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Man can be understood only by ascending from physics, chemistry, biology, and geology. In other words, he is first of all a cosmic problem.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Death is acceptable only if it represents the physically necessary passage toward a union, the condition of a metamorphosis.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Acceptance Condition Death Metamorphosis Passage Physical Represent Towards Union
I feel a distaste for hunting, first because of a kind of Buddhist respect for the unity and sacredness of all life, and also because the pursuit of a hare or chamois strikes me as a kind of ‘escape of energy,’ that is, the expenditure of our effort in an illusory end, one devoid of profit.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Buddist Deel Distance First Hunt Kind Life Respect Sacredness Unity
The mineral world is a much more supple and mobile world than could be imagined by the science of the ancients. Vaguely analogous to the metamorphoses of living creatures, there occurs in the most solid rocks, as we now know, perpetual transformation of a mineral species.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Ancient Imagine Mineral Mobile More Much Science Supple World
We shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Discover God History Man Second Shall Time
Let man live at a distance from God, and the universe remains neutral or hostile to him. But let man believe in God, and immediately all around him the elements, even the irksome, of the inevitable organize themselves into a friendly whole, ordered to the ultimate success of life.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Distance God Him Hostile Let Live Man Neutral Remain Universe
Ever since intelligent beings began to be in contact, and consequently in friction, they have felt the need to guard themselves against each other’s encroachments.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Consequently Contact Each Encroachment Guard Intelligent Need Other
He that will believe only what he can fully comprehend must have a long head or a very short creed.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Believe Comprehend Creed Fully Heard Long Only Short Very
Humanity at the centre of the primates, Homo sapiens, in humanity, is the end-product of a gradual work of creation, the successive sketches for which still surround us on every side.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Centre Create Dissociate Gradual Humanity Most People Person Primitae State Survive Work
There are a good many points about which I may be diffident, but when it comes to questions of Truth and intellectual independence, there is no holding me – I can envisage no finer end than to sacrifice oneself for a conviction.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Conviction Envisage Good Hold Independence Many Oneself Question Sacrifice Time
Everyone, no doubt, remains first and foremost a man of his own country and continues to draw from it his motive force.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Continue Country Doubt Draw Everyone First Force Foremost Man Motive Own Remain
All I know is that, thanks to a sort of habit which has always been ingrained in me, I have never, at any moment of my life, experienced the least difficulty in addressing myself to God as to a supreme Someone.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Act All Been Habit Ingrain Know Me Sort Thanks
What is imponderable in the world is greater than what we can handle.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Can Greater Handle Importendence What World
We often represent God to ourselves as being able to draw from non-being a world without sorrows, faults, dangers – a world in which there is no damage, no breakage. This is a conceptual fantasy and makes it impossible to solve the problem of evil.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Breage Damage Danger World Draw Fault God Often Ourselves Represent Sorrow
We have but one permanent home: heaven – that’s still the old truth that we always have to re-learn – and it’s only through the impact of sad experiences that we assimilate it.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Assilimate Experience Heaven Himself Home Impact Manifest Only Permanent Sad Truth
The longer I live, the more I feel that true repose consists in ‘renouncing’ one’s own self, by which I mean making up one’s mind to admit that there is no importance whatever in being ‘happy’ or ‘unhappy’ in the usual meaning of the words.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Consist Live Longer Mak Mind More One Own Renounce Response Self True
There is neither spirit nor matter in the world. The stuff of the universe is spirit-matter.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN

Matter Neither Spirit Stuff Universe World