"Obstinacy alone is not a virtue."
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Albert Camus quotes (page 29 of 50)
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"The Poor Man whom everyone speaks of, the Poor Man whom everyone pities, one of the repulsive Poor from whom charitable souls keep their distance, he has still said nothing. Or, rather, he has spoken through the voice of Victor Hugo, Zola, Richepin. At least, they said so. And these shameful impostures fed their authors. Cruel irony, the Poor Man tormented with hunger feeds those who plead his case."
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"Camus himself described this work as 'an attempt to understand the time I live in'."
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"For instance, I never complained that my birthday was overlooked; people were even surprised, with a touch of admiration, by my discretion on this subject. But the reason for my disinterestedness was even more discreet: I longed to be forgotten in order to be able to complain to myself... Once my solitude was thoroughly proved, I could surrender to the charms of a virile self-pity."
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"The best are led to make greater demands upon themselves. As for those who succumb, they did not deserve to survive."
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"A symbol always transcends the one who makes use of it and makes him say in reality more than he is aware of expressing."
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"In that daily effort in which intelligence and passion mingle and delight each other, the absurd man discovers a discipline that will make up the greatest of his strengths. The required diligence and doggedness and lucidity thus resemble the conqueror's attitude. To create is likewise to give a shape to one's fate. For all these characters, their work defines them at least as much as it is defined by them. The actor taught us this: There is no frontier between being and appearing."
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"It is immoral not to tell."
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"The love of God is a hard love. It demands total self-surrender, disdain of our human personality. And yet it alone can reconcile us to suffering and the deaths of children, it alone can justify them, since we cannot understand them, and we can only make God's will ours."
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"The loss of love is the loss of all rights, even though one had them all."
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"The more I produce, the less I am certain. On the road along which the artist walks, night falls ever more densely. Finally, he dies blind."
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"In the end, we would like not to be guilty while at the same time being dispensed of the effort of purifying ourselves. Not enough cynicism and not enough virtue."
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"But who would dare condemn me in this world with no judges, where no one is innocent!"
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"Intelligence in chains loses in lucidity what it gains in intensity."
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"Rebellion, in man, is the refusal to be treated as an object and to be reduced to simple historical terms. It is the affirmation of a nature common to all men, which eludes the world of power."
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"The act of love . . . is a confession. Selfishness screams aloud, vanity shows off, or else true generosity reveals itself."
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"He knew now that it was his own will to happiness which must make the next move. But if he was to do so, he realized that he must come to terms with time, that to have time was at once the most magnificent and the most dangerous of experiments. Idleness is fatal only to the mediocre."
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"We spend our days in deliberating, and we end them without coming to any resolve."
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"Liberty is dangerous, as hard to get along with as it is exciting."
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"There is nothing abstract about pain. It is specific, it is real, and, when it is intense, it is world destroying."
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