The Alchemist Quotes

The Alchemist' is the modern bible. ~ Carla Golian

Like my heart and like my soul, it continues to live every day, because my heart and soul are in it. And my heart and soul is your heart and soul. I am Santiago the shepherd boy in search of my treasure, just as you are Santiago the shepherd boy in search of your own. The story of one person is the story of everyone, and one man's quest is the quest of all of humanity, which is why I believe The Alchemist continues all these years later to resonate with people from different cultures all around the world, touching them emotionally and spiritually, equally, without prejudice. ~ Paulo Coelho

All that mattered was that he was Adrian, my Adrian. My match. My partner in crime, in the long battle I'd just signed on for to right the wrongs in the Alchemist and Moroi worlds. Maybe Marcus was right that I'd also signed myself up for disaster, but I didn't care. In that moment, it seemed that as long as Adrian and I were together, there was no challenge too great for us. ~ Richelle Mead

The alchemist saw the union of opposites under the symbol of the tree, and it is therefore not surprising that the unconscious of present-day man, who no longer feels at home in his world and can base his existence neither on the past that is no more nor on the future that is yet to be, should hark back to the symbol of the cosmic tree rooted in this world and growing up to heaven - the tree that is also man. In the history of symbols this tree is described as the way of life itself, a growing into that which eternally is and does not change; which springs from the union of opposites and, by its eternal presence, also makes that union possible. It seems as if it were only through an experience of symbolic reality that man, vainly seeking his own "existence" and making a philosophy out of it, can find his way back to a world in which he is no longer a stranger. ~ C. G. Jung

A scientist must be a traveller, an explorer. Knowledge comes from experience. ... The path to enlightenment is never linear. ~ Joanne Owen

I hold the view that the alchemist's hope of conjuring out of matter the philosophical gold, or the panacea, or the wonderful stone, was only in part an illusion, an effect of projection; for the rest it corresponded to certain psychic facts that are of great importance in the psychology of the unconscious. As is shown by the texts and their symbolism, the alchemist projected what I have called the process of individuation into the phenomena of chemical change. ~ Carl Jung

Fatima is a woman of the desert," said the alchemist. "She knows that men have to go away in order to return. And she already has her treasure: it's you. Now she expects that you will find what it is you're looking for. ~ Paulo Coelho

Like the alchemist of old, for ever searching for the philosopher's stone, the analyst to-day never stops looking for stronger moves to prevent the defender from establishing equality. ~ Savielly Tartakower

Don't think about what you've left behind" The alchemist said to the boy as they began to ride across the sands of the desert. "If what one finds is made of pure matter, it will never spoil. And one can always come back. If what you had found was only a moment of light, like the explosion of a star, you would find nothing on your return. ~ Paulo Coelho

Someone gave me a copy of The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, a fable about a shepherd boy who travels to the Pyramids in search of treasure when all the time it's at home. I loved that book and read it over and over again. 'When you want something all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it,' it says. I don't think that Paulo Coelho had come across the Taliban or our useless politicians. ~ Malala Yousafzai

I must have no fear of failure. It was my fear of failure that first kept me from attempting the Master Work. ~ Paulo Coelho

The true meaning of our philosophy will be unintelligible to the arrogant, the boastful and the mocking. Beware of those who exhibit such traits. ~ Joanne Owen

The Magus,the sorcerer, the alchemist, are seized with the fascination of the unknown; and they desire a greatness that is inaccessible to mankind. ~ W. Somerset Maugham

But history has been adapted here, re-spun to tell Jan's tale: the story of a boy caught up in a world of change and opportunity, trickery and wonder. A story inspired by a city and its legends. ~ Joanne Owen

Most people see the world as a threatening place, and, because they do, the world turns out, indeed, to be a threatening place. ~ Paulo Coelho

Eggs possess an elemental power. Their outer shell is earth. Their white is water. The membrane that lines the shell is air, and the yolk at the core is fire. The core of the egg preserves life and being, and therefore represents heaven and earth, while the white represents chaos. ~ Joanne Owen

