Having seen that I was not capable of using all…

Having seen that I was not capable of using all my resources in political action, I returned to my literary activity. There lay the the battlefield suited to my temperament. I wanted to make my novels the extension of my own father’s struggle for liberty. But gradually, as I kept deepening my responsibility as a writer, the human problem came to overshadow political and social questions. All the political, social, and economic improvements, all the technical progress cannot have any regenerating significance, so long as our inner life remains as it is at present. The more the intelligence unveils and violates the secrets of Nature, the more the danger increases and the heart shrinks.

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As quoted in Nikos Kazantzakis (1968) by Helen Kazantzakis

Other Nikos Kazantzakis Quotes

I said to the almond tree: “Speak to me of God.”
and the almond tree blossomed. - View Quote Details on I said to the almond tree: “Speak to me of…
All my life I struggled to stretch my mind to the breaking point, until it began to creak, in order to create a great thought which might be able to give a new meaning to life, a new meaning to death, and to console mankind. - View Quote Details on All my life I struggled to stretch my mind to…
Where are we going? Do not ask! Ascend, descend. There is no beginning and no end. Only this present moment exists, full of bitterness, full of sweetness, and I rejoice in it all. - View Quote Details on Where are we going? Do not ask! Ascend, descend. There…
Thus night with all her snares passed through the upper world
and baited all heads sweetly, fed all foolish hopes,
for night can bring to men all shrewish day denies,
wrapped as a gift in the green leaves of opiate dream. - View Quote Details on Thus night with all her snares passed through the upper…
How can you reach the womb of the Abyss to make it fruitful? This cannot be expressed, cannot be narrowed into words, cannot be subjected to laws; every man is completely free and has his own special liberation.
No form of instruction exists, no Savior exists to open up the road. No road exists to be opened. - View Quote Details on How can you reach the womb of the Abyss to…
BLESSED BE ALL THOSE WHO HEAR AND RUSH TO FREE YOU, LORD, AND WHO SAY: “ONLY YOU AND I EXIST.”
BLESSED BE ALL THOSE WHO FREE YOU AND BECOME UNITED WITH YOU, LORD, AND WHO SAY: “YOU AND I ARE ONE.”
AND THRICE BLESSED BE THOSE WHO BEAR ON THEIR SHOULDERS AND DO NOT BUCKLE UNDER THIS GREAT, SUBLIME, AND TERRIFYING SECRET:
THAT EVEN THIS ONE
DOES NOT EXIST! - View Quote Details on BLESSED BE ALL THOSE WHO HEAR AND RUSH TO FREE…
I recall an endless desert of infinite and flaming matter. I am burning! I pass through immeasurable, unorganized time, completely done, despairing, crying in the wilderness.
And slowly the flame subsides, the womb of matter grows cool, the stone comes alive, breaks open, and a small green leaf uncurls into the air, trembling. It clutches the soil, steadies itself, raises its head and hands, grasps the air, the water, the light, and sucks at the Universe. - View Quote Details on I recall an endless desert of infinite and flaming matter…
* What a strange machine man is! You fill him with bread, wine, fish, and radishes, and out comes sighs, laughter, and dreams. - View Quote Details on * What a strange machine man is! You fill him…
How difficult, how extremely difficult for the soul to sever itself from its body the world: from mountains, seas, cities, people. The soul is an octopus and these are its tentacles…. No force anywhere on earth is as imperialistic as the human soul. It occupies and is occupied in turn, but it always considers its empire too narrow. Suffocating, it desires to conquer the world in order to breathe freely. - View Quote Details on How difficult, how extremely difficult for the soul to sever…
I am not the light, I am the night; but a flame stabs through my entrails and consumes me. I am the night devoured by light. - View Quote Details on I am not the light, I am the night; but…