Quote

The commerce of minds was necessarily the first commerce in the world, ... since before bartering things one must barter signs, and it is necessary therefore that signs be instituted.There is no market or exchange without language. The first instrument of all commerce is language.

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
Language
Instrument
Firsts
Necessarily
Without
Instruments
Bartering
First
Market
Barter
Must
Minds
Instituted
Mind
Necessary
Exchange
Things
Therefore
Signs
World
Since
Commerce

More quotes by Paul Valery

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Just as water, gas, and electricity are brought into our houses from far off to satisfy our needs in response to a minimal effort, so we shall be supplied with visual or auditory images, which will appear and disappear at a simple movement of the hand, hardly more than a sign.
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The advantage of the incomprehensible is that it never loses its freshness.
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We hope vaguely but dread precisely.
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It is a law of nature that we defend ourselves from one affection only by means of another.
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History is the science of what never happens twice.
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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 great virtues of the German people have created more evils than idleness ever did vices
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The purpose of psychology is to give us a completely different idea of the things we know best.
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Fidelity to meaning alone in translation is a kind of betrayal.
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Liberty is the hardest test that one can inflict on a people. To know how to be free is not given equally to all men and all nations.
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The most ridiculous were those who, on their own authority, made themselves the judges and justices of the tribe. They seemed never to suspect that our judgments judge us, and that nothing exposes our weaknesses and reveals ourselves more naively than the attitude of pronouncing upon our neighbors.
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We are wont to condemn self-love but what we really mean to condemn is contrary to self-love. It is that mixture of selfishness and self-hate that permanently pursues us, that prevents us from loving others, and that prohibits us from losing ourselves.
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My hand feels touched as well as it touches reality says this, and nothing more.
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God created man and, finding him not sufficiently alone, gave him a companion to make him feel his solitude more keenly.
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No work of art is ever completed, it is only abandoned.
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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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The universe is built on a plan the profound symmetry of which is somehow present in the inner structure of our intellect.
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What golden hour of life, what glittering moment will ever equal the pain its loss can cause?
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Science is feasible when the variables are few and can be enumerated when their combinations are distinct and clear. We are tending toward the condition of science and aspiring to do it. The artist works out his own formulas the interest of science lies in the art of making science.
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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.
Paul Valery