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Henry Miller Quotes - Page 11

All Quotes Acceptance Art Beauty Boredom Cancer Change Chaos Christ Consciousness Creation Creativity Crime Criticism Curiosity Death Destiny Dying Earth Eating Effort Ego Evil Falling In Love Fashion Fate Fear Feelings Funny Giving Giving Up Grace Gratitude Growth Happiness Hate Heart History Humanity Imagination Inspiration Inspirational Integrity Joy Life Literature Live Life Love Lying Music Nature Pain Passion Past Peace Perspective Philosophy Progress Purpose Reading Reality Running Silence Sin Singing Soul Spring Struggle Suffering Time Tragedy Travel Understanding Vision Waiting War Water Writing

It is the American vice, the democratic disease which expresses its tyranny by reducing everything unique to the level of the herd.

It is the American vice, the democratic disease which expresses its tyranny by reducing everything unique to the level of the herd.

Unique, Egalitarianism, Vices

Henry Miller (1941). “The Wisdom of the Heart”, p.49, New Directions Publishing

I'm a bit retarded, like most Americans.

Retarded, Bits

Out yonder they may curse, revile, and torture one another, defile all the human instincts, make a shambles of creation (if it were in their power), but here, no, here, it is unthinkable, here there is abiding peace, the peace of God, and the serene security created by a handful of good neighbors living at one with the creature world.

Peace, May, Abiding

Henry Miller (1957). “Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch”, p.404, New Directions Publishing

Music is a beautiful opiate, if you don't take it too seriously.

Music, Beautiful, Opiates

Henry Miller (1945). “The Air-conditioned Nightmare”, [New York] : New directions

I struggled in the beginning. I said I was going to write the truth, so help me God. And I thought I was. I found I couldn't. Nobody can write the absolute truth.

Writing, Helping, God Help Me

I had to learn to think, feel, and see in a totally new fashion, in an uneducated way, in my own way, which is the hardest thing in the world. I had to throw myself into the current, knowing that I would probably sink. The great majority of artists are throwing themselves in with life preservers around their necks, and more often than not it is the life preserver, which sinks them. Nobody can drown in the ocean of reality who voluntarily gives herself up to the experience. Whatever there be of progress in life comes not through adaptation but through daring, through obeying the blind urge.

Fashion, Ocean, Reality

No one asks you to throw Mozart out of the window. Keep Mozart. Cherish him. Keep Moses too, and Buddha and Lao Tzu and Christ. Keep them in your heart. But make room for the others, the coming ones, the ones who are already scratching on the window-panes.

Heart, Window Panes, Innovation

The City of New York is like an enormous citadel, a modern Carcassonne. Walking between the magnificent skyscrapers one feels the presence on the fringe of a howling, raging mob, a mob with empty bellies, a mob unshaven and in rags.

New York, Sky, Cities

A world without hope, but no despair

Despair, World, Without Hope

Henry Miller (1977). “Tropic of Cancer”

We are swimming on the face of time and all else has drowned, is drowning, or will drown.

Swimming, Faces, Drowning

Henry Miller, John Calder (1985). “A Henry Miller reader”, Riverrun Pr

My one thought is to get out of New York, to experience something genuinely American.

New York

Henry Miller (1970). “The Air-Conditioned Nightmare”, p.12, New Directions Publishing

The legal system is often a mystery, and we, its priests, preside over rituals baffling to everyday citizens.

Everyday, Citizens, Legal System

Prayers are offered up daily - without charge... Refreshments are served when demanded.

Prayer, Refreshments

The world is two thirds spaghetti and meatballs, one third syphilitic chancre.

Two, World, Spaghetti

The cradles of civilization are the putrid sinks of the world.

Civilization, World, Cradle

Henry Miller (1977). “Tropic of Cancer”

There is nothing in itself which is wrong or evil not even murder.

Evil, Wickedness, Murder

Were there a Christian so faithful to his God as I was to her we would all be Jesus Christ today.

Christian, Jesus, Faithful

The world itself is pregnant with failure, is the perfect manifestation of imperfection, of the consciousness of failure.

Failure, Perfect, World

Henry Miller (1959). “The Henry Miller Reader”, p.246, New Directions Publishing

Better to separate than never to marry.

Henry Miller (2007). “Plexus: The Rosy Crucifixion II”, p.457, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

We must be holy without holiness. We must be whole, complete. That's being holy. Any other kind of holiness is false, a snare, and a delusion.

Holiness, Kind, Holy

Henry Miller (1963). “The Rosy Crucifixion”

Tomorrow you may bring about the destruction of your world. Tomorrow you may sing in Paradise above the smoking ruins of your world-cities. But tonight I would like to think of one man, a lone individual, a man without name or country, a man whom I respect because he has absolutely nothing in common with you - MYSELF. Tonight I shall meditate upon that which I am.

Country, Men, Thinking

"Black Spring".

In expanding the field of knowledge we but increase the horizon of ignorance.

Witty, Ignorance, Knowledge

Henry Miller (1959). “The Henry Miller Reader”, p.262, New Directions Publishing

Over there you think of nothing but becoming President of the United States some day. Potentially every man is Presidential timber. Here it's different. Here every man is potentially a zero. If you become something or somebody it is an accident, a miracle.

Zero, Men, Thinking

Henry Miller (1977). “Tropic of Cancer”

A book lying idle on a shelf is wasted ammunition. Like money, books must be kept in constant circulation... A book is not only a friend, it makes friends for you. When you have possessed a book with mind and spirit, you are enriched. But when you pass it on you are enriched threefold.

Lying, Book, Mind

Henry Miller (1969). “Mémoires, Plaidoiries Et Documents”, p.23, New Directions Publishing

What is not in the open street is false, derived, that is to say, literature.

Literature, Streets

Henry Miller (2007). “Black Spring”, p.3, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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