Quotes by Simone Weil

"The contemporary form of true greatness lies in a civilization founded on the spirituality of work."

"What a country calls its vital... interests are not things that help its people live, but things that help it make war."

"A self-respecting nation is ready for anything, including war, except for a renunciation of its option to make war."

"Force is as pitiless to the man who possesses it, or thinks he does, as it is to its victims the second it crushes, the first it intoxicates. The truth is, nobody really possesses it."

"The only way into truth is through one's own annihilation through dwelling a long time in a state of extreme and total humiliation."

"The most important part of teaching is to teach what it is to know."

"There is one, and only one, thing in modern society more hideous than crime namely, repressive justice."

"More than in any other performing arts the lack of respect for acting seems to spring from the fact that every layman considers himself a valid critic."

"In the intellectual order, the virtue of humility is nothing more nor less than the power of attention."

"Evil, when we are in its power, is not felt as evil, but as a necessity, even a duty."

"To get power over is to defile. To possess is to defile."

"Humility is attentive patience."

"I can, therefore I am."

"Evil being the root of mystery, pain is the root of knowledge."

"Whatever debases the intelligence degrades the entire human being."

"The role of the intelligence - that part of us which affirms and denies and formulates opinions is merely to submit."

"The intelligent man who is proud of his intelligence is like the condemned man who is proud of his large cell."

"Imagination and fiction make up more than three quarters of our real life."

"The only hope of socialism resides in those who have already brought about in themselves, as far as is possible in the society of today, that union between manual and intellectual labor which characterizes the society we are aiming at."

"Imagination is always the fabric of social life and the dynamic of history. The influence of real needs and compulsions, of real interests and materials, is indirect because the crowd is never conscious of it."