| SOREN KIERKEGAARD |
| (1813-1855) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 |
| �A kiss is a symbolic action which is unimportant when the feeling it should indicate is not present, and this feeling can only be present under certain conditions.� (Either/Or: VOL. I: DIARY OF THE SEDUCER)
�A man is inclined to want to support himself by killing people. Now he sees from God's Word that this is not permissible, that God's will is, �Thou shalt not kill.� �All right,� thinks he, �but that sort of worship doesn't suit me, neither would I be an ungodly man.� What does he do then? He gets hold of a priest who in God's name blesses the daggar.� (Attack Upon "Christendom") �A man of prayer does not pore over learned books, for he is the wise man "whose eyes are opened"--when he kneels down (Numbers 24:16).� (Purity of Heart) �A man who talks like a book is exceedingly tiresome to listen to; sometimes, however, it is quite appropriate to speak in that way. For a book has the remarkable quality that you may interpret it as you wish.� (Either/Or, VOL. I: DIARY OF THE SEDUCER) �A man wishes to write a novel in which one of the characters goes mad; while working on it he himself goes mad by degrees, and finishes it in the first person.� (July 9, 1837) �A man's measure is how long and how far he can endure being alone without the understanding of others.� ("Being Alone", 1854) �A man's whole life is worldliness, all his thought and effort from morning till night, his waking and his dreaming.� ("Ludicrous") �A mirror hangs on the opposite wall; she does not reflect on it, but the mirror reflects her. How faithfully it has caught her picture, like a humble slave who shows his devotion by his faithfulness, a slave for whom she indeed has significance, but who means nothing to her--who indeed dares to catch her, but not to embrace her. Unhappy mirror, that can indeed seize her image but not herself! Unhappy mirror, which cannot hide her image in its secret depths, hide it from the whole world, but on the contrary must betray it to others, as now to me.� (Either/Or, VOL. I: DIARY OF THE SEDUCER) �A physiologist takes it upon himself to explain all of mankind. Here, first and foremost, it is a matter of principiis obsta: What have I to do with this? Why should I need to know about afferent and efferent nerve processes and the circulation of the blood, about the human being's condition microscopically in the womb? The ethical has tasks enough for me. Or must I know the digestive process in order to eat? Or the processes of the nervous system--in order to believe in God and to love men?� (1846) |
 |
| page 1 |