Quotes by Italian Authors

In order to feel anything you need strength.
Anna Maria Ortese
Haste denies all acts their dignity.
Dante Alighieri
There is no better manager than a natural born one.
Rossana Condoleo
Controlling the position of one's body and keeping a straight back are not contemplation, but can in fact become an obstacle to contemplation. ...when leaving the body 'uncontrolled' is spoken of, what is meant is simply allowing the body to remain in an authentic, uncorrected condition, in which it is not necessary to modify or improve anything. This is because, since all our attempts at correcting the body come from the reasoning mind, they are all false and artificial.
Namkhai Norbu
Consider that fact that, being nothing in ourselves, we cannot, without divine assistance, accomplish the smallest good or advance the smallest step toward Heaven.
Lorenzo Scupoli
Good Morning! Good Afternoon! Good Night! These are not just mere greetings.They are powerful blessings, setting the best vibration for the day. Hence, whether it is morning, afternoon or night, make sure that you say your greeting right!
Franco Santoro
Reciprocal marketing, promotions and links. In public good experiments, behavioral economists have demonstrated that the potential for reciprocal actions by players increases the rate of contribution to the public good, providing evidence for the importance of reciprocity in social situations.
Carl William Brown
And she was really good at that: even since she was a little girl, she could eliminate the hours, knew how to kill the minutes. Without them suffering from it, she put them to sleep.
Nicola Lecca
You never have to suffer because of, or be denatured by, another person, even someone you love.
Rossana Condoleo
I like marriage, family life and I wish to get married again. But opting out of an unhappy marriage was a duty toward myself & my future.
Rossana Condoleo
If you knew how much work went into it, you wouldn't call it genius.
Michelangelo Buonarroti
That is the key of this collection, being yourself. Don't be into trends. Don't make fashion own you, but you decide what you are, what you want to express by the way you dress and the way to live.
Gianni Versace
To say that nothing is true is to realize that the foundations of society are fragile and that we must be the shepherds of our civilization. To say that everything is permitted is to understand that we are the architects of our actions, and that we must live with their consequences, whether glorious of tragic.
Ezio Auditore da Firenze
I don't know what you're getting yourself into," said Majid, "but I know I don't like it. Some things in Venice are pure poison." Majid's eyes looked like they could bore through a stone wall. "If someone has put you on a demon's tracks, you'd better make sure the demon doesn't find you first.""What's that supposed to mean," asked Mathias."It means behind every hand stained with blood there's another, and that one stays clean." Majid leaned in close, lowering his voice to a whisper. "What I'm saying is that behind a demon, there's always someone holding the creature on a leash.
Riccardo Bruni
... When Princes devote themselves rather to pleasure than to arms, they lose their dominions.
Niccolò Machiavelli
The whole discussion now underway on revolutionary forms in Russia and in China boils down to the judgement to be made of the historical phenomenon of the "appearance" of industrialism and mechanisation in huge areas of the world previously dominated by landed and precapitalist forms of production.Constructing industrialism and mechanising things is supposedly the same as building socialism whenever central and "national" plans are made. This is the mistaken thesis.
Amadeo Bordiga
Usury is the cancer of the world, which only the surgeon's knife of fascism can cut out of the life of the nations.
Ezra Pound
Enlightenment, or Nirvana, is nothing other than the state beyond all obstacles, in the same way that from the peak of a very high mountain one always sees the sun. Nirvana is not a paradise or some special place of happiness, but is in fact the condition beyond all dualistic concepts, including those of happiness and suffering.When all our obstacles have been overcome, and we find ourselves in a state of total presence, the wisdom of enlightenment manifests spontaneously without limits, just like the infinite rays of the sun. The clouds have dissolved, and the sun is finally free to shine once again.
Namkhai Norbu
The light of the sun is the manifestation of the clarity of the sky; and the sky is the basic condition necessary for the manifestation of the sun's light. So, too, in the sky two, three, four, or any number of suns could arise; but the sky always remains indivisibly one sky. Similarly, every individual's state of presence is unique and distinct, but the void nature of the individual is universal, and common to all beings.
Namkhai Norbu
Daytime sleep is like the sin of the flesh; the more you have the more you want, and yet you feel unhappy, sated and unsated at the same time.
Umberto Eco
Our greatest dreams and desires abide in the mental and spiritual realm. In order to transfer them in the physical plane we need to invert subject and object. You will receive from the world what you deeply long to receive the day when you give to the world what you deeply long to receive. Today could be that day.
Franco Santoro
That's what lay behind the feud under way in the Republic: a battle between different noble family factions in a fight for power. Serving this side or the other was of no interest to Mathias. But the consequences of a Venice under the Pope's direct control weren't at all to his liking. His beloved books would be burned by ignorant, avid priests. Men like Malachia would win.It was the same old struggle. The same fight Gheorg had chosen, the same fight that might take him to Wittenberg. But he wouldn't clear the way for Alexander VI. With what little strength he possessed, even though he was nothing more than a pawn of a chessboard, that extended farther then he could see, Mathias would help those in power smash what had all the makings of a major plot, one designed to overturn the government in power in La Serenissima. And these thoughts allowed the monk to find the first answer to the many question with which he still felt burdened.He and the Borgias did NOT share the same Church.
