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Having precise ideas often leads to a man doing nothing.

Paul Valery

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Paul Valery
Age: 73 †
Born: 1871
Born: October 30
Died: 1945
Died: July 20
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Philosopher
Poet
Professor
Writer
Cette
Paul Ambroise Valéry
Paul Ambroise Valery
Paul-Ambroise Valéry
Paul Valery
Paul-Ambroise Valery
Men
Precise
Leads
Often
Ideas
Nothing

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Breath, dreams, silence, invincible calm, you triumph.
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We need to wake up from a thought that lasts too long.
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History is the science of things which are not repeated.
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Nothing is more natural than mutual misunderstanding the contrary is always surprising. I believe that one never agrees on anything except by mistake, and that all harmony among human beings is the happy fruit of an error.
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Oh, hasten not this loving act, Rapture where self and not-self meet: My life has been the awaiting you, Your footfall was my own heart's beat.
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I thought it necessary to study history, even to study it deeply, in order to obtain a clear meaning of our immediate time.
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In the physical world, one cannot increase the size or quantity of anything without changing its quality. Similar figures exist only in pure geometry.
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A bad poem is one that vanishes into meaning.
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If what has happened in the one person were communicated directly to the other, all art would collapse, all the effects of art would disappear.
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Collect all the facts that can be collected about the life of Racine and you will never learn from them the art of his verse. All criticism is dominated by the outworn theory that the man is the cause of the work as in the eyes of the law the criminal is the cause of the crime. Far rather are they both the effects.
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Two dangers constantly threaten the world: order and disorder.
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To see is to forget the name of the thing one sees.
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If disorder is the rule with you, you will be penalized for installing order.
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A poet's work consists less in seeking words for his ideas than in seeking ideas for his words and predominant rhythms.
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The mere notion of photography, when we introduce it into our meditation on the genesis of historical knowledge and its true value, suggests the simple question: Could such and such a fact, as it is narrated here, have been photographed?
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Photography invites one to give up any attempt to delineate such things as can delineate themselves.
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The great virtues of the German people have created more evils than idleness ever did vices
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What is simple is wrong, and what is complicated cannot be understood.
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My hand feels touched as well as it touches reality says this, and nothing more.
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to live means to lack something at every moment
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