Quotes about Paradise

It may seem paradoxical to say that we have been expelled from the present, but it is a feeling we have all had at some moment. Some of us experienced it first as a condemnation, later transformed into consciousness and action. The search for the present is neither the pursuit of an earthly paradise nor that of a timeless eternity: it is the search for a real reality.
We pursue her in her incessant metamorphoses yet we never manage to trap her. She always escapes: each encounter ends in flight. We embrace her and she disappears immediately: it was just a little air. It is the instant, that bird that is everywhere and nowhere. We want to trap it alive but it flaps its wings and vanishes in the form of a handful of syllables. We are left empty-handed. Then the doors of perception open slightly and the other time appears, the real one we were searching for without knowing it: the present, the presence.

The face of the angel of history is turned toward the past.  Where we perceived a chain of events, he sees a single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet.  The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed.  But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such violence that the angel can no longer close them.  This storm irresistably propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward.  The storm is what we call progress.

If a seperate personal Paradise exists for each of us mine must irreparably be planted with trees of words which the wind silvers like poplars, by people who see their confiscated justice given back, and by birds that even in the midst of the truth of death insist on singing in Greek and saying, eros, eros, eros.

I`ve been to paradise.....it was an absolute pain.

There is no life I know to compare with pure imagination. Living there, you'll be free if you truly wish to be. If you want to view paradise, simply look around and view it. Anything you want to, do it. Want to change the world? There's nothing to it.

The animals of this world did not go into a Christian heaven, a Moslem heaven or a Hindu paradise. They did not claim any God as their own.

Look around you at the gifts of God, the clear sky, the pure air, the tender grass, the birds; nature is beautiful and sinless, and we, only we, are godless and foolish, and we don't understand that life is a paradise, for we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep.

The kingdom of heaven is spread out across the earth, only people don't see it.

Lost between two worlds. One lies dying. The other crying to be born. Lost between two worlds. Paradise's promise and hell fire's scorn.

Paradise is surrounded by what we dislike; the fires of hell are surrounded by what we desire.

Hold on to the center and make up your mind to rejoice in this paradise called life.

TAKING THE FIRST FOOTSTEP with a good thought, the second with a good word, and the third with a good deed, I entered paradise.

This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, This other eden, demi-paradise, This fortress built by nature for herself Against infection and the hand of war, This happy breed of men, this little world, This prescious stone set in the silver sea, Which serves it in the office of a wall Or as a moat defensive to a house, Against the envy of less happier lands, This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England . . .

Cultivate the garden within. What was Paradise? but a garden, an orchard of trees and herbs, full of pleasure and nothing there but delights.

What was paradise? But a garden, an orchard of trees and herbs. Full of pleasure, and nothing there but delights.

Same old slippers, Same old rice, Same old glimpse of Paradise.

The machine can free man or enslave him; it can make of this world something resembling a paradise or a purgatory. Men have it within their power to achieve a security hitherto dreamed of only by the philosophers, or they may go the way of the dinosaurs, actually disappearing from the earth because they fail to develop the social and political intelligence to adjust to the world which their mechanical intelligence has created.

Mutual forgiveness of each vice. Such are the Gates of Paradise.

Perhaps there is only one cardinal sin: impatience. Because of impatience we were driven out of Paradise, because of impatience we cannot return.

Paradise is where I am.

Paradise was made for tender hearts; hell, for loveless hearts.

Let every Christian be a gardener so that he and she and the whole of creation, which groans in expectation of the Spirit's final harvest, may inherit Paradise. If we Christian's truly treasure the hope that one day we, like Adam and the penitent thief, will walk alongside the One who caused even the dead wood of the Cross to blossom with flowers, then we must also imitate the Master's art and make the desolate earth grow green.

An intelligent hell would be better than a stupid paradise.

As Joseph Was A-Walking As Joseph was a-walking He heard Angels sing, "This night shall be born Our Heavenly King. "He neither shall be born In house nor in hall, Nor in the place of paradise, But in an ox-stall. "He shall not be clothed In purple nor pall; But all in fair linen, As wear babies all. "He shall not be rocked In silver nor gold, But in a wooden cradle That rocks on the mould. "He neither shall be christened In milk nor in wine, But in pure spring-well water Fresh spring from Bethine." Mary took her baby, She dressed Him so sweet, She laid Him in a manger, All there for to sleep. As she stood over Him She heard Angels sing, "Oh, bless our dear Saviour Our Heavenly King!"

Terrorism [is] a biological consequence of the multinationals, just as a day of fever is the reasonable price of an effective vaccine . . . The conflict is between great powers, not between demons and heroes. Unhappily, therefore, is the nation that finds the "heroes" underfoot, especially if they still think in religious terms and involve the population in their bloody ascent to an uninhabited paradise.

The pleasures of love are pains that become desirable, where sweetness and torment blend, and so love is voluntary insanity, infernal paradise, and celestial hell - in short, harmony of opposite yearnings, sorrowful laughter, soft diamond.

A Child This Day Is Born A child this day is born, A child of high renown, Most worthy of a sceptre, A sceptre and a crown: Nowell, Nowell, Nowell, Nowell, sing all we may, Because the King of all kings Was born this blessed day. These tidings shepherds heard, In field watching their fold, Were by an angel unto them That night revealed and told: To whom the angel spoke, Saying, "Be not afraid; Be glad, poor silly* shepherds- Why are you so dismayed? "For lo! I bring you tidings Of gladness and of mirth, Which cometh to all people by This holy infant's birth": Then there was with the angel A host incontinent† Of heavenly bright soldiers, Which from the Highest was sent: Lauding the Lord our God, And His celestial King; All glory be in Paradise, This heavenly host did sing: And as the angels told them, So to them did appear; They found the young child, Jesus Christ, With Mary, His mother dear. *Simple. †Innumerable.

We may have to learn again the mystery of the garden: how its external characteristics model the heart itself, and how the soul is a garden enclosed, our own perpetual paradise where we can be refreshed and restored.

The many great gardens of the world, of literature and poetry, of painting and music, of religion and architecture, all make the point as clear as possible: The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. If you don't want paradise, you are not human; and if you are not human, you don't have a soul.

I suppose what makes me most glad is that we all recognize each other in this metaphysical space of silence and happening, and get some sense, for a moment, that we are full of paradise without knowing it.