I have been the apprentice, paid my dues, and have just become master of my ship. But when I look down, why do I see the ancient, tarred, mud-stained slippers that I buried at the start of the journey still stuck to my feet?
ABRAHAM VERGHESEIf ‘ecstasy’ meant the sudden intrusion of the sacred into the ordinary, then it had just happened to me.
More Abraham Verghese Quotes
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The greatest sin is not finding it, ignoring what God made possible in you
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Be careful! Travel expands the mind and loosens the bowels.
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They realize the no money, no church service, no eulogy, no funeral procession no matter how elaborate, can remove the legacy of a mean spirit.
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Empathy can be replaced by cynicism.
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There is a point when grief exceeds the human capacity to emote, and as a result one is strangely composed-
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Certainly when I got to medical school, I had role models of the kind of physicians I wanted to be.
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In an emergency, what treatment is given by ear? Words of Comfort.
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We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot.
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And pray, why would this number interest us?” “It is the only number that describes itself when you read it, ‘One zero, two ones, three twos, two threes’.
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I still find the best way to understand a hospitalized patient is not by staring at the computer screen but by going to see the patient; it’s only at the bedside that I can figure out what is important.
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You are an instrument of God. Don’t leave the instrument sitting in its case, my son. Play! Leave no part of your instrument unexplored. .
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Literature is a beautiful way of keeping the imagination alive, of visiting worlds you would never have time to in your day-to-day life. It keeps you abreast of a wider spectrum of human activities.
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Life for the Italians was what it was, no more and no less, an interlude between meals
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What we are fighting isn’t godlessness–this is the most godly country on earth.
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That’s the funny thing about America–the blessed thing. As many people as there are to hold you back, there are angels whose humanity makes up for all the others.
ABRAHAM VERGHESE






