Imbeciles to be in great places, people of sense in small, and mankind generally unhappy. But the world as it stands is no narrow illusion, no phantasm, no evil dream of the night; we wake up to it, forever and ever; and we can neither forget it nor deny it nor dispense with it.
HENRY JAMESif you are going to be pushed you had better jump
More Henry James Quotes
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Try to be one of the people on whom nothing is lost!
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I don’t want everyone to like me; I should think less of myself if some people did.
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God’s creature is one. He makes man, not men. His true creature is unitary and infinite, revealing himself, indeed, in every finite form, but compromised by none.
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I don’t care anything about reasons, but I know what I like.
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Deep experience is never peaceful.
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It takes an endless amount of history to make even a little tradition.
HENRY JAMES -
Be generous, be delicate, and always pursue the prize.
HENRY JAMES -
Don’t try so much to form your character – it’s like trying to pull open a tight, tender young rose.
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To criticize is to appreciate, to appropriate, to take intellectual possession.
HENRY JAMES -
It is difficult to speak adequately or justly of London. It is not a pleasant place; it is not agreeable, or cheerful, or easy, or exempt from reproach. It is only magnificent.
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The artist is present in every page of every book from which he sought so assiduously to eliminate himself.
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To take what there is in life and use it, without waiting forever in vain for the preconceived, to dig deep into the actual and get something out of that; this, doubtless, is the right way to live.
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Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea.
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Sorrow comes in great waves…but rolls over us, and though it may almost smother us, it leaves us.
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Make the short story tremendously succinct – with a very short pulse or rhythm – and the closest selection of detail.
HENRY JAMES