Romain Rolland Quotes

There is only one heroism in the world: to see the world as it is, and to love it.

Most men are essentially dead by thirty.

Be reverent before the dawning day. Do not think of what will be in a year, or in ten years. Think of to-day.

If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India.

No one ever reads a book. He reads himself through books.

It is the artist's business to create sunshine when the sun fails.

One makes mistakes; that is life. But it is never a mistake to have loved.

A hero is a man who does what he can.

Any man who is really a man must learn to be alone in the midst of others, to think alone for others, and, if necessary, against others.

Discussion is impossible with someone who claims not to seek the truth, but already to possess it.

Thousands of animals (now billions) are butchered every day without a shadow of remorse. It cries vengeance upon all the human race.

The friend who understands you, creates you.

Passion is like genius: a miracle.

To understand everything is to hate nothing.

Every race, every art has its hypocrisy. The world is fed with a little truth and many lies.

Leave your theories. All theories, you see, even those of virtue, are bad, foolish, mischievous.

If a man is to shed the light of the sun upon other men, he must first of all have it within himself.

Each man must learn his own ideal and try to accomplish it: that is a surer way of progress than to take the ideas of another.

There is only one necessary condition for the emergence of a new theatre, that the stage and auditorium should be open to the masses, should be able to contain a people and the actions of a people.

Everyone, deep down within, carries a small cemetery of those he has loved.

Everything is music for the born musician.

I find war detestable but those who praise it without participating in it even more so.

There are some dead who are more alive than the living.

The artist is the compass which, through the raging of the storm, points steadily to the north.

Skepticism, riddling the faith of yesterday, prepared the way for the faith of tomorrow.

Take possession of the air, submit the elements, penetrate the last redoubts of nature, make space retreat, make death retreat.

You want to be a hero. That is why you do such silly things.

I know at last what distinguishes man from animals; financial worries.

It is not peace that I seek, but life.

The greatest human ideal is the great cause of bringing together the thoughts of Europe and Asia; the great soul of India will topple our world.

I would rather have this life of combat than the moral calm and mournful stupor of these last years. God give me struggle, enemies, howling crowds, all the combot of which I am capable.

Love of my country does not demand that I shall hate and slay those noble and faithful souls who also love theirs.

All these young millionaires were anarchists, of course: when a man possesses everything it is the supreme luxury for him to deny society: for in that way he can evade his responsibilities

When nothing hampers action, the soul has fewer reasons for action.

History furnishes to politics all the arguments that it needs, for the chosen cause.

Let us return to our eagle's nest in the Himalayas. It is waiting for us, for it is ours, eaglets of Europe, we need not renounce any part of our real nature...whence we formerly took our flight.

One day History will pass judgment on each of the nations at war; she will weigh their measure of errors, lies, and heinous follies. Let us try to make ours light before her!

The theatre, like the fresco, is art fitted to its place. And therefore it is above all else the human art, the living art.

Mozart was able to do what he wished in music and he never wished to so what was beyond him.

No one ever reads a book. He reads himself through books, either to discover or to control himself.

One makes mistakes that is life. But it is never a mistake to have loved.