Robert Nathan Quotes

You realize as you get older that tomorrow is not guaranteed for anybody.

Life is so fragile.

One should not believe too strongly in a life which can easily vanish.

I'll tell them that on bad mornings, it feels impossible to take pleasure in anything because I'm afraid it could be taken away.

Bravest thing about people is how they go on loving mortal beings after finding out there's such a thing as dying.

There is nothing certain in a man's life but that he must lose it.

We fear that this moment will end, that we won't get what we need, that we will lose what we love, or that we will not be safe. Often, our biggest fear is the knowledge that one day our bodies will cease functioning. So even when we are surrounded by all the conditions for happiness, our joy is not complete.

Death is very mysterious to us. One moment someone is there with us, and the next moment they're not.

A lot of people have great hope, and a lot of people who have great hope live. And, some of them who have great hope die. So it's not that hope is going to save you.

When my children say, 'In the future, Mummy, will things get better or worse for humanity?' I say: 'Who knows, since Amy Winehouse died. It's all in the air now. Eat your broccoli.'

I do have a sense of displacement as constant instability - the uninterrupted existence of everything that I love and care about is not guaranteed at all. I wait for catastrophes.

I just don't get death at all. Yes, it's there. But I don't get it.

Life is an incurable disease.

Remember, tomorrow is promised to no one.

It was despairing to find out that I am mortal.

I don't take things for granted, because everything feels more fragile. It's made me wonder about mortality and how long you've got somebody in the world. I'm more fearful than I used to be.

I realise how precious life is, probably because I've seen how it can be taken away.

Death threatens our speech with futility because death is not just a biological event - it is a reality we fear may rob our living of any significance.

Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow may be for us and it may not.

This is part of the involuntary bargain we make with the world just by being alive. We get to experiences the splendor of nature, the beauty of art, the balm of love and the sheer joy of existence, always with the knowledge that illness, injury, natural disaster, or pure evil can end it in an instant for ourselves or someone we love.

Death is an absolute mystery. We are all vulnerable to it, it's what makes life interesting and suspenseful.

You think, eventually, that nothing can disturb you and that your nerves are impregnable. Yet, looking down at that familiar face, I realized that death is something to which we never become calloused.

We civilizations now know ourselves mortal.

I remember one time watching a bird snatch a dragonfly out of midair and thinking, 'Gee, life can come to an end - crunch! - just like that.'

The great risk of being alive is always that something can happen to you - or to someone you dearly love - at any moment.