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But the history of the changes produced by a universal idea is not a history of changes in the individual, but of changes brought about by the successive efforts of millions of individuals in the course of many generations.

Lafcadio Hearn

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Lafcadio Hearn
Age: 54 †
Born: 1850
Born: June 27
Died: 1904
Died: September 26
Collector Of Fairy Tales
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Professor
Screenwriter
Writer
Lefkas
Koizumi Yakumo
Yakumo Koizumi
Patrick Lafcadio Hearn
Idea
Brought
Individual
Changes
History
Universal
Ideas
Generations
Many
Millions
Successive
Effort
Produced
Courses
Efforts
Course
Individuals

More quotes by Lafcadio Hearn

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It is true that short forms of poetry have been cultivated in the Far East more than in modern Europe but in all European literature short forms of poetry are to be found - indeed quite as short as anything in Japanese.
Lafcadio Hearn
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There are two methods for the literary study of any book - the first being the study of its thought and emotion the second only that of its workmanship. A student of literature should study some of the Bible from both points of view.
Lafcadio Hearn
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Literary success of any enduring kind is made by refusing to do what publishers want, by refusing to write what the public wants, by refusing to accept any popular standard, by refusing to write anything to order.
Lafcadio Hearn
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Some persons have ventured to say that it is only since Englishmen ceased to believe in the Bible that they began to discover how beautiful it was.
Lafcadio Hearn
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Whatever doubts or vexations one has in Japan, it is only necessary to ask one's self: Well, who are the best people to live with?
Lafcadio Hearn
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The time of illusion, then, is the beautiful moment of passion it represents the artistic zone in which the poet or romance writer ought to be free to do the very best that he can.
Lafcadio Hearn
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But what is after all the happiness of mere power? There is a greater happiness possible than to be lord of heaven and earth that is the happiness of being truly loved.
Lafcadio Hearn
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No man can possibly know what life means, what the world means, until he has a child and loves it. And then the whole universe changes and nothing will ever again seem exactly as it seemed before.
Lafcadio Hearn
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But every great scripture, whether Hebrew, Indian, Persian, or Chinese, apart from its religious value will be found to have some rare and special beauty of its own and in this respect the original Bible stands very high as a monument of sublime poetry and of artistic prose.
Lafcadio Hearn
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In order to comprehend the beauty of a Japanese garden, it is necessary to understand - or at least to learn to understand - the beauty of stone.
Lafcadio Hearn
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The Western poet and writer of romance has exactly the same kind of difficulty in comprehending Eastern subjects as you have in comprehending Western subjects.
Lafcadio Hearn
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I often imagine that the longer he studies English literature the more the Japanese student must be astonished at the extraordinary predominance given to the passion of love both in fiction and in poetry.
Lafcadio Hearn
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As a result, the highly civilized man can endure incomparably more than the savage, whether of moral or physical strain. Being better able to control himself under all circumstances, he has a great advantage over the savage.
Lafcadio Hearn
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There was very little suicide among the men of the North, because every man considered it his duty to get killed, not to kill himself and to kill himself would have seemed cowardly, as implying fear of being killed by others
Lafcadio Hearn
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Perhaps there is an idea among Japanese students that one general difference between Japanese and Western poetry is that the former cultivates short forms and the latter longer ones, gut this is only in part true.
Lafcadio Hearn
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The highest duty of the man is not to his father, but to his wife and for the sake of that woman he abandons all other earthly ties, should any of these happen to interfere with that relation.
Lafcadio Hearn
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A proof of really great art is that it is generally true - it seldom falls into the misapprehensions to which minor art is liable.
Lafcadio Hearn
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Any idealism is a proper subject for art.
Lafcadio Hearn
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In the world of reality the more beautiful a work of art, the longer, we may be sure, was the time required to make it, and the greater the number of different minds which assisted in its development.
Lafcadio Hearn
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At last, in 1611, was made, under the auspices of King James, the famous King James version and this is the great literary monument of the English language.
Lafcadio Hearn