At the origin of physics lay the strenuous clarity of the West-Archimedes and Euclid.
PRIMO LEVIDawn came on us like a betrayer; it seemed as though the new sun rose as an ally of our enemies to assist in our destruction.
More Primo Levi Quotes
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If you and your child were going to be killed tomorrow, would you not give him to eat today?
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The sea’s only gifts are harsh blows and, occasionally, the chance to feel strong.
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We are those who, through prevarication, skill or luck, never touched bottom. Those who have, and who have seen the face of the Gorgon, did not return, or returned wordless.
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We have collectively witnessed a fundamental unexpected event, fundamental precisely because unexpected, not foreseen by anyone.
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I have many times been praised for my lack of animosity towards the Germans. It’s not a philosophical virtue. It’s a habit of having my second reactions before the first.
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The new kings of the world will live tranquilly for a long time, confining themselves to devouring each other and being parasites among each other on a cottage industry scale.
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Everybody is somebody’s Jew.
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If it is true that there is no greater sorrow than to remember a happy time in a state of misery, it is just as true that calling up a moment of anguish in a tranquil mood, seated quietly at one’s desk, is a source of profound satisfaction.
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In history and in life one sometimes seems to glimpse a ferocious law which states: to he that has, will be given; from he that has not, will be taken away.
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Sooner or later in life everyone discovers that perfect happiness is unrealizable, but there are few who pause to consider the antithesis: that perfect unhappiness is equally unattainable.
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Man is a centaur, a tangle of flesh and mind, divine inspiration and dust.
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Never again could it be cleansed; it would prove that man, the human species – we, in short – had the potential to construct an enormity of pain, and that pain is the only force created from nothing, without cost and without effort. It is enough not to see, not to listen, not to act.
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There are few men who know how to go to their deaths with dignity, and often they are not those whom one would expect.
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We collected in a group in front of their door, and we experienced within ourselves a grief that was new for us, the ancient grief of the people that has no land, the grief without hope of the exodus which is renewed in every century.
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Each of us bears the imprint of a friend met along the way; In each the trace of each.
PRIMO LEVI