Riccardo Bruni
I, too, head for the Baths of Caracalla,thinking—with my old, magnificentprivilege of thinking…(And let there still be a god in me that thinks,lost, weak, and childish,yet whose voice is so humanit is almost a song.) Oh, to leavethis prison of poverty!To be free of the yearningthat makes these ancient nights so splendid!He who knows yearning, and he who does not,have something in common: man’s desires are humble.
Pier Paolo Pasolini
Sometimes to take two steps in a row, one after the other, I need to make a contract with myself.
Erri De Luca
As a woman I am so curious about prostitutes because of the idea that they know men better than you. Also, it's such a strange way to live. But at the same time there are prostitutes who just want to be prostitutes, and this is this woman, nobody pushed her to do it. She's a prostitute because she wants to be a prostitute. It's her philosophy of life.
Monica Bellucci
They call it "young music"; I see, however, that the record industry makes millions by the carload for shrewd older people! They invoke the name of spontaneity, nonconformity and originality; actually, canny "clothing industrialists" manipulate the field, undisturbed sovereigns! They call themselves revolutionaries, but the overscrupulous attentions devoted to their hair and their dress risk creating merely effeminates.
Pope John Paul I
All the way to heaven is heaven, because Jesus said, "I am the way.
Catherine of Siena
the cemetery is the home of those who are not here, come in.
Italo Calvino
I too entered the Lager as a nonbeliever, and as a nonbeliever I was liberated and have lived to this day.
Primo Levi
I grow fond of David, who lays a single stone before Goliath and a single book, the Psalms, in the mouth of the world.
Erri De Luca
Whatever Nature has in store for mankind, unpleasant as it may be, men must accept, for ignorance is never better than knowledge.
Enrico Fermi
I could hardly sleep and even when I did drop off, I awoke to a grim thought: I’m disgusting. I can’t play any more. I went to bed with Dudek and all his Liverpool team-mates.
Andrea Pirlo
My people? Who are they?I went into the church where the congregationWorshiped my God. Were they my people?I felt no kinship to them as they knelt there.My people! Where are they?I went into the land where I was born,Where men spoke my language.I was a stranger there.“My people,” my soul cried. “Who are my people?”Last night in the rain I met an old manWho spoke a language I do not speak,Which marked him as one who does not know my God.With apologetic smile he offered meThe shelter of his patched umbrella.I met his eyes...And then I knew...
Rosa Zagnoni Marinoni
Questions that pertain to the foundations of mathematics, although treated by many in recent times, still lack a satisfactory solution. Ambiguity of language is philosophy's main source of problems. That is why it is of the utmost importance to examine attentively the very words we use.
Giuseppe Peano
The order that our mind imagines is like a net, or like a ladder, built to attain something. But afterward you must throw the ladder away, because you discover that, even if it was useful, it was meaningless.
Umberto Eco
Not only in antiquity but in our own times also laws have been passed...to secure good conditions for workers; so it is right that the art of medicine should contribute its portion for the benefit and relief of those for whom the law has shown such foresight...[We] ought to show peculiar zeal...in taking precautions for their safety. I for one have done all that lay in my power, and have not thought it beneath me to step into workshops of the meaner sort now and again and study the obscure operations of mechanical arts.
Bernardino Ramazzini
...he's just so out-of-this-world. They don't make them like that anymore.
Camilla Isley
Men are driven by two principal impulses, either by love or by fear.
Niccolò Machiavelli
Most people think that love doesn’t stand the test of time – that it is eternal only as long as it lasts – but love is an unquenchable flame. It is only the fires of momentary desire that burn too fast and go out far too quickly without leaving behind a single trace.
Mirella Muffarotto
One of the most powerful opponents of happiness is indeed fear. Unfortunately, the chains that bind people to their comfortable mediocrity are the same ones that bind their future to an unsuccessful destiny. The courage to dream is the very first step. LISTENING TO YOUR DREAMS is the second!
Rossana Condoleo
Let your projects be independent organisms. They will develop their own beautiful architecture.
Rossana Condoleo
If we could eliminate the concept of town and return to live in small villages, all world problems were solved.
Rossana Condoleo
Divorce = Rebirth: forget the past, replan your life, improve your appearance & REJUVENATE!
Rossana Condoleo
Do the things you like to be happier, stronger & more successful. Only so is hard work replaced by dedication.
Rossana Condoleo
On the brink of sleep I have a gloomy thought: that saving yourself is only pushing yourself even deeper into the trap rather than getting out. Dying is the only way out.
Erri De Luca
Those who plead their cause in the absence of an opponent can invent to their heart's content, can pontificate without taking into account the opposite point of view and keep the best arguments for themselves, for aggressors are always quick to attack those who have no means of defence.
