Quotes by Jack London

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I get intimidated when I see my human limitations, which prevent me from covering all aspects of the problem, especially when it comes to the fundamental issues of life.

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Alcoholism - this product of barbarism - keeps humanity tied to the gray and wild past, and exacts a monstrous tribute from it, devouring the youth, undermining the powers, overwhelming the energies, ruining the flower of the human race.

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To me there is something attractive about a drunken man, and if I were in charge of an educational institution, I would certainly establish a department for the study of the psychology of drunkards, with compulsory practical hours.

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If you think clearly, you will write clearly, if your idea is of value, then the essay will be of value.

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If you lost the truth by hiding it, if you did not stand up and speak in a meeting, if you spoke but did not tell the whole truth - you betrayed the truth.

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Life always gives man less than he asks of it.

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Life is a strange thing. I thought a lot, I reflected a lot on it, but day by day, life seems to me more and more difficult to understand. Why do we have such a thirst for life? Life is a game from which man does not emerge victorious. To live is to work hard and suffer, until old age creeps up on others, and then we lay hands on the cold ashes of the cooled pyres. It's hard to live. The child is born in agony, in agony the old man breathes his last, and all our days are full of sorrow and care. And yet man walks into the open arms of death, unwillingly, stumbling, falling, looking back, fighting to the last moment. Only death is good. Life causes us suffering. But we love life and hate death. This is very strange!

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The true purpose of man is to live, not to exist.

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A bone thrown to a dog is no mercy; mercy is the bone shared with a dog, when you are no less hungry than he is.

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Alcohol always reaches out to us, when we have a setback, we are exhausted...

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A drunkard is able to do things that he would not have done on purpose if he had not been drunk.

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Many people, overburdened with intellectual work, and workers, falling into error, step on the path that alcohol leads to death.

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The beginning of the road - a glass, the middle - a society of drunken companions, a light drink, about two glasses at the table. The end - in prison for a drunken murder, for embezzlement; in a mental hospital, in a grave due to a random minor illness.

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Better to be dust and ashes! Better that my flame be extinguished in a blinding spark, Than mold choke it!

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He knows life... He knows all its vileness and all its beauty, and he knows how great life is, even with all its filth! Holy shit! - will have more to say about this to the world. The saints in heaven - how could they be clean and undefiled? They do not deserve the glory for that. But the saints who live in the mud - this, this is the eternal miracle! That's why it's worth living; so that people can see how moral greatness emerges from the contagion of sin; so that he himself would stand out from it, and as his eyes begin to clear, he would first vaguely catch a glimpse of the beauty looming in the distance. It is worth living so that people can see how strength, truth and soul emerge from all weakness, frailty, sin, and all bottomless meanness.

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My heart is in the palm of my hand, it beats at the end of every finger. If you don't hit me, I'm warning you, I'm going to sit in this chair and die. (...) I don't tremble for my body. I live in my heart and in my head, sir—not in this frail pod of dust in which I temporarily dwell.

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Here, the politeness of the usual life at home must be replaced with altruism, perseverance and patience, this way and only this way you can get to the treasured gem: true friendship. Never say "thank you"; let him feel it without opening his mouth and prove it, reciprocate in actions. In other words, instead of words, actions should be its advocate, instead of dead letters, the living spirit should be its advocate.

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If you throw a bone to the dog, you are not being charitable. You are charitable when you share the bone with the dog, even though you yourself are as hungry as the dog.

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The ancient nomad rebels, the chain of habits breaks, the wild awakens in him after his deep winter sleep.

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Death does not exist. How could there be death when everything is part of the Godhead? The soul never dies, and the body is never truly alive.

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He learned that man cannot know the ultimate meaning of anything, and that beauty is as mysterious as life itself. He also learned that the threads of beauty are everywhere interwoven with the threads of life, and he knew that he himself was only a tiny part of that inextricable tangle, which was woven from sunlight, stardust and miracles.

