Reflection famous quotes
05-25-2025
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One bright and thankful look at the cross is worth a thousand morbid, self-condemning reflections.
-- A. B. Simpson -
It takes a certain ingenuous faith - but I have it - to believe that people who read and reflect more likely than not come to judge things with liberality and truth.
-- A.C. Grayling -
Reflection is the lamp of the heart. If it departs, the heart will have no light.
-- Abdullah ibn Alawi al-Haddad -
City lights shine bright on my complexion, Self-reflection...red hairs flashing at the intersection. Life is a green light, one star, no script, Supporting actors...fresh peaches, no pit.
-- Action Bronson -
When you do what you want, not what you wish...' said the first raven. 'When you no longer seek your reflection in others' eyes...' said the second. 'When you see yourselves face to face...' said the third. 'Then,' the ravens intoned in unison, 'you will have found what you truly seek.
-- Adam Gidwitz -
A man, engaged in his simple reflections in everyday life, will comprehend neither the possibility, nor the benefits of self-sacrifice, but, when given ("qu'on lui donne", Fr.) a great cause to defend, and he will find only natural to sacrifice oneself for it.
-- African Spir -
One of the saddest things in life, is the things one remembers.
-- Agatha Christie -
All our first movements are good, generous, heroical; reflection weakens and kills them.
-- Aime Martin -
Learn to see that it is not things that bother us, that we go out to bother them. See the world as a mirror. It is all a reflection of the mind. When you know this, you can grow in every moment, and every experience reveals truth and brings understanding.
-- Ajahn Chah -
Darkness is where we begin and where we end. We don't usually see light traveling in darkness of space because we only can see its reflection on substance.
-- Ala Bashir -
Art is not ideology. It is completely impossible to explain art on the basis of the homological relation that it is supposed to maintain with the real of history. The aesthetic process decentres the specular relation with which ideology perpetuates its closed infinity. The aesthetic effect is certainly imaginary; but this imaginary is not the reflection of the real, since it is the real of this reflection.
-- Alain Badiou -
TV has taken reflection out of the human condition. People didn't use to have a ready answer for everything, whether they knew something about it or not. People think they have to have an answer for everything because the guys on TV have an answer for everything. But it's bullsh**t! Reflection is crucial.
-- Alan Arkin -
Everyone and everything that shows up in our life is a reflection of something that is happening inside of us.
-- Alan Cohen -
Put simply, the church finds itself in a post-Christendom era, and it had better do some serious reflection or face increasing decline and eventual irrelevance.
-- Alan Hirsch -
Comedy is a reflection. We create nothing. We set no styles, no standards. We're reflections. It's a distorted mirror in the fun house. We watch society. As society behaves, then we have the ability to make fun of it.
-- Alan King -
I have no opposition at all to technology. I think technology is a wonderful thing that has to be used thoughtfully, and we can't just assume that every bit of new technology improvesthe quality of life; it's really in how the technology is used. What I am very disturbed about is this trend of everything happening faster and faster and faster and there being more and more general noise in the world, and less and less time for quiet reflection on who we are, and where we're going.
-- Alan Lightman -
It (Arsenal) is an English club but not an English success. It's probably a greater reflection of youngsters from France and elsewhere in Europe.
-- Alan Pardew -
Well, it's a good life and a good world, all said and done, if you don't weaken.
-- Alan Sillitoe -
Imagine a multidimensiona l spider's web in the early morning covered with dew drops. And every dew drop contains the reflection of all the other dew drops. And, in each reflected dew drop, the reflections of all the other dew drops in that reflection. And so ad infinitum. That is the Buddhist conception of the universe in an image.
-- Alan Watts -
Music is at once the product of feeling and knowledge, for it requires from its disciples, composers and performers alike, not only talent and enthusiasm, but also that knowledge and perception which are the result of protracted study and reflection.
-- Alban Berg -
People not only gain understanding through reflection, they evaluate and alter their own thinking.
