Saul Bellow Quotes

Life is not just food, it's something spiritual.

It is my opinion that a man's soul may be buried and perish under a dung-heap, or in a furrow field, just as well as under a pile of money.

Our life is psychological, and the purpose of life is to make psyche of it, to find connections between life and soul.

By making a soul connection, your true purpose in life will become the foundation of everything you do.

We're so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value that we forget the inner value, the rapture that is associated with being alive, is what it is all about.

Sin is more than turning our backs on God - it is turning our backs on life! Immorality is much more than adultery and dishonesty: it is living drab, colorless, dreary, stale, unimaginative lives.

The word contentment comes from the word content, which is what we hold inside - love, value, a feeling of a life that has meaning or purpose, a cause greater than yourself that you're a part of. These are the things that bring true happiness. As a culture, I think we need to redefine what it means to be happy.

You nourish your soul by fulfilling your destiny.

To be truly happy, you need a clear sense of meaning and purpose in life.

Someday your life will be over, no matter how much attention you give to your health. Will you look back with regret, because you nourished your body but starved your soul?

A human soul devoid of longing was a soul deformed, deprived of its highest good, sick unto death.

I think people are really looking for some way whereby we can grow our souls rather than our economy.

We cannot get grace from gadgets. In the Bakelite house of the future, the dishes may not break, but the heart can. Even a man with ten shower baths may find life flat, stale and unprofitable.

I’ve often said that I wish people could realize all their dreams and wealth and fame, so that they could see that it’s not where they’re gonna find their sense of completion. Like many of you, I was concerned about going out into the world and doing something bigger than myself, until someone smarter than myself made me realize that there is nothing bigger than myself. My soul is not contained within the limits of my body, my body is contained within the limitlessness of my soul.

What is important is not the length of life, but the depth of life. What is important is not to make life longer, but to take your soul out of time, as every sublime act does.

My definition of success is "the fulfillment of your soul's purpose."

A single day spent doing things which fail to nourish the soul is a day stolen, mutilated, and discarded in the gutter of destiny.

There is only one purpose for all of life, and that is for you and all that lives to experience fullest glory...everything else you say, think, or do is attendant to that function. There is nothing else for your soul to do, and nothing else your soul wants to do.

The most good you can do for yourself spiritually is to live your life with total love, conviction, and purpose.

Wealth, my son, should never be your goal in life. Your words are eloquent but they are mere words. True wealth is of the heart, not of the purse.

I seek not a long life, but a full one, like you Lord Jesus.

Each elect soul ... possesses God directly and finds in that unique possession the fulfillment of his own individuality.

Your days are numbered. Use them to throw open the windows of your soul to the sun. If you do not, the sun will soon set, and you with it.

God's goal is not to get what you want; it is to get you what you need.

I came to the conclusion that unless I found myself and became the change I wanted to see in the world - as Gandhi said - I couldn't contribute much, nor would there be anything fulfilling or meaningful in my life. So I went on a spiritual search.