountainhead
If I were a carpenter, I would build you a window to my soul. But I would leave that window shut and locked, so that every time you tried to look through it all you would see is your own reflection. You would see that my soul is a reflection of you.
COLLEEN HOOVER
Point of Retreat
If you have the soul of a warrior, you are a warrior.
CASSANDRA CLARE
Clockwork Angel
What use do I put my soul to? It is a serviceable question this, and should frequently be put to oneself. How does my ruling part stand affected? And whose soul have I now? That of a child, or a young man, or a feeble woman, or of a tyrant, of cattle or wild beasts.
MARCUS AURELIUS
Meditations