-- Albert Bandura -
Mozart's music is so pure and beautiful that I see it as a reflection of the inner beauty of the universe.
-- Albert Einstein -
But without deeper reflection one knows from daily life that one exists for other people--first of all for those upon whose smiles and well-being our own happiness is wholly dependent, and then for the many, unknown to us, to whose destinies we are bound by the ties of sympathy.
-- Albert Einstein -
If every library is in some sense a reflection of its readers, it is also an image of that which we are not, and cannot be.
-- Alberto Manguel -
The stories that unfold in the space of a writer's study, the objects chosen to watch over a desk, the books selected to sit on the shelves, all weave a web of echoes and reflections of meanings and affections, that lend a visitor the illusion that something of the owner of this space lives on between these walls, even if the owner is no more.
-- Alberto Manguel -
In the hall of mirrors, you are everywhere. Which is the real you? Find your original Self, the one who perceives all the reflections and is amused by them. Then you will recognize your path and walk it.
-- Alberto Villoldo -
Modern man's besetting temptation is to sacrifice his direct perceptions and spontaneous feelings to his reasoned reflections; to prefer in all circumstances the verdict of his intellect to that of his immediate intuitions.
-- Aldous Huxley -
Whether you are Minor White or Robert Frank, almost every photograph starts with an act of pure description - a window. But every now and then you catch a glimpse of the photographer's reflection. The mirror is just another function of the window.
-- Alec Soth -
What message, years of conflagration, have you: madness or hope? On thin cheeks strained by war and liberation bloody reflections still remain.
-- Alexander Blok -
It is a sad reflection . . . that a sense of responsibility which comes with power is the rarest of things.
-- Alexander Crummell -
If people are concerned about my house and where I live again it's much more of a reflection on them than it is on me.
-- Alexander Downer -
It has been frequently remarked, that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country to decide, by their conduct and example, the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not, of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend, for their political constitutions, on accident and force.
-- Alexander Hamilton -
When occasions present themselves, in which the interests of the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those interests, to withstand the temporary delusion, in order to give them time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection.
-- Alexander Hamilton -
In vain sedate reflections we would make When half our knowledge we must snatch, not take.
-- Alexander Pope -
The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage. That is a commonplace truth, but one to which my studies are always bringing me back. It is the central point in my conception. I see it at the end of all my reflections.
-- Alexis de Tocqueville -
When I reflect on how things have changed, I can't help but laugh.
-- Alexis Korner -
Mere numbers cannot bring out ... the intimate essence of the experiment. This conviction comes naturally when one watches a subject at work. ... What things can happen! What reflections, what remarks, what feelings, or, on the other hand, what blind automatism, what absence of ideas! ... The experimenter judges what may be going on in [the subject's] mind, and certainly feels difficulty in expressing all the oscillations of a thought in a simple, brutal number, which can have only a deceptive precision. How, in fact, could it sum up what would need several pages of description!
-- Alfred Binet -
You’re like a lighthouse shining beside the sea of humanity, motionless: all you can see is your own reflection in the water. You’re alone, so you think it’s a vast, magnificent panorama. You haven’t sounded the depths. You simply believe in the beauty of God’s creation. But I have spent all this time in the water, diving deep into the howling ocean of life, deeper than anyone. While you were admiring the surface, I saw the shipwrecks, the drowned bodies, the monsters of the deep
-- Alfred de Musset -
It seems obvious to me that the notion of God has never been anything but a kind of ideal projection, a reflection upward of the human personality, and that theology never has been and never can be anything but a more and more purified mythology.
-- Alfred Loisy -
I think that if I get into the habit of writing a bit about what happens, or rather doesn't happen, I may lose a little of the sense of isolation and desolation which abides with me. My circumstances allowing of nothing but the ***** of one-syllabled reflections, a written monologue by that most interesting being, myself, may have its yet to be discovered consolations.
-- Alice James -
We evolved. We have only to look at the pouting face of a young chimpanzee to laugh at its reflections of ourselves. We know that more then 98 percent of our genes are shared with the chimpanzee, but we feel the kinship directly when the furry baby puts up its arms to be held.
