Elude Us Quotes:

Although computer-generated artificial intelligence eludes us, artificial stupidity has been perfected.

- P. J. O'Rourke

topic: Elude Us, Stupidity, Computer

Falling in love is not an act of will. It is not a conscious choice. No matter how open to or eager for it we may be, the experience may still elude us. Contrarily, the experience may capture us at times when we are definitely not seeking it, when it is inconvenient and undesirable.

- M. Scott Peck

source: M. Scott Peck (2012). “The Road Less Travelled: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth”, p.77, Random House

topic: Falling In Love, Love Is, Elude Us

Happiness eludes us if we run after it.

- Mahatma Gandhi

source: Mahatma Gandhi, Anand T. Hingorani, Ganga Anand Hingorani (1985). “The Encyclopaedia of Gandhian Thoughts”

topic: Running, Elude Us, Elude

In 50 years - or 20 years, or 200 years - our current epistemic horizon (the Big Bang, roughly) may look as parochial as the horizon Newton had to settle for in his day, but no doubt there will still be good questions whose answers elude us.

- Daniel Dennett

topic: Elude Us, Years, Doubt, Good Questions

Eternity eludes us, even as a thought.

- Mason Cooley

topic: Elude Us, Literature, Elude

When 'happiness' eludes us - as, eventually, it always will - we have the invitation to examine our programmed responses and to exercise our power to choose again.

- Richard Rohr

source: "Contemplation: Finding Ourselves, Finding God" by Fr. Richard Rohr, www.huffingtonpost.com. October 13, 2011.

topic: Exercise, Elude Us, Response

If wisdom in government eludes us, perhaps courage could substitute-the moral courage to terminate mistakes.

- Barbara Tuchman

source: Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “Practicing History: Selected Essays”, p.207, Random House

topic: Courage, Mistake, Elude Us

If we try to hold on to our partial glimpses of the divine, we cut it down to our own size and close our minds. Like it or nor, our human experience of anything or anybody is always incomplete: there is usually something that eludes us, some portion of experience that evades our grasp.

- Karen Armstrong

source: Karen Armstrong (2007). “The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness”, p.218, Anchor

topic: Cutting, Elude Us, Mind

Human beliefs, like all other natural growths, elude the barrier of systems.

- Miguel de Unamuno

topic: Believe, Elude Us, Growth

There would seem to be nothing more obvious, more tangible and palpable than the present moment. And yet it eludes us completely. All the sadness of life lies in that fact. In the course of a single second, our senses of sight, of hearing, of smell, register (knowingly or not) a swarm of events and a parade of sensations and ideas passes through our head. Each instant represents a little universe, irrevocably forgotten in the next instant.

- Milan Kundera

topic: Lying, Sadness, Elude Us, Swarms

General principles are not the less true or important because from their nature they elude immediate observation; they are like the air, which is not the less necessary because we neither see nor feel it.

- William Hazlitt

source: William Hazlitt (1809). “The Eloquence of the British Senate: Being a Selection of the Best Speeches of the Most Distinguished English, Irish, and Scotch Parliamentary Speakers, from the Beginning of the Reign of Charles I. to the Present Time”, p.209

topic: Philosophy, Elude Us, Air

The power of psychedelics... is that they often reveal, in the span of a few hours, depths of awe and understanding that can otherwise elude us for a lifetime.

- Sam Harris

source: Sam Harris (2014). “Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion”, p.197, Simon and Schuster

topic: Elude Us, Understanding, Depth

We may know ourselves, and yet even with all the efforts we make, we do not know ourselves. We know our fellowman, and yet we do not know him, because we are not a thing, and our fellowman is not a thing. The further we reach into the depths of our being, on someone else's being, the more the goal of knowledge eludes us.

- Erich Fromm

source: Erich Fromm (2013). “The Art of Loving”, p.37, Open Road Media

topic: Elude Us, Goal, Effort

Love is always changing and unless we stay aware and change with it, it eludes us.

- Leo Buscaglia

source: "Leo Buscaglia - An Exclusive Interview". Interview with Veronica M. Hay, www.peopleandpossibilities.com. 1998.

topic: Love, Love Is, Elude Us

At sunrise everything is luminous but not clear.

- Norman Maclean

source: Norman Maclean, Barry Moser (1989). “A River Runs Through It”, p.45, University of Chicago Press

topic: Sunrise, Clear, Luminous, Elude You, Elude Us

For lack of attention a thousand forms of loveliness elude us every day.

- Evelyn Underhill

source: Evelyn Underhill, Dana Greene (1988). “Evelyn Underhill: Modern Guide to the Ancient Quest for the Holy”, p.75, SUNY Press

topic: Beauty, Attention, Elude, Loveliness, Elude Us

Crime is a fact of the human species, a fact of that species alone, but it is above all the secret aspect, impenetrable and hidden. Crime hides, and by far the most terrifying things are those which elude us.

