Showing posts with label Albert Einstein. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Albert Einstein. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

I have received and am still receiving



  illustration by Vladimir Radunsky
 for On a Beam of Light: A Story of Albert Einstein by Jennifer Berne




How strange is the lot of us mortals!
 Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose he knows not, 
though he sometimes thinks he senses it. But without deeper reflection
 one knows from daily life that one exists for other people — 
first of all for those upon whose smiles and well-being
 our own happiness is wholly dependent, and then for the many, 
unknown to us, to whose destinies we are bound by the ties of sympathy. 
 
A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life
 are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, 
and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure
 as I have received and am still receiving.
 
 I am strongly drawn to a frugal life and am often oppressively aware
 that I am engrossing an undue amount of the labor of my fellow-men.
 I regard class distinctions as unjustified and, in the last resort,
 based on force. I also believe that a simple and unassuming life
 is good for everybody, physically and mentally.



 ~ Albert Einstein




Saturday, November 10, 2012

quenching darkness






God
pours light
into every cup,
quenching darkness.

The proudly pious
stuff their cups with parchment
and critique the taste of ink

while God pours light

and the trees lift their limbs
without worry of redemption,
every blossom a chalice.

Hafiz, seduce those withered souls
with words that wet their parched lips

as light
pours like rain
into every empty cup
set adrift on the Infinite Ocean.


~ Hafiz




The solitary is one who is aware of solitude in himself as a basic and inevitable human reality, not just as something which affects him as an isolated individual. Hence his solitude is the foundation of a deep, pure and gentle sympathy with all other men, whether or not they are capable of realizing the tragedy of their plight. More - it is the doorway by which he enters into the mystery of God, and brings others into that mystery by the power of his love and his humility.



- Thomas Merton
  from Disputed Questions
Notes for a Philosophy of Solitude
with thanks to http://fatherlouie.blogspot.com/




photo by Thomas Merton


What the solitary renounces is not his union with other men, but rather the deceptive fictions and inadequate symbols which tend to take the place of genuine social unity - to produce a facade of apparent unity without really uniting men on a deep level.  We are all alike in our aloneness at the deepest level, yet most of us try to distract ourselves from awareness of this in the ways Pascal called "divertissement," the "occupations and recreations so mercifully provided by society, which enable a man to avoid his own company for twenty-four hours a day."


~ John Barbour
from The Value of Solitude
here quoting Thomas Merton





A human being is part of the whole, called by us “universe,” 
a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, 
as something separate from the rest – a kind of optical delusion of consciousness. 
This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires 
and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. 

Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison 
by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures 
and the whole of nature in its beauty.

~ Albert Einstein




Wednesday, March 28, 2012

sower of science, center of religion





The most beautiful and profound emotion we can experience
is the sensation of the mystical.
It is the sower of all true science.
He to whom this emotion is a stranger,
who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe,
is as good as dead.

To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists,
manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty,
which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their primitive forms - 
this knowledge, this feeling,
is at the center of true religion.







~ Albert Einstein


Thursday, October 15, 2009

The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious

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The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Whoever does not know it and can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed. It was the experience of mystery -- even if mixed with fear -- that engendered religion. A knowledge of the existence of something we cannot penetrate, our perceptions of the profoundest reason and the most radiant beauty, which only in their most primitive forms are accessible to our minds: it is this knowledge and this emotion that constitute true religiosity. In this sense, and only this sense, I am a deeply religious man...
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~ Albert Einstein, 1931



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