Explore more quotes by James A. Baldwin

"People are trapped in history and history is trapped in them."

History, People

"Nothing is more desirable than to be released from an affliction, but nothing is more frightening than to be divested of a crutch."

Society, Affliction, Nothing

"Nobody is more dangerous than he who imagines himself pure in heart; for his purity, by definition, is unassailable."

Heart, Purity

"No people come into possession of a culture without having paid a heavy price for it."

People, Culture, Possession

"No one can possibly know what is about to happen: it is happening, each time, for the first time, for the only time."

Time, First

"Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor."

Poor, Poverty

"The world is before you and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in."

World,

"The young think that failure is the Siberian end of the line, banishment from all the living, and tend to do what I then did - which was to hide."

Failure, End, Living

"Pessimists are the people who have no hope for themselves or for others. Pessimists are also people who think the human race is beneath their notice, that they're better than other human beings."

People, Hope, Race

"The face of a lover is an unknown, precisely because it is invested with so much of oneself. It is a mystery, containing, like all mysteries, the possibility of torment."

Possibility, Mystery

Exlpore more Heart quotes

"In all parts of the Old World, as well as of the New, it was evident that Columbus had kindled a fire in every mariner's heart. That fire was the harbinger of a new era, for it was not to be extinguished."

Charles Kendall Adams, American Educator

Heart, Columbus, Fire, Old

"A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows is one of the earliest as well as the keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man."

John Adams, American President

Heart, Desire, Man

"If we may believe our logicians, man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter. He has a heart capable of mirth, and naturally disposed to it."

Joseph Addison, English Writer

Heart, Laughter, Man, May

"There are times when fear is good. It must keep its watchful place at the heart's controls."

Aeschylus, Greek Poet

Heart, Fear

"Simultaneous contrast is not just a curious optical phenomenon - it is the very heart of painting."

Josef Albers, German Artist

Heart, Contrast, Painting

"No temptation can gravitate to a man unless there is that is his heart which is capable of responding to it."

James Allen, British Author

Heart, Man, Temptation

"The way to a man's heart is through his chest."

Aaron Allston, American Novelist

Heart, Man

"She danced a jig, she sung a song that took my heart away."

William Allingham, Irish Poet

Heart, Song

"Easy is to occupy a place in a telephone book. Difficult is to occupy someone's heart; know that you're really loved."

Carlos Drummond de Andrade, Brazilian Poet

Heart,

"A high heart ought to bear calamities and not flee them, since in bearing them appears the grandeur of the mind and in fleeing them the cowardice of the heart."

Pietro Aretino, Italian Poet

Heart, Cowardice, Mind