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Rabindranath Tagore
130 quotes
“As early as 1902 (Bengali Samvat 1309) Rabindranath Tagore wrote that there was no Indian in the history of India written by foreigners: “as if Indians do not exist; only those who have fought and killed among themselves are real ... we are not parasites of India; through hundreds of centuries we have put down tens of thousands of roots in the heart of this land, but unfortunately we have to read a type of history which makes our children forget exactly this. It appears that in (the history of) India we are nobodies; only those who have come from outside matter in (the history of this) land.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: quoted from Chakrabarti, D. K., 1997. Colonial Indology: Sociopolitics of the Ancient Indian Past. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd.
“It was indeed a great day not only for the Sikhs but also for the whole of India when Guru Govinda, defying the age-long conventions of the Hindu society, made his followers one, by breaking down all barriers of caste and thereby made them free to inherit the true blessings of a self-respecting manhood. Sikhism has a brave message to the people and it has a noble record.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1937 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Mahadevi Desai, 4 January 1937. Quoted in The Essential Tagore, Cambridge, Massachusetts : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011.
“Our real ties are with the Bharatavarsha that lies outside our textbooks. If the history of this tie for a substantially long period gets lost, our soul loses its anchorage. After all, we are no weeds or parasitical plants in India. Over many hundreds of years, it is our roots, hundreds and thousands of them, that have occupied the very heart of Bharatavarsha. But, unfortunately, we are obliged to learn a brand of history that makes our children forget this very fact. It appears as if we are nobody in India; as if those who came from outside alone matter.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Rabindranath Tagore: The History of Bharatavarsha. quoted in The Problem of Indian History by Michel Danino* (Published in Dialogue, April-June 2012, vol. 13, no. 4)
“The ancient Indians distrusted the pace and pomp of urbandom; they distrusted it strongly enough to resist central authority and conformism.... "To know my country one has to travel to that age, when she realized her soul and thus transcended her physical boundaries when she revealed her being in a radiant magnanimity which illumined the eastern horizon, making her recognized as their own by those in alien shores who were awakened into a surprise of life."... [He also said about the culture of Indonesia:] ' I see India all around me.'”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Tagore, As attributed and quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture
“I cannot but bring to your mind those days when the whole of Eastern Asia, from Burma to Japan was united with India in the closest ties of friendship...”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Rabindranath Tagore, Essays, Nationalism in Japan, Atlantic Publishers & Dist, 2007 p.471, and quoted in A Look at India From the Views of Other Scholars, by Stephen Knapp
“The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Patriotism cannot be our final spiritual shelter; my refuge is humanity. I will not buy glass for the price of diamonds, and I will never allow patriotism to triumph over humanity as long as I live. I took a few steps down that road and stopped; for when I cannot retain my faith in universal man standing over and above my country, when patriotic prejudices overshadow my God, I feel inwardly starved.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1908 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 1908 letter to Aurobindo Mohan Bose, quoted in Selected Letters of Rabindranath Tagore, Krishna Dutta and Andrew Robinson (1997, p.72)
“When the other person understands that I am not trying to enslave him, or not forcing him to do things against his will, he will surely understand I am doing what every human should do unto another. He will understand that with “Bande Mataram” we are worshipping a motherland whose children are the great and the small. Then, we will not insult or demean anyone through our attitudes, words and thoughts whether Muslim or lower caste, Bihari or Oriya, English educated or not — we will not be filled with self-pride.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1909 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Shodupaye, 1909. Translated by Debjani Sengupta. Quoted in The Essential Tagore, Cambridge, Massachusetts : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011.
“The truth comes as conqueror only because we have lost the art of receiving it as guest.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1924 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Fourfold Way of India (1924); this has become paraphrased as "Truth comes as conqueror only to those who have lost the art of receiving it as friend.
“The time has come when badges of honour make our shame glaring in the incongruous context of humiliation, and I for my part, wish to stand, shorn, of all special distinctions, by the side of those of my countrymen who, for their so called insignificance, are liable to suffer degradation not fit for human beings.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1919 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Lord Chelmsford, Viceroy of India, renouncing his knighthood in protest of the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre.
“The idea of the Nation is one of the most powerful anaesthetics that Man has invented. Under the influence of its fumes the whole people can carry out its systematic programme of the most virulent self-seeking without being in the least aware of its moral perversion,-in fact feeling dangerously resentful if it is pointed out.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1917 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nationalism in the West", 1917. Reprinted in Rabindranath Tagore and Mohit K. Ray, Essays (2007, p. 465). Also cited in Parmanand Parashar, Nationalism: Its Theory and Principles in India (1996, p. 212), and Himani Bann…
“In the heart of Europe runs the purest stream of human love, of justice, of spirit of self-sacrifice for higher ideals. The Christian culture of centuries has sunk deep in her life's core. In Europe we have seen noble minds who have ever stood up for the rights of man irrespective of colour and creed.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1917 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nationalism in the West", 1917. Reprinted in Rabindranath Tagore and Mohit K. Ray, Essays (2007, p. 475). Also cited in John Jesudason Cornelius, Rabindranath Tagore: India's Schoolmaster, (1928, p. 83).