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The unknown is one of the main components of fear.

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Death does not hurt, only life tortures a person!

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He learned a lot about himself - for example, that beauty is more important to him than fame, and that if he still wants to be famous, he wants to please Ruth. It is for his sake that he desires so much fame. He wants to grow big in the eyes of the world (...) so that the woman he loves is proud of him and considers him worthy of himself.

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I (...) am me, and I will not change my taste even if the whole of humanity unanimously has a different opinion. If I don't like something, I don't like it and that's it. I don't see any reason in the world why I should ape it, just because the majority of my fellow humans like something, or at least pretend to like it. In terms of what I like or don't like, I can't go after fashion.

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When life no longer yearns for existence, it is on a straight path to annihilation.

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Unceasing remembrance leads to the hell of madness.

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The point of life is not that you are dealt good cards, but how well you play the bad cards.

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Everyone likes to have their own thoughts presented to them, nicely dressed up.

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Love is beyond all reasoning - it is beyond all reason. Love lives somewhere on the ridges, high above the plains of reason. Being rises above itself in love, to heights that one rarely reaches. The human body achieves its main goal in love, and therefore love should not be argued with, but should be accepted as life's greatest gift.

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If you are participating in a game that you do not know, you must always give the initiative to the other player.

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All thinkers who deal with general questions rely on specialists.

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Everything is connected to everything that exists, from the most distant star hurtling through endless space to the myriads of atomic grains of dust crunching beneath our feet.

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He who travels alone travels the fastest.

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In society, every individual and every group - or rather every individual and group - apes those who stand above it.

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The dog makes the noble nobler and the meaner baser.

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Confined spirits only ever recognize the limitations of others.

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A person who has a strong will can rise above his environment.

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Money means freedom, an acceptable appearance.

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The speed of each fleet depends on the speed of its slowest ship. The speed of the teachers also depends on this. Nor can they progress faster than their slowest-moving students.

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I didn't start when I was born or when I was conceived. I am constantly growing, evolving through uncountable myriads of millennia... all my previous selves have their voices, echoes and whispers within me.

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Everyone in society, or rather: almost everyone, apes those above them. And who are on top? The doers. The rich do nothing. They usually know nothing about the things that interest people who have something to do in the world.

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Life is short and I want the best from everyone I meet.

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There is a kind of estrangement that marks the peak of life, and beyond which life cannot rise. And since existence is a paradoxical thing, this alienation comes to us when our life is burning most fiercely, and at the same time it makes us completely forget that we are alive. This alienation captures the artist, it makes him forget that he is alive when his whole being is engulfed in a flame.

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However persistently he dissected beauty to discover the principles that make something beautiful, he never for a moment forgot that beauty was ultimately a mystery that neither he nor those who had tried in the past had succeeded in deciphering.

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The boy watched how the magic of the story carried him away. (...) He gave it this title: ADVENTURE. But it wasn't about an adventure like in adventure stories, but about the biggest adventure, life, this inexorable hair-crush, which is equally terrible, both punishing and rewarding, faith-breaking and unpredictable, demanding inhuman patience, driving a person to despair by day , and at night he breaks his bones, pushes him into hunger, misery, crippling fevers, slow death, hellish terror... and in the end gives him shining glory or dark death.

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He smiled and admired her face. How touchingly innocent that face is! When he looks at her, he always feels that his purity flows into him, cleansing him of all dirt, and radiating an unearthly glow around him, which is as cool, soft and velvety as the light of the stars.

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This girl's body is more than the robe of her soul: it is the outpouring of her soul - the pure, beautiful crystallization of her divine being.

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He believed that love was a flame that only warms but does not burn, mild as dew, quiet as the murmur of a stream, and pleasantly cool as a summer night. What he thought of as love was more of a peaceful attachment, serving the beloved in the fragrant twilight of some unearthly peace. He had no idea of ​​love's volcanic eruptions, its consuming heat and barren deserts.