- Georges Bataille

topic: Secret, Facts, Elude, Crime And Criminals, Criminals Crime

Each one of us here today will at one time in our lives look upon a loved one who is in need and ask the same question: We are willing to help, Lord, but what, if anything, is needed? For it is true we can seldom help those closest to us. Either we don't know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them - we can love completely without complete understanding.

- Norman Maclean

topic: Love, Giving, Understanding, Completeness, Elude Us

At sunrise everything is luminous but not clear. It is those we live with and love and should know who elude us. You can love completely without complete understanding.

- Norman Maclean

source: Norman Maclean (2009). “A River Runs Through It and Other Stories, Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition”, p.104, University of Chicago Press

topic: Love, Understanding, Sunrise, Luminous, Elude You

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

topic: Time, Memories, Past, Inadequate, Past And Present

If you want something, it will elude you. If you do not want something, you will get ten of it in the mail.

- Anna Quindlen

topic: Literature, Want, Mail, Elude You, Elude Us

But, as we have before been led to remark, most of Mr. Darwin's statements elude, by their vagueness and incompleteness, the test of Natural History facts.

- Richard Owen

topic: Tests, Facts, Elude, Incompleteness, Vagueness

But what you could perhaps do with in these days is a word of most sincere sympathy. Your movement is carried internally by so strong a truth and necessity that victory in one form or another cannot elude you for long.

- Hjalmar Schacht

topic: Sympathy, Strong, Long, Elude You, Elude Us

This commitment to truth is something one senses more and more Americans yearning for, just as they are becoming more and more sophisticated at knowing when the truth is being obscured - an irony that seems to elude most of todays elected officials.

- Michael Musto

topic: Commitment, Knowing, Today, Elected Officials, Elude You

Popularity, I have always thought, may aptly be compared to a coquette-the more you woo her, the more apt is she to elude your embrace.

- John Tyler

source: Message to the House, December 18, 1816.

topic: Presidential, Coquette, May, Us Presidential, Elude You

If you chase something too desperately, it eludes you.

- Steve Coogan

topic: Elude, Elude You, Elude Us

The more we try and understand enlightenment the more it will elude us. And that's because enlightenment does not come from the mind. It comes form 'no-mind.' It comes form just being. You are already enlightened. You just have to realize it to allow it into your experience.

- Anita Moorjani

topic: Mind, Enlightenment, Trying, Elude Us

Absolute certainty will always elude us. We will always be mired in error. The most each generation can hope for is to reduce the error. . . .

- Carl Sagan

source: Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.52, Ballantine Books

topic: Absolute Certainty, Elude Us

Yet so often it seems that victory eludes us. It is when our self-confidence is finally destroyed and is replaced with dependence upon God that we have victory.

- K.P. Yohannan

topic: Self Confidence, Victory, Elude, Elude Us

It is an absolutely vain endeavor to attempt to reconstruct or even comprehend the nature of a human being by simply knowing the forces which have acted upon him. However deeply we should like to penetrate, however close we seem to be drawing to truth, one unknown quantity eludes us: man's primordial energy, his original self, that personality which was given him with the gift of life itself. On it rests man's true freedom; it alone determines his real character.

- Wilhelm von Humboldt

topic: Real, Character, Men, Real Character, Gifts Of Life

We don't have to go in search of our mission or purpose. The more we search for it, the more it will elude us. We just have to be ourselves and find our joy in the present moment or do what calls us in the present moment and our mission will unfold.

- Anita Moorjani

topic: Joy, Purpose, Elude, Elude Us

Acutely aware of the poverty of my means, language became obstacle. At every page I thought, 'That's not it.' So I began again with other verbs and other images. No, that wasn't it either. But what exactly was that it I was searching for? It must have been all that eludes us, hidden behind a veil so as not to be stolen, usurped and trivialized. Words seemed weak and pale.

- Elie Wiesel

topic: Writing, Mean, Verbs, Elude Us

It is the familiar that usually eludes us in life. What is before our nose is what we see last.

- William Barrett

topic: Life, Vision, Elude, Elude Us

Every fall into love involves the triumph of hope over self-knowledge. We fall in love hoping we won't find in another what we know is in ourselves, all the cowardice, weakness, laziness, dishonesty, compromise, and stupidity. We throw a cordon of love around the chosen one and decide that everything within it will somehow be free of our faults. We locate inside another a perfection that eludes us within ourselves, and through our union with the beloved hope to maintain (against the evidence of all self-knowledge) a precarious faith in our species.

- Alain de Botton

topic: Falling In Love, Self, Perfection, Chosen One, Elude Us

Even though the discples were not aware of it, the presence was with them while they were reviewing the scriptures together on the road. Henceforth, we will catch only a fleeting glimpse of it -- in the study of sacred writings, in other human beings, in liturgy, and in communion with strangers. But these moments remain us that our fellow men and women are themselves sacred; there is something about them taht is worthy of absolute reverence, is in the last resort mysterious, and we will always elude us.

