Jan Potocki · 631 pages
Rating: (2.1K votes)
“Words strike the air and the mind, they act on the senses and on the soul.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“Nature is infinitely rich and diverse in her ways. She can be seen to break her most unchanging laws. She has made self-interest the motive of all human action, but in the great host of men she produces ones who are strangely constituted, in whom selfishness is scarcely perceptible because they do not place their affections in themselves. Some are passionate about the sciences, others about the public good. They are as attached to the discoveries of others as if they themselves had made them, or to the institutions of public welfare and the state as if they derived benefit from them. This habit of not thinking of themselves influences the whole course of their lives. They don't know how to use other men for their profit. Fortune offers them opportunities which they do not think of taking up.
In nearly all men the self is almost never inactive. You will detect their self-interest in nearly all the advice they give you, in the services they do for you, in the contacts they make, in the friendships they form. They are deeply attached to the things which affect their interests however remotely, and are indifferent to all others. When they encounter a man who is indifferent to personal interest they cannot understand him. They suspect him of hidden motives, of affectation, or of insanity. They cast him from their bosom, revile him.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“It is not science which leads to unbelief but rather ignorance. The ignorant man thinks he understands something provided that he sees it every day. The natural philosopher walks amid enigmas, always striving to understand and always half-understanding. He learns to believe what he does not understand, and that is a step on the road to faith.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“Thought assists memory in enabling it to order the material it has assembled. So that in a systematically ordered memory every idea is individually followed by all conclusions it entails.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“I study theology in the works of creation and find in it new reasons for adoring the creator.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“Cuando se ha pasado de los treinta años, aún puede sentirse un intenso afecto y también inspirarlo, pero ¡ay del hombre que a esta edad quiere mezclarse en los juegos de los amores juveniles! Ya no encontramos la alegría en sus labios, la tierna felicidad en sus ojos, la deliciosa sinrazón en su lenguaje. Busca la manera de agradar y ya no posee el instinto fácil que la inspira. Razona el amor. Las más maliciosas y juguetonas desprecian sus lecciones y huyen con raudo vuelo a buscar la compañía de los jóvenes.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“La palabra golpea el aire y el espíritu, y obra sobre los sentidos y sobre el alma.”
― Jan Potocki, quote from The Manuscript Found in Saragossa
“People move on quicker than I can comprehend. People forget you within days, they take new pictures to put on Facebook and they don't read your messages. They keep on moving forward and shove you to the side because you make more mistakes than you should.”
― Alice Oseman, quote from Radio Silence
“Until It’s Gone
“Some people don’t know what they have until it’s gone.”
“But what about the ones who do know? The ones who never took a damn thing for granted? Who tried their hardest to hold on, yet could only look on helplessly while they lost the thing they loved the most.”
“Isn’t it so much worse for them?”
― Lang Leav, quote from The Universe of Us
“If you write science fiction you can spell things the way you like, sometimes.”
― Ursula K. Le Guin, quote from The Birthday of the World and Other Stories
“New steps. That's what it amounted to. The two of them were learning the steps that would bring them together, a dance that would take them into forever. A dance that could be nothing less than God's plan for their lives.”
― Karen Kingsbury, quote from Redemption
“An impractical man--which he not only seems to be, but really is--will always be unreliable and unpredictable in his dealings with others. He will engage in actions that mean something else to him than to others, but he is at peace with himself about everything as long as he can make it all come together in a fine idea.”
― Robert Musil, quote from The Man Without Qualities: Vol. 1
BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.