-- Alison Jolly -
My mirror image always had to be interpreted. And for that I sought my reflection in someone else's eyes.
-- Alix Kates Shulman -
I think a lot of self-identity and inner-personal development is hampered by consumerism and capitalism because we see ourselves as a reflection of the TV, rather than as a reflection of the people who are around us, truly.
-- Aloe Blacc -
Friends tell the truth to one another. Friends don't slam the door to correction or reflection when it is offered with affection.
-- Amy Dickinson -
You cannot tie your fiance to the railroad track of self-reflection and personal improvement.
-- Amy Dickinson -
How much more beautiful is the moon, Slanting down the gauffered branches of a plum-tree; The moon Wavering across a bed of tulips; The moon, Still, Upon your face. You shine, Beloved, You and the moon. But which is the reflection?
-- Amy Lowell -
You carry away with you a reflection of me, a part of me. I dreamed you; I wished for your existence. You will always be a part of my life. If I love you, it must be because we shared, at some moment, the same imaginings, the same madness, the same stage.
-- Anais Nin -
The important thing is that man is lost in time, in the moment that immediately precedes him - which only attests, by reflection, to the fact that he is lost in the moment that follows
-- Andre Breton -
Government . . . is a reflection of us. It is up to us to earn a better reflection.
-- Andrew Horning -
In a Western or a thriller there is often room for reflection upon the coercive necessities; even, occasionally, some attempt to pose other possibilities. In the horror movies there is finally a Hobbesian state of nature: 'continual fear and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short'.
-- Andrew Tudor -
In the sweet territory of silence we touch the mystery. It's the place of reflection and contemplation, and it's the place where we can connect with the deep knowing, to the deep wisdom way.
-- Angeles Arrien -
The universe is contained within us, and what we experience externally is only a reflection.
-- Anita Moorjani -
How could you cleanse yourself if you couldn’t forget?
-- Ann Brashares -
Ten years ago I was not heavily involved in the film world but on reflection it was a boom time with the mineral boom happening, so there was immense growth for industrial training films, documentaries to do with the mining, and the outback world.
-- Ann Macbeth -
I myself, from the very beginning, Seemed to myself like someone's dream or delirium Or a reflection in someone else's mirror, Without flesh, without meaning, without a name. Already I knew the list of crimes That I was destined to commit.
-- Anna Akhmatova -
To me, fashion is like a mirror. It's a reflection of the times. And if it doesn't reflect the times, it's not fashion. Because people aren't gonna be wearing it.
-- Anna Sui -
Fashion is a reflection of our times. Fashion can tell you everything that's going on in the world with a strong fashion image.
-- Anna Wintour -
When I tell you not to marry without love, I do not advise you to marry for love alone: there are many, many other things to be considered. Keep both heart and hand in your own possession, till you see good reason to part with them; and if such an occasion should never present itself, comfort your mind with this reflection, that though in single life your joys may not be very many, your sorrows, at least, will not be more than you can bear. Marriage may change your circumstances for the better, but, in my private opinion, it is far more likely to produce a contrary result.
-- Anne Bronte -
I did not know my soul until I saw it's reflection in your eyes.
-- Anne Fortier -
The city (regardless which one it is) does provide a certain degree of sophistication and intellectualism. It offers the challenge of professional matters. It throws new and interesting people in one's path. There is a dynamic and an energy in cities which is diametric to the life-forces of the forest. Still the cabin is the wellspring, the source, the hub of my existence. It gives me tranquility, a closeness of nature and wildlife, good health and fitness, a sense of security, the opportunity for resourcefulness, reflection and creative thinking.....
-- Anne LaBastille -
The Amateur Marriage grew out of the reflection that of all the opportunities to show differences in character, surely an unhappy marriage must be the richest.