- Karen Armstrong

topic: Writing, Men, Together, Elude Us

Many of you have already found out, and others will find out in the course of their lives, that truth eludes us if we do not concentrate our attention totally on it's pursuit. But even while it eludes us, the illusion of knowing it still lingers and leads to many misunderstandings. Also, truth seldom is pleasant; it is almost invariably bitter.

- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

topic: Knowing, Elude, Attention, Elude Us

The fact is that the beautiful, humanly speaking, is merely form considered in its simplest aspect, in its most perfect symmetry, in its most entire harmony with our make-up. Thus the ensemble that it offers us is always complete, but restricted like ourselves. What we call the ugly, on the contrary, is a detail of a great whole which eludes us, and which is in harmony, not with man but with all creation. That is why it constantly presents itself to us in new but incomplete aspects.

- Victor Hugo

topic: Beautiful, Men, Perfect, Symmetry, Completeness

schools for love do not exist. everyone assumes that we will know how to love instinctively. despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, we still accept that the family is the primary school for love. those of us who do not learn how to love among family are expected to experience love in romantic relationships. however this love often eludes us.

- Bell Hooks

topic: School, Elude, How To Love, Primary School, Romantic Relationship

Something must always remain that eludes us ... For power to have an object on which it can be exercised, a space in which to stretch out its arms ... As long as I know there exists in the world someone who does tricks only for the love of the trick, as long as I know there is a woman who loves reading for reading's sake, I can convince myself that the world continues ... And every evening I, too, abandon myself to reading, like that distant unknown woman ....

- Italo Calvino

topic: Reading, Space, Long, Love Of Reading, Elude Us

Indeed, the direction of the future is only there in order to elude us.

- Georges Bataille

topic: Order, Elude, Elude Us

The stories we sit up late to hear are love stories. It seems that we cannot know enough about this riddle of our lives. We go back and back to the same scenes, the same words, trying to scrape out the meaning. Nothing could be more familiar than love. Nothing else eludes us so completely.

- Jeanette Winterson

topic: Trying, Stories, Elude, Meaning Nothing, Elude Us

All that is best for us comes of itself into our hands-but if we strive to overtake it, it perpetually eludes us.

- Ananda Coomaraswamy

source: Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy (1924). “The Dance of ?iva: Essays on Indian Art and Culture”, p.109, Courier Corporation

topic: Hands, Elude, Awareness, Elude Us

I believe profoundly in the possibilities of democracy, but democracy needs to be emancipated from capitalism. As long as we inhabit a capitalist democracy, a future of racial equality, gender equality, economic equality will elude us.

- Angela Davis

topic: Believe, Long, Democracy, Economic Equality, Racial Equality

The unique eludes us; yet we remain faithful to the ideal of it; and in spite of sense and of our merely abstract thinking, it becomes for us the most real thing in the actual world, although for us it is the elusive goal of an infinite quest.

- Josiah Royce

source: Josiah Royce (1952). “The Religious Philosophy of Josiah Royce; Edited, with an Introductory Essay, by Stuart Gerry Brown”

topic: Real, Unique, Thinking, Abstract Thinking, Elude Us

The past slips from our grasp. It leaves us only scattered things. The bond that united them eludes us. Our imagination usually fills in the void by making use of preconceived theories...Archaeology, then, does not supply us with certitudes, but rather with vague hypotheses. And in the shade of these hypotheses some artists are content to dream, considering them less as scientific facts than as sources of inspiration.

- Igor Stravinsky

topic: Dream, Inspiration, Artist, Archaeology, Elude Us

The creative act is also in a small way a suffering act - we start out with our ego, this hope of making this thing whatever it be, but so often it eludes us and it collapses and we kind of regress into this mental suffering, we can't find what we're looking for.

- Michael Leunig

topic: Creative, Ego, Suffering, Elude Us

Freedom, peace, and inner joy will continue to elude us until we become aware of our real truth, without hiding ourselves or being ashamed of what we are.

- Lynn Grabhorn

topic: Real, Joy, Elude, Elude Us

And so when we talk about intangible values remember that they cannot be separated from the others. The conservation of waters, forests, soils, and wildlife are all involved with the conservation of the human spirit. The goal we all strive toward is happiness, contentment, the dignity of the individual, and the good life. This goal will elude us forever if we forget the importance of the intangibles.

- Sigurd F. Olson

topic: Good Life, Water, Goal, Elude Us

Every other civilized country has determined when life begins and it's something that eludes us. We've got things that have to be done! "We didn't fix that bridge because you are all down at the meeting house discussing abortion again."

- Lewis Black

topic: Country, Bridges, House, Discussing, Elude Us