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my favourite quotes from the little prince
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If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.
As for the future, your task is not to forsee it, but to enable it.
The Wisdom of the Sands
A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.
Flight to Arras
La perfection est atteinte non quand il ne reste rien à ajouter, mais quand il ne reste rien à enlever.
(You know you've achieved perfection in design, not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing more to take away.)
Love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.
Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.
(It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; What is essential is invisible to the eye.)
The Little Prince
What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well.
Transport of the mails, transport of the human voice, transport of flickering pictures - in this century, as in others, our highest accomplishments still have the single aim of bringing men together.
Wind, Sand, and Stars
Pure logic is the ruin of the spirit.
The machine does not isolate us from the great problems of nature but plunges us more deeply into them
There is no hope of joy except in human relations.
What is your fav quotes ???? |
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| hardstyle |
All grown-ups were children first. (But few remember it).
Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is exhausting for children to have to provide explanations over and over again.
That's the way they are. You must not hold it against them. Children should be very understanding of grown-ups.
I have had, in the course of my life, lots of encounters and lots of serious people. I have spent lots of time with grown-ups. I have seen them at close range... which haven't much improved my opinion of them.
Grown-ups like numbers. When you tell them about a new friend, they never ask questions about what really matters. They never ask: "What does his voice sound like?" "What games does he like best?" "Does he collect butterflies?". They ask: "How old is he?" "How many brothers does he have?" "How much does he weigh?" "How much money does his father make?" Only then do they think they know him.
If you tell grown-ups, "I saw a beautiful red brick house, with geraniums at the windows and doves on the roof...," they won't be able to imagine such a house. You have to tell them, "I saw a house worth a hundred thousand francs." Then they exclaim, "What a pretty house!"
For millions of years flowers have been producing thorns. For millions of years sheep have been eating them all the same. And it's not serious, trying to understand why flowers go to such trouble produce thorns that are good for nothing? It's not important, the war between the sheep and the flowers?... Suppose I happen to know a unique flower, one that exists nowhere in the world except on my planet, one that a little sheep can wipe out in a single bite one morning, just like that, even without realizing what he's doing - that isn't important? If someone loves a flower of which just one example exists among all the millions and millions of stars, that's enough to make him happy when he looks at the stars. He tells himself, 'My flower's up there somewhere...' But if the sheep eats the flower, then for him it's as if, suddenly, all the stars went out. And that isn't important?'"
"If I were to command a general to turn into a seagull, and if the general did not obey, that would not be the general's fault. It would be mine."
"I'd like to see a sunset... Do me a favor your majesty... Command the sun to set."
If I commanded a general to fly from one flower to the next like a butterfly, or to write a tragedy, or to turn into a seagull, and if the general did not carry out my command, which of us would be in the wrong, the general or me?"
"You would be," said the little prince quite firmly.
"Exactly. One must command from each what each can perform," the king went on. "Authority is based first of all upon reason. If you command your subjects to jump in the ocean, there will be a revolution. I am entitled to command obedience because my orders are reasonable."
"Then my sunset?" insisted the little prince, who never let go of a question once he had asked it.
"You shall have your sunset. I shall command it. But I shall wait, according to my science of government, until conditions are favorable."
"And when will that be?" inquired the little prince.
"Well, well!" replied the king, first consulting a large calender. "Well, well! That would be around... around... that would be tonight around seven-forty! And you'll see how well I'm obeyed."
That is the hardest thing of all. It is much harder to judge yourself than to judge others. If you succeed in judging yourself, it's because you're truly a wise man."
What are you doing here," he asked the drunkard...
"Drinking," replied the drunkard, with a gloomy expression.
"Why are you drinking?" the little prince asked.
"To forget," replied the drunkard.
"To forget what?" inquired the little prince, who was already feeling sorry for him.
"To forget that I'm ashamed," confessed the drunkard, hanging his head.
"What are you ashamed of?" inquired the little prince, who wanted to help.
"Of drinking!" concluded the drunkard...
Nothing's perfect," sighed the fox. "My life is monotonous. I hunt chickens; people hunt me. All chickens are just alike, and all men are just alike. So I'm rather bored. But if you tame me, my life will be filled with sunshine. I'll know the sound of footsteps that will be different from all the rest. Other footsteps send me back underground. Yours will call me out of my burrow like music. And then, look! You see the wheat fields over there? I don't eat bread. For me, wheat is no use whatever. Wheat fields say nothing to me. Which is sad. But you have hair the color of gold. So it will be wonderful, once you've tamed me! The wheat, which is golden, will remind me of you. And I'll love the sound of the wind in the wheat..."
"Language is the source of misunderstandings."
You're lovely, but you're empty," he went on. "One couldn't die for you. Of course an ordinary passerby would think my rose looked just like you. But my rose, all on her own, is more important than you altogether, since she's the one I've watered. Since she's the one I put under glass. Since she's the one I sheltered behind a screen. Since she's the one for whom I killed the caterpillars (except for two or three for butterflies). Since's she the one I listened to when she complained, or when she boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing at all. Since she's my rose."
People where you live," the little prince said, "grow five thousand roses in one garden... yet they don't find what they're looking for..."
"They don't find it," I answered.
"And yet what they're looking for could be found in a single rose, or a little water..."
"Of course," I answered.
And the little prince added, "But eyes are blind. You have to look with the heart."
"People have stars, but they aren't the same. For travelers, the stars are guides. For other people, they're nothing but tiny lights. And for still others, for scholars, they're problems. For my businessman, they were gold. But all those stars are silent stars. You, though, you'll have stars like nobody else."
"What do you mean?"
"When you look up at the sky at night, since I'll be living on one of them, since I'll be laughing on one of them, for you, it'll be as if all the stars are laughing. You'll have stars that can laugh!"
And he laughed again.
"And when you're consoled (everyone is eventually consoled), you'll be glad you've known me. You'll always be my friend. You'll feel like laughing with me. And you'll open your windows sometimes just for the fun of it... And your friends will be amazed to see you laughing while you're looking up at the sky. Then you'll tell them, 'Yes, it's the stars. They always make me laugh!" |
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| whiskers |
| the whole thing ;) |
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