Selma Lagerlof Famous Quotes
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The ways of Providence cannot be reasoned out by the finite mind ... I cannot fathom them, yet seeking to know them is the most satisfying thing in all the world.
He needed so much to weep. All the distrust of life which misfortunes had brought to the little Värmland boy needed tears to wash it away. Distrust that love and joy, beauty and strength blossomed on the earth, distrust in himself, all must go, all did go, for it was Easter; the dead lived and the Spirit of Fasting would never again come into power.
Anyone who has ever sat in a train as it rushes through a dark night will know that sometimes there are long minutes when the coaches slide smoothly along without so much as a shudder.
Nothing on earth can make up for the loss of one who has loved you.
Or if this did not help, one stormy night I would let the fire approach the buckling wooden walls and let it ravage everything, so that people might no longer be enticed to dwell in this home of misfortune. Then no one would be able to enter this doomed place, only the church steeple's black jackdaws would found a colony in the large chimney, rising, blackened and eerie, over the desolate ground.
Yet I would surely be anxious when I saw the flames intertwined over the roof, when thick smoke, reddened by the firelight and interspersed with sparks, poured forth out of the old count's estate. In the crackling and sighing I would think I heard the lament of homeless people; at the blue tips of the flames I would think I saw disturbed phantasms hovering. I would think about how sorrow beautifies, how misfortune adorns, and weep, as if a temple to old gods had been doomed to disintegration.
There is so little that one can do for the dead!
Young horses who cannot bear the whip or spur find life hard. At every smart they start forward and rush to their destruction, and when the way is stony and difficult, they know no better expedient than to overturn the cart and gallop madly away.
Strange, when you ask anyone's advice you see yourself what is right.
Here, no mercy is shown. One hates one's fellow man to the glory of God.
It is a strange thing to come home. While yet on the journey, you cannot at all realize how strange it will be.
There is always a third possibility, as long as you have the ability to find it.
No one is able to enjoy such feast than the one who throws a party in his own mind.
What would have become of me if no one had wanted to read my books? And don't forget all those who have written of me.
It is not a good omen to meet a lot of cats when one sets out on a journey, so the Lieutenant spat three times for each cat, as his mother had taught him to do ...
More die in flight than in battle.
Shouldn't we fear life? Who steers a safe boat? Around us sorrow swells like a heaving ocean; we can see how the hungry waves lick the ship's sides, how they climb to board her. No safe anchorage, no solid ground, no steady ship, as far as the eye can see; only an unknown sky over an ocean full of trouble!
What is so certain of victory as patience?
Never repeat a rumor before you have verified it. And if it is true, hold your tongue all the more.
Have you ever seen a child sitting on its mother's knee listening to fairy stories? As long as the child is told of cruel giants and of the terrible suffering of beautiful princesses, it holds its head up and its eyes open; but if the mother begins to speak of happiness and sunshine, the little one closes its eyes and falls asleep with its head against her breast ... I am a child like that, too. Others may like stories of flowers and sunshine; but I choose the dark nights and sad destinies.
Women can do nothing that has permanence.
Old butterflies should have the sense to die while the summer sun is shining,
If dead things love, if earth and water distinguish friends from enemies, I should like to possess their love. I should like the green earth not to feel my step as a heavy burden. I should like her to forgive that she for my sake is wounded by plough and harrow, and willingly to open for my dead body.
There is so much one would rather not believe until one has seen for oneself whether it is true.
I had become shy of life's bustle in my solitary retreat and was apprehensive at the thought of facing the world.
He who is sorrowful can force himself to smile, but he who is glad cannot weep.
I thought of my father and felt a deep sorrow that he should no longer be alive, and that I could not go to him and tell him that I had been awarded the Nobel Prize. I knew that no one would have been happier than he to hear this.
What Gosta,' he said to himself, 'can you no longer endure? You have been hardened in poverty all of your life; you have heard every tree in the forest, every tuft in the meadows preach to you of sacrifice and patience. You, brought up in a country where the winter is severe, and the summer joy is very short, have you forgotten the art of bearing your trials?
'Oh Gosta, a man must bear all that life gives him with a courageous heart and a smile on his lips, else he is no man. Sorrow as much as you will. If you love your beloved, let your conscience burn and chafe within you, but show yourself a man and a Varmlander. Let your glances beam with joy, and meet your friends with a gay word on your lips! Life and nature are hard. They bring forth courage and joy as a counterweight against their own hardness, or no one could endure them ...
There isn't much that tastes better than praise from those who are wise and capable.
It is often the case with the silent children about us, that they cherish a dream which they dare not talk about.