-- Anne Tyler -
Like any child, I slid into myself perfectly fitted, as a diver meets her reflection in a pool. Her fingertips enter the fingertips on the water, her wrists slide up her arms. The diver wraps herself in her reflection wholly, sealing it at the toes, and wears it as she climbs rising from the pool, and ever after.
-- Annie Dillard -
He who is different from me does not impoverish me - he enriches me. Our unity is constituted in something higher than ourselves - in Man... For no man seeks to hear his own echo, or to find his reflection in the glass.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery -
I am interested in study, reflection, philosophy - but always as a dilettante. I also consider myself a dilettante as a painter.
-- Antoni Tapies -
Reading Shakespeare is sometimes like looking through a window into a dark room. You don't see in. You see nothing but a reflection of yourself unable to see in. An unflattering image of yourself blind.
-- Antony Sher -
No - the light in Tamani's eyes was much more than a reflection. It was the fire that melted her anger and devastated her resolve, every single time she saw it.
-- Aprilynne Pike -
A lot of women make choices based on how they saw their mother's choices working out, how they saw the choices of the women elders in their lives working out. There's some rebellion in that, but there's also some deep reflection.
-- Ariel Gore -
We don't take photographs with our cameras, we take them with our hearts and our minds. They are a reflection of ourselves...wha t we are and what we think.
-- Arnold Newman -
Influences come from everywhere but when you are actually shooting you work primarily by instinct. But what is instinct? It is a lifetime accumulation of influence: experience, knowledge, seeing and hearing. There is little time for reflection in taking a photograph. All your experiences come to a peak and you work on two levels: conscious and unconscious.
-- Arnold Newman -
To tell the truth, in Pacific 231 I was on the trail of a very abstract and quite ideal concept, by giving the impression of a mathematical acceleration of rhythm, while the movement itself slowed . Â I first called this piece Mouvement symphonique. On reflection I found that a bit colorless. Suddenly, a rather romantic image crossed my mind, and when the work was finished, I wrote the title Pacific 231, which indicates a locomotive for heavy loads and high speeds (a type unfortunately disappeared, alas, and sacrificed to electric traction).
-- Arthur Honegger -
He fell in love with Manhattan's skyline, like a first-time brothel guest falling for a seasoned professional. He mused over her reflections in the black East River at dusk, dawn, or darkest night, and each haloed light-in a tower or strung along the jeweled and sprawling spider legs of the Brooklyn Bridge's spans-hinted at some meaning, which could be understood only when made audible by music and encoded in lyrics.
-- Arthur Phillips -
In youth it is the outward aspect of things that most engages us; while in age, thought or reflection is the predominating qualityof the mind. Hence, youth is the time for poetry, and age is more inclined to philosophy. In practical affairs it is the same: a man shapes his resolutions in youth more by the impression that the outward world makes upon him; whereas, when he is old, it is thought that determines his actions.
-- Arthur Schopenhauer -
I act with full responsibility and after extensive reflection.
-- Asger Jorn -
In 1939 I wrote my first article ("Intime banaliteter" [Intimate banalities] in the journal Helhesten ) in which I expressed my love for sofa painting, and for the last twenty years I have been preoccupied with the idea of rendering homage to it. Thus I act with full responsibility and after extensive reflection. Only my current situation has enabled me to accomplish the expensive task of demonstrating that the preferred sustenance of painting is painting.
-- Asger Jorn -
The milestone of 100 episodes is a reflection of the amazing work and dedication of the entire Clone Wars cast and crew. Being a part of this production has been an honor and privilege that has changed my life forever.
-- Ashley Eckstein -
The thinker requires exactly the same light as the painter, clear, without direct sunshine, or blinding reflection, and, where possible, from above.
-- August Wilhelm von Schlegel -
I have lived with my conscience and my own memories for over quarter of a century since the events of 1973.... These are not easy reflections for me. But I am at peace with myself, and with the Chilean people, about what happened. I am clear in my mind that the return to Chile of true democracy, and from that the true freedom to which all individual people are entitled, could not have been achieved without the removal of the Marxist government.
