Quote

Art holds out the promise of inner wholeness.

Alain de Botton

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Alain de Botton
Age: 55
Born: 1969
Born: December 20
Journalist
Philosopher
Publisher
Writer
City of Zurich
Alain De Botton
Wholeness
Holds
Inner
Promise
Art

More quotes by Alain de Botton

Image
The media insists on taking what someone didn't mean to say as being far closer to the truth than what they did.
Alain de Botton
Image
I am conscious of trying to stretch the boundaries of non-fiction writing. It's always surprised me how little attention many non-fiction writers pay to the formal aspects of their work.
Alain de Botton
Image
The fear of saying something stupid (which stupid people never have) has censored far more good ideas than bad ones.
Alain de Botton
Image
We should not be frightened by appearances.
Alain de Botton
Image
What we seek, at the deepest level, is inwardly to resemble, rather than physically to possess, the objects and places that touch us through their beauty.
Alain de Botton
Image
He was marked out by his relentless ability to find fault with others' mediocrity - suggesting that a certain type of intelligence may be at heart nothing more or less than a superior capacity for dissatisfaction.
Alain de Botton
Image
These inventors were elevating the formulation of entrepreneurial ideas to the status of a visionary activity. Though forced to justify their efforts in the pragmatic language of venture capital, they were at heart utopian thinkers intent on transforming the world.
Alain de Botton
Image
A dominant impulse on encountering beauty is to wish to hold on to it, to possess it and give it weight in one’s life. There is an urge to say, ‘I was here, I saw this and it mattered to me.
Alain de Botton
Image
It is striking how much more seriously we are likely to be taken after we have been dead a few centuries.
Alain de Botton
Image
The longing for a destiny is no nowhere stronger than in our romantic life. All too often forced to share our bed with those who cannot fathom our soul, can we not be forgiven if we believe ourselves fated to stumble one day upon the man or woman of our dreams.
Alain de Botton
Image
The genius of religions is that they structure the inner life.
Alain de Botton
Image
Arguments are like eels: however logical, they may slip from the minds weak grasp unless fixed there by imagery and style.
Alain de Botton
Image
Pick up any newspaper or magazine, open the TV, and you'll be bombarded with suggestions of how to have a successful life. Some of these suggestions are deeply unhelpful to our own projects and priorities - and we should take care.
Alain de Botton
Image
Sweetness is the opposite of machismo, which is everywhere-and I really don't get on with machismo. I'm interested in sensitivity, and weakness, and fear, and anxiety, because I think that, at the end of the day, behind our masks, that's what we are.
Alain de Botton
Image
Not everyone is worth listening to.
Alain de Botton
Image
It's perhaps easier now than ever before to make a good living it's perhaps harder than ever before to stay calm, to be free of career anxiety.
Alain de Botton
Image
Life gives us no such handy markers - a storm comes, and far from this being a harbinger of death and collapse, during its course a person discovers love and truth, beauty and happiness, the rain lashing at the windows all the while.
Alain de Botton
Image
It is perhaps sad books that best console us when we are sad, and to lonely service stations that we should drive when there is no one for us to hold or love.
Alain de Botton
Image
We each appear to hold within ourselves a range of divergent views as to our native qualities.. And amid such uncertainty, we typically turn to the wider world to settle the question of our significance.. we seem beholden to affections of others to endure ourselves.
Alain de Botton
Image
Paying tax should be framed as a glorious civic duty worthy of gratitude - not a punishment for making money.
Alain de Botton