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Quotes by Kahlil Gibran

Quotes By Kahlil Gibran

Pity the nation whose statesman is a fox, whose philosopher is a juggler, and whose art is the art of patching and mimicking. Pity the nation that welcomes its new ruler with trumpetings, and farewells him with hootings, only to welcome another ruler with trumpetings again. Pity the nation whose sages are dumb with years and whose strong men are yet in the cradle. Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation.

 

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight. Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater." But I say unto you, they are inseparable. Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed. Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.

 

One day you will ask me which is more important? My life or yours? I will say mine and you will walk away not knowing that you are my life.

 

If I could take your troubles

I would toss them into the sea,

But all these things I'm finding

Are impossible for me.

I cannot build a mountain

Or catch a rainbow fair,

But let me be what I know best,

A friend that is always there.

 

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you, yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love, but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward, nor tarries with yesterday.

 

Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that you can not bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel all you are beyond that pain.

 

There must be something strangely sacred about salt. It is in our tears and in the sea.

 

Verily the lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul, and then walks grinning in the funeral.

 

And God said, Love your enemy, & I obeyed Him & loved myself.

 

That deepest thing, that recognition, that knowledge, that sense of kinship began the first time I saw you, and it is the same now - only a thousand times deeper and tenderer. I shall love you to eternity. I loved you long before we met in this flesh. I knew that when I first saw you. It was destiny. We are together like this and nothing can shake us apart.

 

Joy and sorrow are inseparable. . . together they come and when one sits alone with you . . remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

 

You may forget with whom you laughed, but you will never forget with whom you wept.

 

God made the world with a heart full of love,

Then He looked down from Heaven above,

And saw that we all need a helping hand,

Someone to share with, who'll understand.

He made special people to see us through

The glad times and the sad times, too;

A person on whom we can always depend,

Someone we can call a friend.

God made friends so we'll carry a part

Of His perfect love in all our hearts.

 

To belittle, you have to be little.

 

Only yesterday I was no different than them, yet I was saved. I am explaining to you the way of life of a people who say every sort of wicked thing about me because I sacrificed their friendship to gain my own soul. I left the dark paths of their duplicity and turned my eyes toward the light where there is salvation, truth, and justice. They have exiled me now from their society, yet I am content. Mankind only exiles the one whose large spirit rebels against injustice and tyranny. He who does not prefer exile to servility is not free in the true and necessary sense of freedom.

 

Half of what I say is meaningless; but I say it so that the other half may reach you.

 

Our worst fault is our preoccupation with the faults of others.

 

The universe is my country and the human family is my tribe.

 

Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self. Therefore, trust the physician and drink his remedy in silence and tranquility.

 

Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children.

 

If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours. And if they don't, they never were.

 

To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires to.

 

If I accept the sunshine and warmth, then I must also accept the thunder and lightning.

 

Between what is said and not meant, and what is meant and not said, most of love is lost.

Anglais