Christine de Pizan
We've never heardAbout a marvel quite so great,For all the heroes who have livedIn history can't measure upIn bravery against the Maid.
Christine de Pizan
You two are bound to one another. You always have been … and you can't run away from what you are. No matter where you go, your feelings for her are going to follow you.
Mirella Muffarotto
I tried to hate you, to forgive you, all just to forget you, but I'm only capable of loving you. You're tattooed onto my skin, and the more I try to erase you, the deeper you sink in.
Mirella Muffarotto
It's absurd how crazy love can make you......but even more absurd how stupid jealousy can make you!
Mirella Muffarotto
The function of muscle is to pull and not to push, except in the case of the genitals and the tongue.
Leonardo da Vinci
You do not carry the cross. Instead you are all crucified on the timber of your sufficiency, which is given to you, the more you insist, the more you bleed: it suits you to say you carry the cross like a sacred duty, whereas you are heavy with the weight of your necessities. Have the courage not to admit those necessities and lift yourselves up for your own sakes.
Carlo Michelstaedter
Don't you ever get tired of reading?" she asked. "You could hardly be called good company! Don't you know that, with women, you're supposed to make conversation?" she added; her half smile was perhaps meant to be ironic, though to Amedeo, who at that moment would have paid anything rather than give up his novel, it seemed downright threatening.
Italo Calvino
I'd be willing to bet that the notion of the end of time is more common today in the secular world than in the Christian. The Christian world makes it the object of meditation, but acts as if it may be projected into a dimension not measured by calendars. The secular world pretends to ignore the end of time, but is fundamentally obsessed by it. This is not a paradox, but a repetition of what transpired in the first thousand years of history.... I will remind readers that the idea of the end of time comes out of one of the most ambiguous passages of John's text, chapter 20...This approach, which isn't only Augustine's but also the Church Fathers' as a whole, casts History as a journey forward—a notion alien to the pagan world. Even Hegel and Marx are indebted to this fundamental idea, which Pierre Teilhard de Chardin pursued.Christianity invented History, and it is in fact a modern incarnation of the Antichrist that denounces History as a disease. It's possible that secular historicism has understood history as infinitely perfectible—so that tomorrow we improve upon today, always and without reservation... But the entire secular world is not of the ideological view that through history we understand how to look at the regression and folly of history itself. There is, nonetheless, an originally Christian view of history whenever the signpost of Hope on this road is followed. The simple knowledge of how to judge history and its horrors is fundamentally Christian, whether the speaker is Emmanuel Mounier on tragic optimism or Gramsci on pessimism of reason and optimism of will.
Umberto Eco
She was tall and well-made, on an ample scale; her skin looked as if it had the flavour of fresh cream which it resembled, her childlike mouth that of strawberries. Under a mass of raven hair, curling in gentle waves, her green eyes gleamed motionless as those of statues, and like them a little cruel. She was moving slowly, making her wide white skirt rotate around her, and emanating from her whole person the invincible calm of a woman sure of her own beauty.
Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
Don’t we see that men’s rightful task is to go out to work and wear themselves out trying to accumulate wealth, as though they were our factors or stewards, so that we can remain at home like the lady of the house directing their work and enjoying the profit of their labors? That, if you like, is the reason why men are naturally stronger and more robust than us — they need to be, so they can put up with the hard labor they must endure in our service.
Moderata Fonte
How many women are there ... who because of their husbands' harshness spend their weary lives in the bond of marriage in greater suffering than if they were slaves among the Saracens?
Christine de Pizan
Men were created before women. ... But that doesn't prove their superiority – rather, it proves ours, for they were born out of the lifeless earth in order that we could be born out of living flesh. And what's so important about this priority in creation, anyway? When we are building, we lay foundations on the ground first, things of no intrinsic merit or beauty, before subsequently raising up sumptuous buildings and ornate palaces. Lowly seeds are nourished in the earth, and then later the ravishing blooms appear; lovely roses blossom forth and scented narcissi.
Moderata Fonte
[M]en, though they know full well how much women are worth and how great the benefits we bring them, nonetheless seek to destroy us out of envy for our merits. It's just like the crow, when it produces white nestlings: it is so stricken by envy, knowing how black it is itself, that it kills its own offspring out of pique.
Moderata Fonte
It really is something ... that men disapprove even of our doing things that are patently good. Wouldn't it be possible for us just to banish these men from our lives, and escape their carping and jeering once and for all? Couldn't we live without them? Couldn't we earn our living and manage our affairs without help from them? Come on, let's wake up, and claim back our freedom, and the honour and dignity that they have usurped from us for so long. Do you think that if we really put our minds to it, we would be lacking the courage to defend ourselves, the strength to fend for ourselves, or the talents to earn our own living? Let's take our courage into our hands and do it, and then we can leave it up to them to mend their ways as much as they can: we shan't really care what the outcome is, just as long as we are no longer subjugated to them.
Moderata Fonte