Andre Gide was a French novelist, essayist, and dramatist of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was a leading intellectual figure in France and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1947. His works are known for their exploration of the complexities of the modern individual and the human condition.
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It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for something you are not.
The true hypocrite is the one who ceases to perceive his deception, the one who lies with sincerity. — Andre Gide
The thing I am most aware of is my limits. And this is natural; for I never, or almost never, occupy the middle of my cage; my whole being surges toward the bars. — Andre Gide
I wished for nothing beyond her smile, and to walk with her thus, hand in hand, along a sun warmed, flower bordered path. — Andre Gide
The most decisive actions of our life -- I mean those that are most likely to decide the whole course of our future -- are, more often than not, unconsidered. — Andre Gide
What seems different in yourself; that's the rare thing you possess. The one thing that gives each of us his worth, and that's just what we try to suppress. And we claim to love life. — Andre Gide
Know that joy is rarer, more difficult, and more beautiful than sadness. Once you make this all-important discovery, you must embrace joy as a moral obligation. — Andre Gide
True intelligence very readily conceives of an intelligence superior to its own; and this is why truly intelligent men are modest. — Andre Gide
Know thyself. A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly. Whoever studies himself arrest his own development. A caterpillar who seeks to know himself would never become a butterfly. — Andre Gide
It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves - in finding themselves. — Andre Gide
It is good to follow one's own bent, so long as it leads upward. — Andre Gide
Whoever starts out toward the unknown must consent to venture alone. — Andre Gide
Through loyalty to the past, our mind refuses to realize that tomorrow's joy is possible only if today's makes way for it; that each wave owes the beauty of its line only to the withdrawal of the preceding one. — Andre Gide
It is essential to persuade the soldier that those he is being urged to massacre are bandits who do not deserve to live; before killing other good, decent fellows like himself, his gun would fall from his hands. — Andre Gide
The want of logic annoys. Too much logic bores. Life eludes logic, and everything that logic alone constructs remains artificial and forced. — Andre Gide
Fish die belly upward, and rise to the surface. Its their way of falling. — Andre Gide
Welcome anything that comes to you, but do not long for anything else. — Andre Gide
Sadness is almost never anything but a form of fatigue. — Andre Gide
Believe those who seek the truth, doubt those who find it; doubt all, but do not doubt yourself. — Andre Gide
Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it. — Andre Gide
The most beautiful things are those that madness prompts and reason writes. — Andre Gide
Art begins with resistance - at the point where resistance is overcome. No human masterpiece has ever been created without great labor. — Andre Gide
What another would have done as well as you, do not do it. What another would have said as well as you, do not say it; what another would have written as well, do not write it. Be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in yourself-and thus make yourself indispensable. — Andre Gide
There are very few monsters who warrant the fear we have of them. — Andre Gide
I owe much to my friends; but, all things considered, it strikes me that I owe even more to my enemies. The real person springs life under a sting even better than under a caress. — Andre Gide
Are you then unable to recognize unless it has the same sound as yours? — Andre Gide
It is easier to lead men to combat, stirring up their passion, than to restrain them and direct them toward the patient labors of peace. — Andre Gide
Understanding is the beginning of approving. — Andre Gide
In hell there is no other punishment than to begin over and over again the tasks left unfinished in your lifetime. — Andre Gide
True kindness presupposes the faculty of imagining as one's own the suffering and joys of others. — Andre Gide
To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one's freedom. — Andre Gide
Great authors are admirable in this respect: in every generation they make for disagreement. Through them we become aware of our differences. — Andre Gide
But can one still make resolutions when one is over forty? I live according to twenty-year-old habits. — Andre Gide
Every instant of our lives is essentially irreplaceable: you must know this in order to concentrate on life. — Andre Gide
In other people's company I felt I was dull, gloomy, unwelcome, at once bored and boring. — Andre Gide
No theory is good unless it permits, not rest, but the greatest work. No theory is good except on condition that one use it to go on beyond. — Andre Gide
It is unthinkable for a Frenchman to arrive at middle age without having syphilis and the Cross of the Legion of Honor. — Andre Gide
In order to be utterly happy the only thing necessary is to refrain from comparing this moment with other moments in the past, which I often did not fully enjoy because I was comparing them with other moments of the future. — Andre Gide
Oh, would that my mind could let fall its dead ideas, as the tree does its withered leaves! — Andre Gide
To read a writer is for me not merely to get an idea of what he says, but to go off with him and travel in his company. — Andre Gide
Our judgements about things vary according to the time left us to live -that we think is left us to live. — Andre Gide
Nothing is so silly as the expression of a man who is being complimented. — Andre Gide
To understand is nothing, but to be understood-that is the problem and the source of anguish. The soul throbs and would have the other know-but can not and feels isolated. Then come gestures, words, awkward explanations and material symbols for imponderable outbursts of feeling-and the soul despairs. — Andre Gide
It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle. — Andre Gide
