Joseph Conrad quotes - page 4

One wonders that there can be found a man courageous enough to occupy the post. It is a matter of meditation. Having given it a few minutes I come to the conclusion in the serenity of my heart and the peace of my conscience that he must be either an extreme megalomaniac or an utterly unconscious being. (Joseph Conrad)
Even geniuses get the blues. The more I write the less substance I see in my work, ... It is tolerably awful. And I face it, I face it but the fright is growing on me. My fortitude is shaken by the view of the monster. It does not move its eyes are baleful it is as still as death itself -- and it will devour me. Its stare has eaten into my soul already deep, deep. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Every age is fed on illusions, lest men should renounce life early and the human race come to an end. View quote
Joseph Conrad
The air of the New World seems favorable to the art of declamation. View quote
Joseph Conrad
The world of finance is a mysterious world in which, incredible as the fact may appear, evaporation precedes liquidation. View quote
Joseph Conrad
There is no peace and no rest in the development of material interests. They have their law, and their justice. But it is founded on expediency, and is inhuman; it is without rectitude, without the continuity and the force that can be found only in a moral principal. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Each blade of grass has its spot on earth whence it draws its life, its strength; and so is man rooted to the land from which he draws his faith together with his life. View quote
Joseph Conrad
It is respectable to have no illusions, and safe, and profitable and dull. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Egoism, which is the moving force of the world, and altruism, which is its morality, these two contradictory instincts, of which one is so plain and the other so mysterious, cannot serve us unless in the incomprehensible alliance of their irreconcilable antagonism. View quote
Joseph Conrad
The sea never changes and its works, for all the talks of men, are wrapped in mystery. View quote
Joseph Conrad
I saw him open his mouth wide. . . as though he had wanted to swallow all the air, all the earth, all the men before him. (Joseph Conrad)
For all that has been said of the love that certain natures (on shore) have professed for it, for all the celebrations it has been the object of in prose and song, the sea has never been friendly to man. At most it has been the accomplice of human restlessness. View quote
Joseph Conrad
There is something haunting in the light of the moon it has all the dispassionateness of a disembodied soul, and something of its inconceivable mystery. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Above all, we must forgive the unhappy souls who have elected to make the pilgrimage on foot, who skirt the shore and look uncomprehendingly upon the horror of the struggle, the joy of victory, the profound hopelessness of the vanquished. View quote
Joseph Conrad
The mind of man is capable of anything. View quote
Joseph Conrad
He remembered that she was pretty, and, more, that she had a special grace in the intimacy of life. She had the secret of individuality which excites--and escapes. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Let them think what they liked, but I didn't mean to drown myself. I meant to swim till I sank -- but that's not the same thing. View quote
Joseph Conrad
I don't like work... but I like what is in work - the chance to find yourself. Your own reality - for yourself, not for others - which no other man can ever know. View quote
Joseph Conrad
All a man can betray is his conscience. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Even extreme grief may ultimately vent itself in violence--but more generally takes the form of apathy. View quote
Joseph Conrad
Few men realize that their life, the very essence of their character, their capabilities and their audacities, are only the expression of their belief in the safety of their surroundings. (Joseph Conrad)
It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core. View quote
Joseph Conrad
They were conquerors, and for that you want only brute force--nothing to boast of, when you have it, since your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others. View quote
Joseph Conrad
No, it is impossible; it is impossible to convey the life-sensation of any given epoch of one's existence--that which makes its truth, its meaning--its subtle and penetrating essence. It is impossible. We live, as we dream--alone. View quote
Joseph Conrad
All idealization makes life poorer. To beautify it is to take away its character of complexity - it is to destroy it. View quote
Joseph Conrad