Everybody must be managed. Queens must be managed. Kings must be managed, for men want managing almost as much as women, and that's saying a good deal.
Thomas HardyRead
Many...have learned that the magnitude of lives is not as to their external displacements, but as to their subjective experiences. The impressionable peasant leads a larger, fuller, more dramatic life than the pachydermatous king.
Interpretation
What this quote means
True quality of life is measured by personal experiences rather than social status or outward appearances.
In this quote, Thomas Hardy emphasizes that the depth and richness of an individual's life is determined by their personal feelings, thoughts, and experiences rather than their social standing or material possessions. He suggests that even those in lowly positions can lead profoundly meaningful lives compared to those who might be seen as powerful or prestigious but lack emotional and subjective depth.
Themes
LifeExperiencesSubjectiveMeaningStatus
In practice
Example use cases
This quote would be perfect in a motivational speech about valuing personal growth.
More from Thomas Hardy
All quotes →Because what's the use of learning that I am one of a long row only - finding out that there is set down in some old book somebody just like me, and to know that I shall only act her part; making me sad, that's all. The best is not to remember your nature and your past doings have been just like thousands' and thousands', and that your coming life and doings'll be like thousands' and thousands'.
Thomas HardyRead
But nothing is more insidious than the evolution of wishes from mere fancies, and of wants from mere wishes.
Thomas HardyRead
I wish I had never been born--there or anywhere else.
Thomas HardyRead
Her affection for him was now the breath and life of Tess's being; it enveloped her as a photosphere, irradiated her into forgetfulness of her past sorrows, keeping back the gloomy spectres that would persist in their attempts to touch her—doubt, fear, moodiness, care, shame. She knew that they were waiting like wolves just outside the circumscribing light, but she had long spells of power to keep them in hungry subjection there.
Thomas HardyRead
The trees have inquisitive eyes, haven't they? -that is, seem as if they had. And the river says,-'Why do ye trouble me with your looks?' And you seem to see numbers of to-morrows just all in a line, the first of them the biggest and clearest, the others getting smaller and smaller as they stand further away; but they all seem very fierce and cruel and as if they said, 'I'm coming! Beware of me! Beware of me!
Thomas HardyRead
Similar quotes
Israelites, Christians and Muslims profess immortality, but the veneration they render this world proves they believe only in it, since they destine all other worlds, in infinite number, to be its reward or punishment.
Jorge Luis BorgesRead
I am very defective in all duties... In prayer I wander and am formal... I soon tire; devotion languishes; and I do not walk with God.
William CareyRead
Humanism is the only - I would go so far as saying the final- resistance we have against the inhuman practices and injustices that disfigure human history.
Edward SaidRead
The political currents that topped the global agenda in the late 20th century - revolutionary nationalism, feminism and ethnic struggle - place culture at their heart.
Terry EagletonRead
One is always at home in one's past.
Vladimir NabokovRead
Death is not a blotting-out of existence, a final escape from life; nor is death the door to immortality. He who has fled his Self in earthly joys will not recapture It amidst the gossamer charms of an astral world. There he merely accumulates finer perceptions and more sensitive responses to the beautiful and the good, which are one. It is on the anvil of this gross earth that struggling man must hammer out the imperishable gold of spiritual identity.
Paramahansa YoganandaRead