16 Quotes by Emile Chartier

Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it is the only one you have.

To think is to say no.

Every idea I get I have to deny, that’s my way of testing it.

Two things are aesthetically perfect in the world – the clock and the cat.

When we speak, in gestures or signs, we fashion a real object in the world; the gesture is seen, the words and the song are heard. The arts are simply a kind of writing, which, in one way or another, fixes words or gestures, and gives body to the invisible.

People who are upset about something ruminate on it whenever they get a chance; they are constantly drawn back to their own unhappy tale as if it were a horror story left open on a table.

One must be truthful with oneself about one’s own motives, especially if one is to survive in the world. It takes rigor, and it takes courage.

There is a future that makes itself and a future we make. The real future is composed of both.

The most difficult thing in the world is to say thinkingly what everybody says without thinking.