"You’ve never seen death? Look in the mirror every day and you will see it like bees working in a glass hive."

Jean Cocteau Literature See all quotes by Jean Cocteau →

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“Art is science made clear.”

“Look out! Be on your guard, because alone of all the arts, music moves all around you.”

“Expect neither reward nor beatitude. Return noble waves for ignoble.”

“Do as the beautiful woman: see to your figure and your petticoats. Though, of course, I am not speaking literally.”

“Poetry is indispensable — if I only knew what for.”

“Such is the role of poetry. It unveils, in the strict sense of the word. It lays bare, under a light which shakes off torpor, the surprising things which surround us and which our senses record mechanically.”

Resonant Thoughts

"You resent death. You regret death. But as for your own life, you know perfectly well that no one can threaten it at all. Death is something that happens to someone else."

— Orson Scott Card

Literature1951–2003

#life

"My attitude toward life was also my attitude toward science. Jesus said one must be born again, must become as a little child. He must let no laziness, no fear, no stubbornness keep him from his duty.…"

— George Washington Carver

Technology1864–1943

#life

"I call it to mind and delight in it now, but I did not notice it at the time. We next to never know when we are well off: but this cuts two ways,--for if we did, we should perhaps know better when we …"

— Samuel Butler (novelist)

Literature1835–1902

#mind

"It requires greater courage to preserve inner freedom, to move on in one's inward journey into new realms, than to stand defiantly for outer freedom. It is often easier to play the martyr, as it is to…"

— Rollo May

Philosophy1909–1994

#freedom