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Simone Weil

139 quotes

“Just as a vagrant accused of stealing a carrot from a field stands before a comfortably seated judge who keeps up an elegant flow of queries, comments and witticisms while the accused is unable to stammer a word, so truth stands before an intelligence which is concerned with the elegant manipulation of opinions.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is because of my wretchedness that I am "I." It is on account of the wretchedness of the universe that, in a sense, God is "I" (that is to say a person).”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Those who keep the masses of men in subjection by exercising force and cruelty deprive them at once of two vital foods, liberty and obedience; for it is no longer within the power of such masses to accord their inner consent to the authority to which they are subjected. Those who encourage a state of things in which the hope of gain is the principal motive take away from men their obedience, for consent which is its essence is not something which can be sold.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Liberty, taking the word in its concrete sense, consists in the ability to choose.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Great Beast is the only object of idolatry, the only ersatz of God, the only imitation of something which is infinitely far from me and which is I myself.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The collective is the object of all idolatry, this it is which chains us to the earth. In the case of avarice: gold is of the social order. In the case of ambition: power is of the social order. Science and art are full of the social element also. And love? Love is more or less of an exception: that is why we can go to God through love, not through avarice and ambition.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A society like the Church, which claims to be Divine is perhaps more dangerous on account of the ersatz good which it contains then on account of the evil which sullies it. Something of the social labelled divine: an intoxicating mixture which carries with it every sort of license. Devil disguised.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Conscience is deceived by the social. Our supplementary energy (imaginative) is to a great extent taken up with the social. It has to be detached from it. That is the most difficult of detachments.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is only by entering the transcendental, the supernatural, the authentically spiritual order that man rises above the social. Until then, whatever he may do, the social is transcendent in relation to him.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Rome is the Great Beast of atheism and materialism, adoring nothing but itself. Israel is the Great Beast of religion. Neither one nor the other is likable. The Great Beast is always repulsive.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The state of conformity is an imitation of grace. By a strange mystery — which is connected with the power of the social element — a profession can confer on quite ordinary men in their exercise of it, virtues which, if they were extended to all circumstances of life, would make of them heroes or saints. But the power of the social element makes these virtues natural. Accordingly they need a compensation.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But if Germany, thanks to Hitler and his successors, were to enslave the European nations and destroy most of the treasures of their past, future historians would certainly pronounce that she had civilized Europe.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A Pharisee is someone who is virtuous out of obedience to the Great Beast.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“La force, c'est ce qui fait de quiconque lui est soumis une chose. Quand elle s'exerce jusqu'au bout, elle fait de l'homme une chose au sens le plus littéral, car elle en fait un cadavre.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“La force qui tue est une forme sommaire, grossière de la force. Combien plus variée en ses procédés, combien plus surprenante en ses effets, est l'autre force, celle qui ne tue pas; c'est-à-dire celle qui ne tue pas encore.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Du pouvoir de transformer un homme en chose en le faisant mourir procède un autre pouvoir, et bien autrement prodigieux, celui de faire une chose d'un homme qui reste vivant.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Une âme ... n'est pas faite pour habiter une chose ; quand elle y est contrainte, il n’est plus rien en elle qui ne souffre violence.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Si tous sont destinés en naissant à souffrir la violence, c'est là une vérité à laquelle l'empire des circonstances ferme les esprits des hommes.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Le prestige, qui constitue la force plus qu'aux trois quarts, est fait avant tout de la superbe indifférence du fort pour les faibles, indifférence si contagieuse qu'elle se communique à ceux qui en sont l'objet.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Celui qui ignore à quel point la fortune variable et la nécessité tiennent toute âme humaine sous leur dépendance ne peut pas regarder comme des semblables ni aimer comme soi-même ceux que le hasard a séparés de lui par un abîme. La diversité des contraintes qui pèsent sur les hommes fait naître l'illusion qu'il y a parmi eux des espèces distinctes qui ne peuvent communiquer.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Il n'est possible d'aimer et d'être juste que si l'on connaît l'empire de la force et si l'on sait ne pas le respecter.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Moreover, nothing is so rare as to see misfortune fairly portrayed; the tendency is either to treat the unfortunate person as though catastrophe were his natural vocation, or to ignore the effects of misfortune on the soul, to assume, that is, that the soul can suffer and remain unmarked by it, can fail, in fact, to be recast in misfortune's image.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I also am other than what I imagine myself to be. To know this is forgiveness.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Truth is sought not because it is truth but because it is good.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We can know only one thing about God — that he is what we are not. Our wretchedness alone is an image of this. The more we contemplate it, the more we contemplate him.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The recognition of human wretchedness is difficult for whoever is rich and powerful because he is almost invincibly led to believe that he is something. It is equally difficult for the man in miserable circumstances because he is almost invincibly led to believe that the rich and powerful man is something.