“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
Life
“England has always been disinclined to accept human nature.”
NatureAll Quotes by E. M. Forster
“We are willing enough to praise freedom when she is safely tucked away in the past and cannot be a nuisance. In the present, amidst dangers whose outcome we cannot foresee, we get nervous about her, and admit censorship.”
Freedom“England has always been disinclined to accept human nature.”
Nature“The sort of poetry I seek resides in objects man can't touch.”
Poetry“I hate the idea of causes, and if I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.”
Hope“The historian must have some conception of how men who are not historians behave. Otherwise he will move in a world of the dead. He can only gain that conception through personal experience, and he can only use his personal experiences when he is a genius.”
Experience“Beauty ought to look a little surprised: it is the emotion that best suits her face. The beauty who does not look surprised, who accepts her position as her due - she reminds us too much of a prima donna.”
Beauty“What is the good of your stars and trees, your sunrise and the wind, if they do not enter into our daily lives?”
Good“The sadness of the incomplete, the sadness that is often Life, but should never be Art.”
Art“Either life entails courage, or it ceases to be life.”
Courage“A poem is true if it hangs together. Information points to something else. A poem points to nothing but itself.”
Poetry“One must be fond of people and trust them if one is not to make a mess of life.”
Trust“Faith, to my mind, is a stiffening process, a sort of mental starch.”
Faith“The work of art assumes the existence of the perfect spectator, and is indifferent to the fact that no such person exists.”
Art“The people I respect most behave as if they were immortal and as if society was eternal.”
Respect“History develops, art stands still.”
Art“The main facts in human life are five: birth, food, sleep, love and death.”
Death“What is wonderful about great literature is that it transforms the man who reads it towards the condition of the man who wrote.”
Great“If I had to choose between betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the guts to betray my country.”
Hope“One of the evils of money is that it tempts us to look at it rather than at the things that it buys.”
Money