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Antoine de Saint-Exupery, a French writer and pioneering aviator, is best known for his beloved work "The Little Prince," which has touched generations with its themes of love, loss, and the importance of seeing the world with the eyes of a child. Saint-Exupery's life was a courageous blend of adventure and introspection, and his experiences as a pilot during World War II deeply influenced his writing. His timeless stories encourage readers to embrace curiosity, the search for meaning, and the pursuit of personal truth, leaving an indelible mark on literature and human understanding.
"When you've finished your own toilet in the morning, then it is time to attend to the toilet of your planet, just so, with the greatest care."
"To be a man is to feel that one's own stone contributes to building the edifice of the world."
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"Life has a meaning only if one barters it day by day for something other than itself."
"Grown-ups love figures. When you talk to them about a new friend, they never ask questions about essential matters."
"The stars are beautiful, because of a flower that cannot be seen... The desert is beautiful," the little prince added. And that was true. I have always loved the desert. One sits down on a desert sand dune, sees nothing, hears nothing. Yet through the silence something throbs, and gleams... "What makes the desert beautiful," said the little prince, "is that somewhere it hides a well..." I was astonished by a sudden understanding of that mysterious radiation of the sands."
"When I opened my eyes I saw nothing but the pool of nocturnal sky, for I was lying on my back with out-stretched arms, face to face with that hatchery of stars. Only half awake, still unaware that those depths were sky, having no roof between those depths and me, no branches to screen them, no root to cling to, I was seized with vertigo and felt myself as if flung forth and plunging downward like a diver."
"No single event can awaken within us a stranger whose existence we had never suspected. To live is to be slowly born."
"If a sheep eats bushes does it eat flowers too?a sheep eats whatever it findseven a flower with thorn?even a flower with thorns.then what's the good of thorns?"
"Even so did you feel yourself swept away by that inward migration about which no one had ever said a word to you. A great wind swept through and delivered from the matrix the sleeping prince you sheltered- man within you. You are the equal of the musician composing his music, of the physicist extending the frontier of knowledge you have reached an altitude where all loves are of the same stuff."
"I am looking for friends. What does that mean -- tame?""It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. "It means to establish ties." "To establish ties?" "Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world...."
"Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies."
"Men? One never knows where to find them. The wind blows them away. They have no roots, and that makes their life very difficult."
"We do not pray for immortality, but only not to see our acts and all things stripped suddenly of all their meaning; for then it is the utter emptiness of everything reveals itself."
"If you love a flower which happens to be on a star, it is sweet at night to gaze at the sky. All the stars are a riot of flowers."
"Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy ready-made things in the shops. But since there are no shops where you can buy friends, men no longer have any friends."
"Go and have another look at the roses. And you will understand that yours is indeed unique in all the world."
"If you are to be, you must begin by assuming responsibility."
"In silence alone does a man's truth bind itself together and strike root."
"You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed."
"This water was indeed a different thing from ordinary nourishment. Its sweetness was born of the walk under the stars, the song of the pulley, the effort of my arms. It was good for the heart, like a present."
"Supposing I know of a flower that is absolutely unique, that is nowhere to be found except on my planet, and any minute that flower could accidentally be eaten up by a little lamb, isn't that important? If a person loves a flower that is the only one of its kind on all the millions and millions of stars, then gazing at the night sky is enough to make him happy. He says to himself "My flower is out there somewhere." But if the lamb eats the flower, then suddenly it's as if all the stars had stopped shining. Isn't that important?"
"He fell as gently as a tree falls. There was not even any sound.."
"Where are the men? the little prince at last took up the conversationagain. "It is a little lonely in the desert. . . "It is also lonely among men, the snake said."
"But the vain man did not hear him. Vain men never hear anything but praise."
"Sometimes, there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day."
"She cast her fragrance and her radiance over me. I ought never to have run away from her... I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little stratagems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her..."
"I don't much like assuming the tone of a moralist. But the danger of baobabs is so little recognized, and the risks run by anyone who might get lost on an asteroid are so considerable, that for once I am making an exception to my habitual reserve."
"She wished to appear only in the full radiance of her beauty. Oh yes, she was quite vain! And her mysterious adornment had lasted days and days. And then one morning, precisely at sunrise, she showed herself."
"No one is ever satisfied where he is....Only the children know what they're looking for."
"The field of consciousness is tiny. It accepts only one problem at a time. Get into a fist fight put your mind on the strategy of the fight and you will not feel the other fellow's punches."
"Man is a knot a web a mesh into which relationships are tied. Only those relationships matter."
"What a space between men their spiritual natures create! A girl's reverie isolates her from me, and how shall I enter it? What can one know of a girl that passes, slow steps homeward, out of thoughts, she can form an empire, locked up in her language, in the singing echoes of her memory. Born yesterday of the volcanoes, of greenswards, of brine of the sea, she walks here already half divine."
"Of course I'll hurt you. Of course you'll hurt me. Of course we will hurt each other. But this is the very condition of existence. To become spring, means accepting the risk of winter. To become presence, means accepting the risk of absence."
"But in the machine of today we forget that motors are whirring: the motor, finally, has come to fulfill its function, which is to whirr as a heart beats - and we give no thought to the beating of our heart. Thus, precisely because it is perfect the machine dissembles its own existence instead of forcing itself upon our notice."
"If you love a flower that lives on a star, it is sweet to look at the sky at night. All the stars are a-bloom with flowers..."