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  • Alain de Botton Quotes   372
  • I thought about societies where exceptional fortunes are built up in industries with very little connection to out sincere and significant needs, industries where it is difficult to escape from the disparity between a seriousness of means and a triviality of ends.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Mean Quotes , Connections Quotes
  • Sublime places repeat in grand terms a lesson that ordinary life typically teaches viciously: that the universe is mightier than we are, that we are frail and temporary and have no alternative but to accept limitations on our will; that we must bow to necessities greater than ourselves.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Sublime Quotes , Bows Quotes
  • It is the most ambitious and driven among us who are the most sorely in need of having our reckless hopes dampened through immersive dousings in the darkness which religions have explored. This is a particular priority for secular Americans, perhaps the most anxious and disappointed people on earth, for their nation infuses them with the most extreme hopes about what they may be able to achieve in their working lives and relationships.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Atheist Quotes , People Quotes
  • The pre-scientific age, whatever its deficiencies, had at least offered its members the peace of mind that follows from knowing all man-made achievements to be nothing next to the grandeur of the universe. We, more blessed in our gadgetry but less humble in our outlook, have been left... having no more compelling repository of veneration than our brilliant, precise, blinkered and morally troubling fellow human beings.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Blessed Quotes , Humble Quotes
  • .. if you asked most people whether they believed in love or not, they’d probably say they didn’t. Yet that’s not necessarily what they truly think. It’s just the way they defend themselves against what they want. They believe in it, but pretend they don’t until they’re allowed to. Most people would throw away all their cynicism if they could. The majority just never gets the chance.
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Believe Quotes , Thinking Quotes
  • There is psychological pleasure in this takeoff, too, for the swiftness of the plane’s ascent is an exemplary symbol of transformation. The display of power can inspire us to imagine analogous, decisive shifts in our own lives, to imagine that we, too, might one day surge above much that now looms over us.” P. 38-39
  • 6 years ago



    Tags : Alain de Botton Quotes , Inspire Quotes , One Day Quotes