"In history as in human life, regret does not bring back a lost moment and a thousand years will not recover something lost in a single hour."
"In my youth and comparative inexperience I had always regarded the yearning and pangs of love as the worst torture that could afflict the human heart. At this moment, however, I began to realize that there was another and perhaps grimmer torture than that of longing and desiring: that of being loved against one's will and of being unable to defend oneself against the urgency of another's passion; of seeing another human being seared by the flame of her desire and of having to look impotently, lacking the power, the capacity, the strength to pluck her from the flames."
5 likes
Source: Beware of Pity. Book by Stefan Zweig, 1939.
About the author
Same author
More quotes by Stefan Zweig
"Time to leave now, get out of this room, go somewhere, anywhere; sharpen this feeling of happiness and freedom, stretch your limbs, fill your eyes, be awake, wider awake, vividly awake in every sense and every pore."
"Truth to tell, we are all criminals if we remain silent."
"It is never until one realizes that one means something to others that one feels there is any point or purpose in one's own existence."
"Freedom is not possible without authority - otherwise it would turn into chaos and authority is not possible without freedom - otherwise it would turn into tyranny."
"All I know is that I shall be alone again. There is nothing more terrible than to be alone among human beings."