Authors:

A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z

Henry Miller Quotes - Page 7

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

Everyday we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read the lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the

Everyday we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read the lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our own criterion of truth and beauty. Everyman, when he gets quiet, when he becomes desperately honest with himself, is capable of uttering profound truths.

Inspirational, Life, Believe

Madness is tonic and invigorating. It makes the sane more sane. The only ones who are unable to profit by it are the insane.

Insane, Literature, Madness

Henry Miller (1961). “The Cosmological Eye”, p.180, New Directions Publishing

We are all guilty of crime the great crime of not living life to the full. But we are all potentially free. We can stop thinking of what we have failed to do and do whatever lies within our power. What those powers that are in us may be no one has truly dared to imagine. That they are infinite we will realize the day we admit to ourselves that imagination is everything. Imagination is the voice of daring.

Lying, Live Life, Thinking

Henry Miller (2007). “Sexus: The Rosy Crucifixion I”, p.341, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

The prisoner is not the one who has commited a crime, but the one who clings to his crime and lives it over and over.

Prison Life, Literature, Crime

Henry Miller (2007). “Sexus: The Rosy Crucifixion I”, p.341, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

The Frenchman is first and foremost a man. He is likeable often just because of his weaknesses, which are always thoroughly human, even if despicable.

Men, Weakness, Firsts

Henry Miller (1941). “The Wisdom of the Heart”, p.50, New Directions Publishing

There is no salvation in becoming adapted to a world which is crazy.

Crazy, World, Becoming

Henry Miller (2010). “The Colossus of Maroussi”, p.41, New Directions Publishing

We must get going. Tomorrow, tomorrow.

Journey, Tomorrow

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

I want to undress you, vulgarize you a bit.

Sex, Want, Bits

Anaïs Nin, Henry Miller (1989). “A Literate Passion: Letters of Anaïs Nin & Henry Miller, 1932-1953”, p.56, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

You make me tremendously happy to hold me undivided - to let me be the artist, as it were, and yet not forgo the man, the animal, the hungry, insatiable lover. No woman has ever granted me all the privileges I need - and you, why you sing out so blithely, so boldly, with a laugh even - yes, you invite me to go ahead, be myself, benture anything. I adore you for that. That is where you are truly regal, a woman extraordinary. What a woman you are! I laugh to myself now when I think of you. I have no fear of your femaleness.

Artist, Animal, Men

Anaïs Nin, Henry Miller (1989). “A Literate Passion: Letters of Anaïs Nin & Henry Miller, 1932-1953”, p.45, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

In the attempt to defeat death man has been inevitably obliged to defeat life, for the two are inextricably related. Life moves on to death, and to deny one is to deny the other.

Death, Moving, Men

Henry Miller (1941). “The Wisdom of the Heart”, p.6, New Directions Publishing

Art is only a means to life, the life more abundant. It merely points the way.

Art, Mean, Way

Henry Miller (1941). “The Wisdom of the Heart”, p.24, New Directions Publishing

For there is only one great adventure and that is inward toward the self, and for that, time nor space nor even deeds matter.

Adventure, Self, Space

Henry Miller (1966). “Tropic of Capricorn”

I have never been able to look upon America as young and vital but rather as prematurely old, as a fruit which rotted before it had a chance to ripen.

America, Looks, Literature

Henry Miller (1970). “The Air-conditioned Nightmare”, p.117, New Directions Publishing

An artist is always alone - if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.

Music, Lonely, Loneliness

Henry Miller (1977). “Tropic of Cancer”

When you can't create you can work

Writing

Henry Miller (1964). “Henry Miller on Writing”, New Directions Publishing

Keep your exclamation points under control!

Exclamation Points, Emotion, Exclamation

We have two American flags always: one for the rich and one for the poor. When the rich fly it means that things are under control; when the poor fly it means danger, revolution, anarchy.

Mean, Two, Society

Henry Miller (1970). “The Air-Conditioned Nightmare”, p.37, New Directions Publishing

Topographically the country is magnificent - and terrifying. Why terrifying? Because nowhere else in the world is the divorce between man and nature so complete. Nowhere have I encountered such a dull, monotonous fabric of life as here in America. Here boredom reaches its peak.

Country, Divorce, Men

Life, as we all know, is conflict, and man, being part of life, is himself an expression of conflict. If he recognizes the fact and accepts it, he is apt, despite the conflict, to know peace and to enjoy it. But to arrive at this end, which is only a beginning (for we haven’t begun to live yet!), a man has got to learn the doctrine of acceptance, that is, of unconditional surrender, which is love.

Acceptance, Men, Expression

Henry Miller (1959). “The Henry Miller Reader”, p.254, New Directions Publishing

The man who is intoxicated with life does not pass judgment, does not seek to come to a conclusion, does not impose his message on the world.

Life Lesson, Men, Doe

Anaïs Nin, Henry Miller (1989). “A Literate Passion: Letters of Anaïs Nin & Henry Miller, 1932-1953”, p.217, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

The concert is a polite form of self induced torture.

Self, Form, Concerts

Life is constantly providing us with new funds, new resources, even when we are reduced to immobility. In life's ledger there is no such thing as frozen assets.

Life, Frozen, Assets

Henry Miller (1959). “The Henry Miller Reader”, p.359, New Directions Publishing

If you can fall in love again and again if you can forgive as well as forget, if you can keep from growing sour, surly, bitter and cynical you've got it half licked.

Falling In Love, Cynical, Forgiving

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

I haven't any allegiance, any responsibilities, any hatreds, any worries, any prejudices, any passion. I'm neither for nor against. I'm a neutral.

Passion, Responsibility, Worry

Henry Miller (1977). “Tropic of Cancer”

I wanted to feel the blood running back into my veins, even at the cost of annihilation. I wanted to shake the stone and light out of my system. I wanted the dark fecundity of nature, the deep well of the womb, silence, or else the lapping of the black waters of death. I wanted to be that night which the remorseless eye illuminated, a night diapered with stars and trailing comets. To be of night so frighteningly silent, so utterly incomprehensible and eloquent at the same time. Never more to speak or to listen or to think.

Running, Stars, Eye

You May Also Like: