Herman Hesse

Now true humor begins when a man ceases to take himself seriously.

Siddhartha stopped fighting his fate this very hour, and he stopped suffering.

Within you, there is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at anytime and be yourself.

The opposite of every truth is just as true.

Madness, in a higher sense, is the beginning of all wisdom.

Writing is good, thinking is better. Cleverness is good, patience is better.

You knew all along that your sanctioned world was only half the world, and you tried to suppress the other half the same way the priests and teachers do. You won't succeed. No one succeeds in this once he has begun to think.

Everyone can perform magic, everyone can reach his goals, if he is able to think, if he is able to wait, if he is able to fast.

An enlightened man had but one duty - to seek the way to himself, to reach inner certainty, to grope his way forward, no matter where it led.

The man of power is ruined by power, the man of money by money, the submissive man by subservience, the pleasure seeker by pleasure.

The world is not imperfect or slowly evolving along a path to perfection. No, it is perfect at every moment, every sin already carries grace in it.

I do want more. I am not content with being happy. I was not made for it. It is not my destiny. My destiny is the opposite.

I call that man awake who, with conscious knowledge and understanding, can perceive the deep unreasoning powers in his soul, his whole innermost strength, desire and weakness, and knows how to reckon with himself.

It seems to me, Govinda, that love is the most important thing in the world.

One can beg, buy, be presented with and find love in the streets, but it can never be stolen.

I realize today that nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to take the path that leads to himself.

Those who direct the maximum force of their desires toward the center, toward true being, toward perfection, seem quieter than the passionate souls because the flame of their fervor cannot always be seen.

Not in his speech, not in his thoughts, I see his greatness only in his actions, in his life.

He had loved and had found himself. But most people love to lose themselves.

You know quite well, deep within you, that there is only a single magic, a single power, a single salvation... and that is called loving. 

When artists create pictures and thinkers search for laws and formulate thoughts, it is in order to salvage something from the great dance of death, to make something last longer than we do.

Opinions mean nothing; they may be beautiful or ugly, clever or foolish, anyone can embrace or reject them.

You should never be afraid of people... such fear can destroy us completely. You've simply got to get rid of it, if you want to turn into someone decent.

You are only afraid if you are not in harmony with yourself. People are afraid because they have never owned up to themselves. A whole society composed of men afraid of the unknown within them!

He has robbed me, yet he has given me something of greater value... he has given to me myself.

I have always been a great dreamer. In dreams I have always been more active than in my real life, and these shadows sapped me of my health and energy.

I have always thirsted for knowledge, I have always been full of questions.

I have no right to call myself one who knows. I was one who seeks, and I still am, but I no longer seek in the stars or in books; I'm beginning to hear the teachings of my blood pulsing within me.

Youth ends when egotism does; maturity begins when one lives for others.

My real self wanders elsewhere, far away, wanders on and on invisibly and has nothing to do with my life.

In eternity there is no time, only an instant long enough for a joke.

Perhaps people like us cannot love. Ordinary people can - that is their secret.

There is no reality except the one contained within us. That is why so many people live such an unreal life. They take the images outside of them for reality and never allow the world within to assert itself.

Solitude is independence. It had been my wish and with the years I had attained it. It was cold. Oh, cold enough! But it was also still, wonderfully still and vast like the cold stillness of space in which the stars revolve.

Whoever wants music instead of noise, joy instead of pleasure, soul instead of gold, creative work instead of business, passion instead of foolery, finds no home in this trivial world of ours.