“What India has been, the whole world is now. The whole world is becoming one country through scientific facility. And the moment is arriving when you also must find a basis of unity which is not political. If India can offer to the world her solution, it will be a contribution to humanity. There is only one history — the history of Man. All national histories are merely chapters in the larger one.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1917 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Nationalism in the West", 1917. Reprinted in Rabindranath Tagore and Mohit K. Ray, Essays (2007, p. 492).
“According to the Upanishads, the complete aspect of Truth is in the reconciliation on the finite and the infinite, of everchanging things and the eternal spirit of perfection. When in our life and work the harmony between these two is broken, then either our life is thinned into a shadow, or it becomes gross with accumulations.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1924 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Talks in China",1924. Reprinted in Rabindranath Tagore and Mohit K. Ray, Essays (2007, p. 735).
“Those who live in England, away from the East, have now got to recognize that Europe has completely lost her former moral prestige in Asia. She is no longer regarded as the champion throughout the world of fair dealing and the exponent of high principle, but rather as the upholder of Western race supremacy and the exploiter of those outside her own borders.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1930 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Message From India," The Living Age magazine, July 1, 1930, pp. 518-529. Quoted in Xu Guoqi, Asia and the Great War: A Shared History. Oxford University Press, 2016.
“Just as weak people struck by poverty can be gripped by epidemics, so the spread of famine in Europe is enabling Fascism and Communism to get a strong hold. Both are symptoms of unhealthiness. No sane person can regard the suppression of independent thinking as something beneficial to man... Man’s brutality to man makes me shudder.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1931 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Nitindranath Ganguli, 31 July 1931. Quoted in Andrew Robinson and Krishna Dutta (eds.) Selected letters of Rabindranath Tagore, Cambridge University Press, 1997. (p.403)
“One of the most potent sources of Hindu–Muslim conflict is our scant knowledge of each other. We live side by side and yet very often our worlds are entirely different. Such mental aloofness has done immense mischief in the past and forebodes an evil future. It is only through sympathetic understanding of each other’s culture and social customs and conventions that we can create an atmosphere of peace and goodwill.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1935 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Foreword, to A. Karim. A Simple Guide to Islam’s Contribution to Science and Civilisation (1935), Reprinted by Goodword Books (2002). Also quoted in Sibaji Pratim Basu ,Rabindranath Tagore's Axiology of Politics, Spring…
“God, the Great Giver, can open the whole universe to our gaze in the narrow space of a single land.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We will have to get rid of the superstition that the cage is bigger than the spread of the wing. Only then will we be able to secure happiness for ourselves. The union of Hindus and Muslims is waiting for that crucial moment of transformation. But there is no reason to take fright at this thought. This is because other nations have already managed to alter themselves through arduous struggle; they have thereby been able to come out of their shells and have been able to stretch their wings. We too must overcome our mental barriers, for if we don't, there will be no future for us.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) first seen 1937 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Kalantar, 1937. Translated by Fakrul Alam. Quoted in The Essential Tagore, Cambridge, Massachusetts : Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011.
“There are two religions in earth, which have distinct enmity against all other religions. These two are Christianity and Islam. They are not just satisfied with observing their own religions, but are determined to destroy all other religions. That’s why the only way to make peace with them is to embrace their religions.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Original works of Rabindranath Vol. 24 page 375, Vishwa Bharti; 1982.