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A man thinks he is dying for his country," said Anatole France, "but he is dying for a few industrialists." But even that is saying too much. What one dies for is not even so substantial and tangible as an industrialist.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The aim is to replace economic oligarchies by the State, which has a will-to-power of its own and is quite as little concerned with the public good; and a will-to-power, moreover, which is not economic but military and therefore much more dangerous to any good folk who have a taste for staying alive. And on the bourgeois side what on earth is the sense of objecting to State control in economic affairs if one accepts private monopolies which have all the economic and technical disadvantages of State monopolies and possibly some others as well?”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The struggle between the opponents and defenders of capitalism is a struggle between innovators who do not know what innovation to make and conservatives who do not know what to conserve.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The necessity for power is obvious, because life cannot be lived without order; but the allocation of power is arbitrary because all men are alike, or very nearly. Yet power must not seem to be arbitrarily allocated, because it will not then be recognized as power. Therefore prestige, which is illusion, is of the very essence of power.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“An imaginary perfection is automatically at the same level as I who imagine it — neither higher nor lower.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is not in a person's nature to desire what he already has. Desire is a tendency, the start of a movement toward something, toward a point from which one is absent. If, at the very outset, this movement doubles back on itself toward its point of departure, a person turns round and round like a squirrel in a cage or a prisoner in a condemned cell. Constant turning soon produces revulsion. All workers, especially though not exclusively those who work under inhumane conditions, are easily the victims of revulsion, exhaustion and disgust and the strongest are often the worst affected.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We must leave on one side the beliefs which fill up voids and sweeten what is bitter. The belief in immortality. The belief in the utility of sin: etiam peccata. The belief in the providential ordering of events — in short the "consolations" which are ordinarily sought in religion.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We should desire neither the immortality nor the death of any human being, whoever he may be, with whom we have to do.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The miser deprives himself of his treasure because of his desire for it.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If we love God while thinking that he does not exist, he will manifest his existence.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If we want a love which will protect the soul from wounds we must love something other than God.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“God's love for us is not the reason for which we should love him. God's love for us is the reason for us to love ourselves.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To desire friendship is a great fault. Friendship should be a gratuitous joy like those afforded by art or life. We must refuse it so that we may be worthy to receive it; it is of the order of grace.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Désirer échapper à la solitude est une lâcheté. L'amitié ne se recherche pas, ne se rêve pas, ne se désire pas ; elle s'exerce (c'est une vertu).”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Meditation on the chance which led to the meeting of my mother and father is even more salutary than meditation on death.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Stars and blossoming fruit-trees: utter permanence and extreme fragility give an equal sense of eternity.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The most important part of education — to teach the meaning of to know (in the scientific sense).”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Humility consists of knowing that in this world the whole soul, not only what we term the ego in its totality, but also the supernatural part of the soul, which is God present in it, is subject to time and to the vicissitudes of change. There must be absolutely acceptance of the possibility that everything material in us should be destroyed. But we must simultaneously accept and repudiate the possibility that the supernatural part of the soul should disappear.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Concerning the Our Father" in Waiting on God (1972), Routledge & Kegan Paul edition, p. 153
“The key to a Christian conception of studies is the realization that prayer consists of attention. It is the orientation of all the attention of which the soul is capable toward God. The quality of the attention counts for much in the quality of the prayer. Warmth of heart cannot make up for it.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Although people seem to be unaware of it today, the development of the faculty of attention forms the real object and almost the sole interest of studies.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“School children and students who love God should never say: "For my part I like mathematics"; "I like French"; "I like Greek." They should learn to like all these subjects, because all of them develop that faculty of attention which, directed toward God, is the very substance of prayer.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Attention consists of suspending our thought, leaving it detached, empty, and ready to be penetrated by the object; it means holding in our minds, within reach of this thought, but on a lower level and not in contact with it, the diverse knowledge we have acquired which we are forced to make use of.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Above all our thought should be empty, waiting, not seeking anything, but ready to receive in its naked truth the object that is to penetrate it. All wrong translations, all absurdities in geometry problems, all clumsiness of style, and all faulty connection of ideas in compositions and essays, all such things are due to the fact that thought has seized upon some idea too hastily, and being thus prematurely blocked, is not open to the truth.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We do not obtain the most precious gifts by going in search of them but by waiting for them. Man cannot discover them by his own powers, and if he sets out to seek for them he will find in their place counterfeits of which he will be unable to discern falsity.”
Simone Weil (1909–1943) said by 1943 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source