-- Augusto Pinochet -
There’s something very important about films about black women and girls being made by black women. It’s a different perspective. It is a reflection as opposed to an interpretation, and I think we get a lot of interpretations about the lives of women that are not coming from women.
-- Ava DuVernay -
People want nothing but mirrors around them. To reflect them while they’re reflecting too ... Reflections of reflections and echoes of echoes. No beginning and no end. No center and no purpose.
-- Ayn Rand -
Whatever we attempt is a reflection of our inner thirst, which we hope to quench in all these external ways. What we are looking for lies within us, and if we gave out time and energy to an interior search, we would come across it much faster, since that is the only place where it is to be found.
-- Ayya Khema -
Self-reflection is the school of wisdom.
-- Baltasar Gracian -
Women need real moments of solitude and self reflection to balance out how much of ourselves we give away.
-- Barbara De Angelis -
the art world has always been an unrelenting taste machine, but now flavors of the month have morphed into flavors of the minute. Again, all a reflection of a wider cultural condition. I mean, the art world is slow compared with the music and movie businesses.
-- Barbara Kruger -
All efforts at self-transformation challenge us to engage in on-going, critical self-examination and reflection about feminist practice, and about how we live in the world. This individual commitment, when coupled with engagement in collective discussion, provides a space for critical feedback which strengthens our efforts to change and make ourselves anew.
-- Bell Hooks -
The man of reflection discovers Truth;Â but the one who enjoys it and makes use of its heavenly gifts is the man of action.
-- Benito Perez Galdos -
Many studies have established the fact that there is a high correlation between vocabulary and intelligence and that the ability to increase one's vocabulary throughout life is a sure reflection of intellectual progress.
-- Bergen Evans -
We are ... led to a somewhat vague distinction between what we may call "hard" data and "soft" data. This distinction is a matter of degree, and must not be pressed; but if not taken too seriously it may help to make the situation clear. I mean by "hard" data those which resist the solvent influence of critical reflection, and by "soft" data those which, under the operation of this process, become to our minds more or less doubtful.
-- Bertrand Russell -
On the robot kit, I can choose very boring parts or I can choose exciting and interesting parts. That is a reflection of my personality and the kinds of things I am interested in.
-- Bill Budge -
I had a born-again experience at the age of 33. As a result of that I found a church where I felt I was being fed properly. I don't say that as a reflection on Catholicism. But once I was born again, I got an evangelical spirit.
-- Bill McCartney -
There is no ideal Christmas; only the one Christmas you decide to make as a reflection of your values, desires, affections, traditions.
-- Bill McKibben -
Television can stir emotions, but it doesn't invite reflection as much as the printed page.
-- Bill Moyers -
When I make my work, I am making what I hope to be something functional - a space for individual contemplation and reflection. I want my art to be useful.
-- Bill Viola -
Music is critical in our lives and culture. It's the inspiration that drives us. It's also the window to our souls. It's a reflection as to who we are, what we stand for and where we're going.
-- Bill Walton -
The Bible stresses that a marriage ideally should be a picture or a reflection of Christ's love for His people.
-- Billy Graham -
Eloquence is a way of saying things in such a way, first, that those to whom we speak may listen to them without pain and with pleasure, and second, that they feel themselves interested, so that self-love leads them more willingly to reflection upon it.
-- Blaise Pascal -
they say every man needs protection, they say every man must fall. yet I swear I see my reflection,some place high above this wall.....and someday I shall be released.
-- Bob Dylan -
I can't see my reflection in the waters, I can't speak the sounds that show no pain. I can't hear the echo of my footsteps, or can't remember the sound of my own name.
-- Bob Dylan -
Garry Hill is a pleasure to be around, and his work is a rewarding reflection of my career.
-- Bobby Allison -
Just another point of view, I'm just a reflection of you.
-- Bootsy Collins -
The very fine line between loneliness and solitude, reflection; being alone, always appealed to me when I was a kid.
-- Brad Mehldau
