You can't measure time by days, the way you measure money by dollars and cents, because dollars are all the same while every day is different and maybe every hour as well.
Jorge Luis BorgesRead
In the order of literature, as in others, there is no act that is not the coronation of an infinite series of causes and the source of an infinite series of effects.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that every action in literature (and life) is the result of a complex chain of causes and leads to a multitude of effects.
Jorge Luis Borges reflects on the interconnectedness of actions and events in literature, highlighting that each act is not isolated but rather the culmination of countless preceding influences and the catalyst for numerous subsequent outcomes. This perspective encourages a deeper understanding of the narrative and its broader implications, suggesting that every story is part of a larger continuum of human experience.
In practice
In a literary discussion about causality and narrative structure.
You can't measure time by days, the way you measure money by dollars and cents, because dollars are all the same while every day is different and maybe every hour as well.
To say good-bye is to deny separation; it is to say Today we play at going our own ways, but we'll see each other tomorrow. Men invented farewells because they somehow knew themselves to be immortal, even while seeing themselves as contingent and ephemeral.
The execution was set for the 29th of March, at nine in the morning. This delay was due to a desire on the part of the authorities to act slowly and impersonally, in the manner of planets or vegetables.
This felicitous supposition declared that there is only one Individual, and that this indivisible Individual is every one of the separate beings in the universe, and that these beings are the instruments and masks of divinity itself.
A man sets out to draw the world. As the years go by, he peoples a space with images of provinces, kingdoms, mountains, bays, ships, islands, fishes, rooms, instruments, stars, horses, and individuals. A short time before he dies, he discovers that the patient labyrinth of lines traces the lineaments of his own face.
Let neither tear nor reproach besmirch this declaration of the mastery of God who, with magnificent irony, granted me both the gift of books and the night.
Death is the wish of some, the relief of many, and the end of all.
In Buddhism, we speak of touching Nirvana with our own body, In Christianity, you can also touch the Kingdom of God with your body, right here and now. it is much safer than placing our hope in the future. If we cling to the idea of hope in the future, we might not notice the peace and joy that are available in the present moment. The best way to take care of the future is to take care of the present moment.
What greater reassurance can the weak have than that they are like anyone else?
As we are, so we associate. The good, by affinity, seek the good; the vile, by affinity, the vile. Thus of their own volition, souls proceed into Heaven, into Hell.
The moment we face it frankly we are driven to the conclusion that the community has a right to put a price on the right to live in it
We’re not Indians and we’re not Native Americans. We’re older than both concepts. We’re the people, we’re the human beings.
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