There are many things that seem impossible only so long as one does not attempt them. — Andre Gide
The only real education comes from what goes counter to you. — Andre Gide
Man: The most complex of beings, and thus the most dependent of beings. On all that made you up, you depend. — Andre Gide
Most quarrels amplify a misunderstanding. — Andre Gide
To what a degree the same past can leave different marks - and especially admit of different interpretations. — Andre Gide
Humanity cherishes its swaddling clothes; but it shall not grow up unless it can free itself from them. Turning down his mother's breast does not make the weaned child ungrateful. ... Rise up naked, valiant; make the sheaths crack; push aside the stakes; to grow straight you need no more than the thrust of your sap and the call of the sun. — Andre Gide
The most important things to say are those which often I did not think necessary for me to say - because they were too obvious. — Andre Gide
The only really Christian art is that which, like St. Francis, does not fear being wedded to poverty. This rises far above art-as-ornament. — Andre Gide
When you have nothing to say, or to hide, there is no need to be prudent. — Andre Gide
There is no prejudice that the work of art does not finally overcome. — Andre Gide
Nothing is more fatal to happiness than the remembrance of happiness. — Andre Gide
Without mysticism man can achieve nothing great. — Andre Gide
Our deeds attach themselves to us like the flame to phosphorus. They constitute our brilliance, to be sure, but only in so far as they consume us. — Andre Gide
A work of art is an exaggeration. — Andre Gide
So long as we live among men, let us cherish humanity. — Andre Gide
The pettiness of a mind can be measured by the pettiness of its adoration or its blasphemy. — Andre Gide
Each thought becomes an anxiety in my brain. I am becoming the ugliest of all things: a busy man. — Andre Gide
At times is it seems that I am living my life backward, and that at the approach of old age my real youth will begin. My soul was born covered with wrinkles. Wrinkles my ancestors and parents most assiduously put there and that I had the greatest trouble removing. — Andre Gide
We live counterfeit lives in order to resemble the idea we first had of ourselves. — Andre Gide
Do not do what someone else could do as well as you. Do not say, do not write what someone else could say, could write as well as you. Care for nothing in yourself but what you feel exists nowhere else. And, out of yourself create, impatiently or patiently, the most irreplaceable of beings. — Andre Gide
Great minds tend toward banality. It is the noblest effort of individualism. But it implies a sort of modesty, which is so rare that it is scarcely found except in the greatest, or in beggars. — Andre Gide
Woe to these people who have no appetite for the very dish that their age serves up. — Andre Gide
Money cannot buy happiness, but it can make you awfully comfortable while you're being miserable. Nothing prevents happiness like the memory of happiness. — Andre Gide
Drunkenness is never anything but a substitute for happiness. — Andre Gide
It is better to fail at your own life than to succeed at someone else's. — Andre Gide
Faith can move mountains; true: mountains of stupidity. — Andre Gide
Not everyone can be an orphan. — Andre Gide
Man is more interesting than men. God made him and not them in his image. Each one is more precious than all. — Andre Gide
If one could recover the uncompromising spirit of one's youth, one's greatest indignation would be for what one has become. — Andre Gide
True eloquence forgoes eloquence. — Andre Gide
Solitude is bearable only with God. — Andre Gide
I find just as much profit in cultivating my hates as my loves. — Andre Gide
Pay attention only to the form; emotion will come spontaneously to inhabit it. A perfect dwelling always finds an inhabitant. The artist's business is to build the dwelling; as for the inhabitant, it is up to the reader to provide him. — Andre Gide
Too chaste a youth leads to a dissolute old age. — Andre Gide
It is one of life's laws that as soon as one door closes another opens. But the tragedy is we look at the closed door and disregard the open one. — Andre Gide
Nothing prevents happiness like the memory of happiness. — Andre Gide
Let every emotion be capable becoming an intoxication to you. If what you eat fails to make you drunk, it is because you are not hungry enough. — Andre Gide
The world will be saved by one or two people. — Andre Gide
Old hands soil, it seems, whatever they caress, but they too have their beauty when they are joined in prayer. Young hands were made for caresses and the sheathing of love. It is a pity to make them join too soon. — Andre Gide
Atheism. There is not a single exalting and emancipating influence that does not in turn become inhibitory. — Andre Gide
The young people who come to me in the hope of hearing me utter a few memorable maxims are quite disappointed. Aphorisms are not my forte, I say nothing but banalities.... I listen to them and they go away delighted. — Andre Gide
From the satisfaction of desire there may arise, accompanying joy and as it were sheltering behind it, something not unlike despair. — Andre Gide
Never have I been able to settle in life. Always seated askew, as if on the arm of a chair; ready to get up, to leave. — Andre Gide
It is the special quality of love not to be able to remain stationary, to be obliged to increase under pain of diminishing. — Andre Gide
Oh, would that my mind could let fall its dead ideas, as the tree does its withered leaves! And without too many regrets, if possible! Those from which the sap has withdrawn. But, good Lord, what beautiful colors! — Andre Gide
The great artist is one whom constraint exalts, for whom the obstacle is a springboard. — Andre Gide
Life Lessons by Andre Gide
Andre Gide taught that it is important to take risks and be open to new experiences in order to grow and learn.
He believed that it was important to be honest with oneself and to stay true to one's values, even when it is difficult.
He also encouraged people to be independent and to make their own decisions, rather than relying on the opinions of others.
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