Curiosity breeds discovery. ~ Joanne Owen

In the world of physics we watch a shadowgraph performance of the drama of familiar life. The shadow of my elbow rests on the shadow table as the shadow ink flows over the shadow paper. It is all symbolic, and as a symbol the physicist leaves it. Then comes the alchemist Mind who transmutes the symbols. The sparsely spread nuclei of electric force become a tangible solid; their restless agitation becomes the warmth of summer; the octave of aethereal vibrations becomes a gorgeous rainbow. Nor does the alchemy stop here. In the transmuted world new significances arise which are scarcely to be traced in the world of symbols; so that it becomes a world of beauty and purpose - and, alas, suffering and evil. ~ Arthur Stanley Eddington

The real mystery does not behave mysteriously or secretively; it speaks a secret language, it adumbrates itself by a variety of images which all indicate its true nature. I am not speaking of a secret personally guarded by someone, with a content known to its possessor, but of a mystery, a matter or circumstance which is "secret," i.e., known only through vague hints but essentially unknown. The real nature of matter was unknown to the alchemist: he knew it only in hints. In seeking to explore it he projected the unconscious into the darkness of matter in order to illuminate it. In order to explain the mystery of matter he projected yet another mystery - his own psychic background -into what was to be explained: Obscurum per obscurius, ignotum per ignotius! This procedure was not, of course, intentional; it was an involuntary occurrence. ~ C. G. Jung

The study of nature with a view to works is engaged in by the mechanic, the mathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the magician; but by all as things now are with slight endeavour and scanty success. ~ Francis Bacon

Only those who find life, find treasures. ~ Paulo Coelho

The art of the alchemist, whether spiritual or physical, consists in completing the work of perfection, bringing forth and making dominant, as it were, the "latent goldness" which "lies obscure" in metal or man. The ideal adept of alchemy was therefore an "auxiliary of the Eternal Goodness." By his search for the "Noble Tincture" which should restore an imperfect world, he became a partner in the business of creation, assisting the Cosmic Plan. Thus the proper art of the Spiritual Alchemist, with whom alone we are here concerned, was the production of the spiritual and only valid tincture or Philosopher's Stone; the mystic seed of transcendental life which should invade, tinge, and wholly transmute the imperfect self into spiritual gold. That this was no fancy of seventeenth-century allegorists, but an idea familiar to many of the oldest writers upon alchemy - whose quest was truly a spiritual search into the deepest secrets of the soul - is proved by the words which bring to an end the first part of the antique "Golden Treatise upon the Making of the Stone," sometimes attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. "This, O Son," says that remarkable tract, "is the Concealed Stone of Many Colours, which is born and brought forth in one colour; know this and conceal it . . . it leads from darkness into light, from this desert wilderness to a secure habitation, and from poverty and straits to a free and ample fortune. ~ Evelyn Underhill

My heart is a traitor," the boy said to the alchemist, when they had paused to rest the horses. "It doesn't want me to go on." "That makes sense," the alchemist answered. "Naturally it's afraid that, in pursuing your dream, you might lose everything you've won." "Well, then, why should I listen to my heart?" "Because you will never again be able to keep it quiet. Even if you pretend not to have heard what it tells you, it will always be there inside you, repeating to you what you're thinking about life and about the world." "You mean I should listen, even if it's treasonous?" "Treason is a blow that comes unexpectedly. If you know your heart well, it will never be able to do that to you. Because you'll know its dreams and wishes, and will know how to deal with them. "You will never be able to escape from your heart. So it's better to listen to what it has to say. That way, you'll never have to fear an unanticipated blow. ~ Paulo Coelho

He was an orphan, taken on by the alchemist to be little better than a slave. Will had never, not once, had anywhere to go
not really.
He realized this for the first time as he was crouching in the alleyway, but the realization, instead of making him feel unhappy, made him feel strangely free. It was like walking into a room and hearing everyone go silent and knowing yes, it was true, they *were* all talking about you; and they had been saying that your feet smelled like rotten fish; but also that you didn't care. ~ Lauren Oliver

While the alchemist of old sought to turn lead into gold, the modern alchemist has a more noble dream: to turn men from rot to rock ~ Agona Apell

But he was able to understand one thing: making a decision was only the beginning of things. When someone makes a decision, he is really diving into a strong current that wil carry him into places he had never dreamed of when he first made the decision. - The Alchemist, Paulo Cohelo - ~ Paulo Coelho

Death continues to stalk the streets, stealing the souls of our children as they sleep. We're running out of fingers to close their eyes, voices to bless their souls, hands to dig their graves. Poisonous fumes from their unburied bodies contaminate the alleys, and the ghosts of those who have been buried rise nightly. Their tiny forms dance above their tombstones, an agonising reminder that we've failed them. ~ Joanne Owen

