Robert Musil

"Mathematics is the bold luxury of pure reason, one of the few that remain today."

"In their field they do what we ought to be doing in ours. Therein lies the significant lesson … of their existence. They are an analogy for the intellectual of the future."

"… the restricting of intellectual and spiritual needs to the mania of progress"

"There is nothing more deplorable than those skeptics and reformers, liberal priests and humanistically-oriented scholars, who moan about “soullessness,” “barren materialism,” what is “unsatisfying in …"

"With its claims to profundity, boldness and originality, thinking still limits itself provisionally to the exclusively rational and scientific. … As soon as it lays hold of the feelings, it becomes sp…"

"If someone were to discover, for instance, that under hitherto unobserved circumstances stones were able to speak, it would take only a few pages to describe and explain so earth-shattering a phenomen…"

"His appearance gives no clue to what his profession might be, and yet he doesn't look like a man without a profession either. Consider what he's like: He always knows what to do. He knows how to gaze …"

"If there is a sense of reality, there must also be a sense of possibility. To pass freely through open doors, it is necessary to respect the fact that they have solid frames. This principle, by which …"