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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.

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
Less
Words
Predominant
Art
Rhythms
Ideas
Consists
Work
Rhythm
Seeking
Poet
Poetry

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The mind has transformed the world, and the world is repaying it with interest. It has led man where he had no idea how to go.
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The best way to make your dreams come true is to wake up.
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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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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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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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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.
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Growing nations should remember that, in nature, no tree, though placed in the best conditions of light, soil, and plot, can continue to grow and spread indefinitely.
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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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The great virtues of the German people have created more evils than idleness ever did vices
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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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Breath, dreams, silence, invincible calm, you triumph.
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Poems are never finished - just abandoned
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History is the science of what never happens twice.
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Long years must pass before the truths we have made for ourselves become our very flesh.
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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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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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At times I think and at times I am.
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We need to wake up from a thought that lasts too long.
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To see is to forget the name of the thing one sees.
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Serious people have few ideas. People with ideas are never serious.
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