Learn to recognize omens, and follow them ~ Paulo Coelho

He learned the most important part of the language that all the world spoke - the language that everyone on earth was capable of understanding in their heart. It was love. ~ Paulo Coelho

You gave them everything I had!" the boy said. "Everything I've saved in my entire life!" "Well, what good would it be to you if you had to die?" the alchemist answered. "Your money saved us for three days. It's not often that money saves a person's life." But ~ Paulo Coelho

This is for you,' he (the Alchemist) said, holding one of the parts (of gold) out to the monk. 'It's for your generosity to the pilgrims.'
'But this payment goes well beyond my generosity,' the monk responded.
'Don't say that again. Life might be listening, and give you less the next time. ~ Paulo Coelho

No matter the opinion, everyone knew their names. The Reaper. Magiano. The Windwalker. The Alchemist.
The Young Elites. ~ Marie Lu

Creatures like the sheep, that are used to traveling, know about moving on. ~ Paulo Coelho

When Love comes to us, it's usually at a time we least expect and in a form we don't immediately recognize - and more often than not it's an agent of Love in human form. ~ Colm Holland

Maktub - (It is written)
- Paul Coelho, The Alchemist ~ Klaus Schirmer

Everyone has his or her own way of learning things. His way isn't the same as mine, nor mine as his. But we're both in search of our destinies, and I respect him for that. ~ Paulo Coelho

Alchemy, the masters teach, is the process of linking the spiritual to the material. The alchemist is the bridge between the worlds. It is a process of working inside a mirror, knowing always that in the end, the part will reflect the whole. As inside, so outside. ~ Thomas Lloyd Qualls

And so the moral of his fabled travels read like Santiago's, the boy in Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist: Randy had traveled around the world in search of treasure and came home to find it in his own backyard. He ~ Eric Blehm

It's the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting ~ Paul Coelho

Don't give in to your fears," said the alchemist, in a strangely gentle voice. "If you do, you won't be able to talk to your heart." "But I have no idea how to turn myself into the wind." "If a person is living out his Personal Legend, he knows everything he needs to know. ~ Paulo Coelho

Contentment produces, in some measure, all those effects which the alchemist usually ascribes to what he calls the philosopher's stone; and if it does not bring riches, it does the same thing by banishing the desire for them. ~ Joseph Addison

The evening sky was sprinkled with stars ... ~ Joanne Owen

But that wasn't why the boy, whose name was Will but who also answered to "Useless" and "Hopeless" and "Snot-Face" and "Sniveler" (at least when the alchemist was the one calling to him), felt sorry for himself. ~ Lauren Oliver

The friar organized a hunt. But the Alchemist was long gone -- lost among the townspeople like one bad penny melting into a puddle of lead. ~ Geraldine McCaughrean

I have asked Love to give you everything you need to be the Alchemist in your world. ~ Colm Holland

Why don't people's hearts tell them to continue following their dreams?" the boy asked the alchemist.
"Because that's what makes a heart suffer most, and hearts don't like to suffer."
From then on, the boy understood his heart. He asked it, please, never to stop speaking to him. He asked that, when he wandered far from his dreams, his heart press him and sound the alarm. The boy swore that, every time he heard the alarm, he would heed its message. ~ Paulo Coelho

Getting to the root of our fears is the unavoidable first step of the process of personal transformation. ~ Colm Holland

She believed in me. Where I had doubt and fear, she had faith. ~ Joanne Owen

No need for apologies. ... it's good to question things, but you must have faith too. ~ Joanne Owen

Sometimes it's better to be with the sheep, who don't say anything. And better still to be alone with one's books. They tell their incredible stories at the time when you want to hear them. But when you're talking to people, they say some things that are so strange that you don't know how to continue the conversation. ~ Paulo Coelho

Everyone believes the world's greatest lie ... " says the mysterious old man.
"What is the world's greatest lie?" the little boy asks.
The old man replies, "It's this: that at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what's happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That's the world's greatest lie. ~ Paulo Coelho

