Jorge Luis Borges Quotes

For my part I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars makes me dream.

Life, what is it but a dream?

The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.

All nature is but art unknown to thee.

Apart from the known and the unknown, what else is there?

It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful country lies in between.

Art evokes the mystery without which the world would not exist.

Who does understand life?

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science.

In the world there exists no aesthetic plane, not even the aesthetic plane of goodness.

Be clearly aware of the stars and infinity on high. Then life seems almost enchanted after all.

Plant a garden in which strange plants grow and mysteries bloom.

Colors are the deeds/ and sufferings of light.

Life may as properly be called an art as any other.

Is Life itself a dream, I wonder?

The artist appeals to that part of our being which is not dependent on wisdom; to that in us which is a gift and not an acquisition-and therefore, more permanently enduring. He speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty and pain.

To the humble man, and to the humble man alone, the sun is really a sun; to the humble man, and to the humble man alone, the sea is really a sea.

One of the weaknesses of much abstract painting is the attempt to substitute the inventions of the intellect for a pristine imaginative conception. The inner life of a human being is a vast and varied realm and does not concern itself alone with stimulating arrangements of color, form and design. The term 'life' as used in art is something not to be held in contempt, for it applies all of its existence, and the province of art is to react to it and not to shun it. Painting will have to deal more fully and less obliquely with life and nature's phenomena before it can again be great.

What shall I compare it to, this fantastic thing I call my Mind? To a waste-paper basket, to a sieve choked with sediment, or to a barrel full of floating froth and refuse? No, what it is really most like is a spider's web, insecurely hung on leaves and twigs, quivering in every wind, and sprinkled with dewdrops and dead flies. And at its centre, pondering forever the Problem of Existence, sits motionless the spider-like and uncanny Soul.

All we have to believe with is our senses, the tools we use to perceive the world: our sight, our touch, our memory. If they lie to us, then nothing can be trusted. And even if we do not believe, then still we cannot travel in any other way than the road our senses show us; and we must walk that road to the end.

Triumphal arch, that fill'st the sky When storms prepare to part, I ask not proud Philosophy To teach me what thou art.

Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth, are never alone or weary of life.

Beauty is as useful as the useful. More so, perhaps. (Le beau est aussi utile que l'utile. Plus peut-etre.)

There is a sun, a light that for want of another word I can only call yellow, pale sulphur yellow, pale golden citron. How lovely yellow is!