“When two-three different religions claim that only their own religions are true and all other religions are false, their religions are only ways to Heaven, conflicts can not be avoided. Thus, fundamentalism tries to abolish all other religions. This is called Bolshevism in religion. Only the path shown by the Hinduism can relieve the world from this meanness.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“India chose her places of pilgrimages on the top of hills and mountains, by the side of the holy rivers, in the heart of forests and by the shores of the ocean, which along with the sky, is our nearest visible symbol of the vast, the boundless, the infinite and the sublime.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: quoted in Sastri, K. S. Ramaswami Dewan Bahadur Indian Culture and the Modern Age Annamalai University. 1956 p. 32-33, and in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time ab…
“My debts are large, my failures great, my shame secret and heavy; yet I come to ask for my good, I quake in fear lest my prayer be granted.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I thought that my invincible power would hold the world captive, leaving me in a freedom undisturbed. Thus night and day I worked at the chain with huge fires and cruel hard strokes. When at last the work was done and the links were complete and unbreakable, I found that it held me in its grip.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When old words die out on the tongue, new melodies break forth from the heart; and where the old tracks are lost, new country is revealed with its wonders.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The smile that flickers on baby's lips when he sleeps — does anybody know where it was born? Yes, there is a rumor that a young pale beam of a crescent moon touched the edge of a vanishing autumn cloud, and there the smile was first born in the dream of a dew-washed morning.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In this playhouse of infinite forms I have had my play, and here have I caught sight of him that is formless.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high Where knowledge is free Where the world has not been broken up into fragments By narrow domestic walls Where words come out from the depth of truth Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit Where the mind is led forward by thee Into ever-widening thought and action Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Even so, in death the same unknown will appear as ever known to me. And because I love this life, I know I shall love death as well.** 95”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I dive down into the depth of the ocean of forms, hoping to gain the perfect pearl of the formless.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All the great utterances of man have to be judged not by the letter but by the spirit — the spirit which unfolds itself with the growth of life in history.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The human soul is on its journey from the law to love, from discipline to liberation, from the moral plane to the spiritual. Buddha preached the discipline of self-restraint and moral life; it is a complete acceptance of law. But this bondage of law cannot be an end by itself; by mastering it thoroughly we acquire the means of getting beyond it. It is going back to Brahma, to the infinite love, which is manifesting itself through the finite forms of law.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In love, at one of its poles you find the personal, and at the other the impersonal. At one you have the positive assertion — Here I am; at the other the equally strong denial — I am not. Without this ego what is love? And again, with only this ego how can love be possible? Bondage and liberation are not antagonistic in love. For love is most free and at the same time most bound. If God were absolutely free there would be no creation. The infinite being has assumed unto himself the mystery of finitude. And in him who is love the finite and the infinite are made one.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“That side of our existence whose direction is towards the infinite seeks not wealth, but freedom and joy. There the reign of necessity ceases, and there our function is not to get but to be. To be what? To be one with Brahma. For the region of the infinite is the region of unity. Therefore the Upanishads say: If man apprehends God he becomes true. Here it is becoming, it is not having more. Words do no gather bulk when you know their meaning; they become true by being one with the idea.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Knowledge is partial, because our intellect is an instrument, it is only a part of us, it can give us information about things which can be divided and analysed, and whose properties can be classified part by part. But Brahma is perfect, and knowledge which is partial can never be a knowledge of him.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The light of the stars travels millions of miles to reach the earth, but it cannot reach our hearts — so many millions of miles further off are we!”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Every person is worthy of an infinite wealth of love — the beauty of his soul knows no limit.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When sorrow is deepest...then the surface crust is pierced, and consolation wells up, and all the forces of patience and courage are banded together to do their duty. Thus great suffering brings with it the power of great endurance. So while we are cowards before petty troubles, great sorrows make us brave by rousing our truer manhood.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The world is ever new to me; like an old friend loved through this and former lives, the acquaintance between us is both long and deep.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One of the many suppressed longings of creation which cry after fulfilment is for neglected joys within reach; while we are busy pursuing chimerical impossibilities we famish our lives...The emptiness left by easy joys, untasted, is ever growing in my life. And the day may come when I shall feel that, could I but have the past back, I would strive no more after the unattainable, but drain to the full these little, unsought, everyday joys which life offers.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It sometimes strikes me how immensely fortunate I am that each day should take its place in my life, either reddened with the rising and setting sun, or refreshingly cool with deep, dark clouds, or blooming like a white flower in the moonlight. What untold wealth!”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Reason tells us that creation never can be perfectly happy. So long as it is incomplete it must put up with imperfection and sorrow. It can only be perfect when it ceases to be creation, and is God. Do our prayers dare go so far?”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To Indians the idea of the transmigration of the soul from animal to man, and man to animal, does not seem strange, and so from our scriptures pity for all sentient creatures has not been banished as a sentimental exaggeration. When I am in close touch with Nature in the country, the Indian in me asserts itself and I cannot remain coldly indifferent to the abounding joy of life throbbing within the soft down-covered breast of a single tiny bird.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If you shed tears when you miss the sun, you also miss the stars.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“That I exist is a perpetual surprise which is life.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The fish in the water is silent, the animal on the earth is noisy, the bird in the air is singing, But Man has in him the silence of the sea, the noise of the earth and the music of the air.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“God finds himself by creating.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Your idol is shattered in the dust to prove that God's dust is greater than your idol.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Life is given to us, we earn it by giving it.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.”
Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) said by 1941 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source