A voice: "My goodness, Nurse Jones." I look up, startled. Simon's in the doorway, leaning against the frame, smiling.
No doubt I'm quite the sight in my bloody, sexy nurse's outfit, sitting on a bed next to a tied-up, taped-up target. "Oh, please." I collect my purse, my phone and my stun gun and walk around the bed.
Simon's smile reaches deep into his dark blue eyes. He has a long face and delicate features for a man.
I grab the sleeve of his black jacket and pull him into the outer room.
"What the fuck are you wearing? You look insane," he says.
"This? This is the creepy outfit the Alchemist put me in after he kidnapped me."
Simon stops smiling. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah. ~ Carolyn Crane

It's not what enters men's mouths that's evil," said the alchemist. "It's what comes out of their mouths that is." The ~ Paulo Coelho

The alchemist pulled his gaze back to Vorcan, ~ Steven Erikson

The greatest challenge we face is to truly believe, at the very core of our heart,
we are loved unconditionally for who we are, and not for what we can do.'
Colm Holland ~ Colm Holland

You came so that you could learn about your dreams," said the old woman. "And dreams are the language of God. When he speaks in our language, I can interpret what he has said. But if he speaks in the language of the soul, it is only you who can understand. ~ Paulo Coelho

Where your treasure is, there also will be your heart. ~ Paulo Coelho

The alchemist said, "No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn't know it." The ~ Paulo Coelho

The surrealists know that the surreal is in the real, just as the mage knows that the invisible is in the visible and the alchemist knows that the infinite is to be found in the finite - and the Great Work consists of its extraction. ~ Patrick Lepetit

Do you believe people can change their fate, or do you think our lives are mapped out before us? I mean, do you think we're each doomed to die a certain death? ~ Joanne Owen

A kind and generous man by nature, he had stumbled, by chance, over that common Philosopher`s stone (much more easily discovered than the object of the alchemist`s researches), which sometimes trips up kind and generous men, and has the fatal property of turning gold to dross and every precious thing to poor account. ~ Charles Dickens

THE BOY RODE ALONG THROUGH THE DESERT FOR SEVERAL hours, listening avidly to what his heart had to say. It was his heart that would tell him where his treasure was hidden. "Where your treasure is, there also will be your heart," the alchemist had told him. But his heart was speaking of other things. ~ Paulo Coelho

This is what drives me crazy whenever I hear people say things like, "Ask the universe for what you want, and you'll get it," why I fucking hated that Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist that everybody was reading int he late nineties. Whenever I saw the book in anybody's hands on the subway I always wanted to say, "So the reason a million Tustis were just slaughtered in Rwanda is that they didn't ask the universe not to kill them? ~ Joel Derfner

If someone isn't what others want them to be, the others become angry. ~ The Alchemist

Shortly afterwards, a whistling customer with a ponytail and what I can only assume was a hat he'd borrowed from a clown bought a copy of Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist, I suspect deliberately to undermine my faith in humanity and dampen my spirits further. ~ Shaun Bythell

I'm thinking about that afternoon you came to the empty restaurant, that day after the Alchemist. You were so alone." He pauses. I was. I'd never felt so alone. "Nobody saw it, but I did. I always see you. And you came in that door and came up to me and everything was new. ~ Carolyn Crane

And the old King said - Wen You want Something, all the Universe conspires in helping You to achieve it !!!- The Alchemist ~ Cohelo

Jan knew it was pointless to ponder the rights and wrongs of Greta's decision, for the decision had been made and they were on their way to a foreign city. He would just have to make the best of things, for all their sakes. He tried to turn his attention to more practical matters, ... ~ Joanne Owen

Next time I see you, I'll tell you everything, she promised. ~ Joanne Owen

The alchemist was dazed and dumbfounded, as the true meaning of the magic was revealed: *The dead will rise from glade to glen and ancient will be young again*. The dead had, after all, risen. From dead and dry things there was growth, and new life everywhere. And the endlessly long winter had at last turned to spring.
From life to death and back again to life. It was indeed the greatest magic in the world. ~ Lauren Oliver

When the alchemist speaks of Mercurius, on the face of it he means quicksilver (mercury), but inwardly he means the world-creating spirit concealed or imprisoned in matter. The dragon is probably the oldest pictoral symbol in alchemy of which we have documentary evidence. It appears as the Ouroboros, the tail-eater, in the Codex Marcianus, which dates from the tenth or eleventh century, together with the legend 'the One, the All'. Time and again the alchemists reiterate that the opus proceeds from the one and leads back to the one, that it is a sort of circle like a dragon biting its own tail. For this reason the opus was often called circulare (circular) or else rota (the wheel). Mercurius stands at the beginning and end of the work: he is the prima materia, the caput corvi, the nigredo; as dragon he devours himself and as dragon he dies, to rise again in the lapis. He is the play of colours in the cauda pavonis and the division into the four elements. He is the hermaphrodite that was in the beginning, that splits into the classical brother-sister duality and is reunited in the coniunctio, to appear once again at the end in the radiant form of the lumen novum, the stone. He is metallic yet liquid, matter yet spirit, cold yet fiery, poison and yet healing draught - a symbol uniting all the opposites. ~ C.G. Jung

The closer one gets to realizing his destiny, the more that destiny becomes his true reason for being. ~ Paulo Coelho

The boy and his heart had become friends, and neither was capable now of betraying the other. ~ Paulo Coelho

The alchemist of the West has turned stone into glass
But my alchemy has transmuted glass into flint
Pharaohs of today have stalked me in vain ~ Muhammad Iqbal

Reading The Alchemist was like getting up at dawn and seeing the sun rise while the rest of the world still slept. ~ Paulo Coelho

We need to transmute the lead of personality into the gold of the Spirit. This work is only possible in the laboratory of the Alchemist. ~ Samael Aun Weor

I'm an adventurer, looking for treasure ~ Paulo Coelho

When you want something, all the Universe conspires to helping you achieve it.
The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
Just ask.. ~ Victoria Aldridge Washuk

But the observers were even more surprised by her thigh boots, black breeches, and the red leather corset she wore over a white shirt. It was a daring outfit, to say the least... She also wore a sword and rode her horse like a man. It was scandalous...
Page 37 of ARC ~ Pierre Pevel

The charlatan is always the pioneer. From the astrologer came the astronomer, from the alchemist the chemist, from the mesmerist the experimental psychologist. The quack of yesterday is the professor of tomorrow. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better.
The Alchemist ~ Paulo Coelho

It's not what enters men's mouth that is evil, said the alchemist. It's what comes out of their mouths that is. ~ Paulo Coelho

He was sure that it made no difference to her on which day he appeared: for her, every day was the same, and when each day is the same as the next, it's because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day the sun rises. ~ Paulo Coelho

A painless lesson is one without any meaning, one who does not sacrifice anything cannot achieve anything. ~ Hiromu Arakawa

That creature's staying?' It figured. Her daughter-in-law transforming into an animal? No problem. Having to take care of a cat? Crisis. (Sydney Sage-Ivashkov) ~ Richelle Mead

Good intentions do not guarantee good results. Somehow Andrew Keates turns works of merit into evenings of entertainment. Don't call him a dramaturge, call him an alchemist. ~ Paul Gambaccini

Now,young lady,I suppose you're here for a work assignment."
Work?" Tally said.
They both looked down at her puzzled expression, and Shay burst into laughter. ~ Scott Westerfeld

When you are in love, things make even more sense, he thought. ~ Paulo Coelho

This is what you wanted, isn't it? To become a human, so you could die with them? ~ Wrath

Thank you, Edward. You really are special. Being able to create something so wonderful ... But it's too bad ...
... You couldn't put me back together too.
Trisha Elric ~ Hiromu Arakawa

When we send Love in response to hate, we become spiritual alchemists. ~ Wayne Dyer

To die tomorrow was no worse than dying on any other day. Every day was there to be lived or to mark one's departure from this world. ~ Paulo Coelho

What name shall I call you?"
"Addie's fine. I know who she is."
"A mouthy little alchemist?"
"See, you know her, too. ~ Becca Andre

Indeed, I am as skilled as any alchemist, but instead of turning lead into gold, I turn my fear into daring, and assuredly that is a far greater trick. ~ Robin LaFevers

Bottoms are alchemists who magically transform pain into sex. ~ Dossie Easton

We are master alchemists: We may not have discovered how to make gold out of lead, but we are able to make heaven out of hell, hell out of heaven, and purgatory out of nothing. ~ Khang Kijarro Nguyen

Fool! Nothing but black ink runs through my veins! ~ Hiromu Arakawa

Waddya want me to do? through my sling shot at him? ~ Shirley Hughes

Eat when it is time to eat. And walk when it is time to walk. ~ Paulo Coelho

She managed to look like a perfect, pissed-off Alchemist. Now I wanted to kiss her more than ever. ~ Richelle Mead