Sublimity Quotes

“Tonight I miss you like the sky misses his moon; a delicate epiphany growing on grass. I serenade the breeze into dancing a cha cha cha; the mountains echo in the background. September sky never looked more charming; or the sublime petals of the rose looked so graceful.”
― Avijeet Das

“Finer feeling, which we now wish to consider, is chiefly of two kinds: the feeling of the *sublime* and that of the *beautiful*. The stirring of each is pleasant, but in different ways. The sight of a mountain whose snow-covered peak rises above the clouds, the description of a raging storm, or Milton's portrayal of the infernal kingdom, arouse enjoyment but with horror; on the other hand, the sight of flower strewn meadows, valleys with winding brooks and covered with grazing flocks, the description of Elysium, or Homer's portrayal of the girdle of Venus, also occasion a pleasant sensation but one that is joyous and smiling. In order that the former impression could occur to us in due strength, we must have *a feeling of the sublime*, and, in order to enjoy the latter well, *a feeling of the beautiful*. Tall oaks and lonely shadows in a sacred grove are sublime; flower beds, low hedges and trees trimmed in figures are beautiful. Night is sublime; day is beautiful. Temperaments that possess a feeling for the sublime are drawn gradually, by the quiet stillness of a summer evening as the shimmering light of the stars breaks through the brown shadows of night and the lonely moon rises into view, into high feelings of friendship, of disdain for the world, of eternity. The shining day stimulates busy fervor and a feeling of gaiety. The sublime *moves*, the beautiful *charms*.”
― Immanuel Kant, Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime

“I hope I shall never marry. Though the most beautiful Creature were waiting for me at the end of a Journey or a Walk; though the Carpet were of Silk, the Curtains of the morning Clouds; the chairs and Sofa stuffed with Cygnet's down; the food Manna, the Wine beyond Claret, the Window opening on Winander mere, I should not feel - or rather my Happiness would not be so fine, as my Solitude is sublime. Then instead of what I have described, there is a sublimity to welcome me home - The roaring of the wind is my wife and the Stars through the window pane are my Children. The mighty abstract Idea I have of Beauty in all things stifles the more divided and minute domestic happiness - an amiable wife and sweet Children I contemplate as a part of that Beauty, but I must have a thousand of those beautiful particles to fill up my heart. I feel more and more every day, as my imagination strengthens, that I do not live in this world alone but in a thousand worlds”
― John Keats, The Letters of John Keats, 1814-1818, Volume One

“Our boat travelled on, day after day, through an unknown and mysterious land. Our company were noisy, gay, quarrelsome, full of facile theories, with glib explanations of everything, persuaded that there is nothing they could not understand and no human destiny outside the purview of their system. One of us lay at death's door, fighting a grim battle with weakness and terror and the indifference of the strong, assailed day and night by the sounds of loud-voiced love-making and trivial laughter. And all around us lay a great silence, strong as death, unfathomable as the heavens. It seemed that none had leisure to hear the silence, yet it called to me so insistently that I grew deaf to the harangues of propagandists and the endless information of the well-informed.”
― Bertrand Russell, The Problem of China

“Often, during times when I am in a state of absolute bliss and gratitude, those are the times that people will ask me, “Are you happy or are you sad?” It’s funny, because when you are happy in a way that most people are happy in, that is, when you are jumping up and down and laughing and smiling and giggling, people will recognize that as happiness. But when you go beyond that state and on into the state of blissfulness— nirvana— only a very few number of people are going to be able to recognize and understand that. Why? Because only very few people have gone beyond the level of obvious happiness, to experience actual nirvaana. Nirvana is what I describe as being in a state of worship; you see, you go beyond just feeling happy and grateful, and you enter into a state of mind that allows you to worship what you have been given or what you have attained or achieved, or whatever circumstance you are in that is making you happy. You stop and you worship the person, the place, the thing, the feeling. I’m easily flung into that state, so, I often find it strange that I can be in an absolute state of bliss, meanwhile, the other person can be asking me if I am either happy or sad. But I am worshipping.”
― C. JoyBell C.

“There is a strange breeze that flows from the mountains. The breeze is tender yet harsh, sublime yet subtle, and it drifts from place to place in search of a nothingness. I am that breeze and I can't belong to one place or to anyone. I am the wanderer and wandering is my destiny.”
― Avijeet Das

“Our mind is a limitless sky and we can only be an albatross flying in the vast expanse to occasionally discover the joys of sublimity!”
― Avijeet Das

“Sublimity belongs to the most persevering.”
― Prof.Salam Al Shereida

“We must see that there is a sublimity and majesty in monotony, when there is not a frequent or rapid variation. This is true throughout all nature. The greater part of the sublimity of the sea depends on its monotony. So also that of desolate moor and mountain scenery; and especially the sublimity of motion.So also there is sublimity in darkness when there is no light.”
― John Ruskin, On Art and Life

“The rain always reminds me of your sublimity...”
― Avijeet Das

“In the silence of the ticking of the clock's minute hand, I found you. In the echoes of the reverberations of time, I found you. In the tender silence of the long summer night, I found you. In the fragrance of the rose petals, I found you. In the orange of the sunset, I found you. In the blue of the morning sky, I found you. In the echoes of the mountains, I found you. In the green of the valleys, I found you. In the chaos of this world, I found you. In the turbulence of the oceans, I found you. In the shrill cries of the grasshopper at night, I found you. In the gossamer sublimity of the silken cobweb, I found you.”
― Avijeet Das

“The beautiful in nature is a question of the form of the object, and it consists in limitation, whereas the sublime is to be found in an object even devoid of form, so far as it immediately involves, or else by its presence evokes, a representation of limitlessness, yet with a super-added thought of its totality. Accordingly the beautiful seems to be regarded as a presentation of an indeterminate concept of the understanding , the sublime as a presentation of an indeterminate concept of reason, Hence, the delight is in the former case coupled with the representation of quality, but in this case with that of quantity. Moreover, the former delight is very different from the latter in kind. For the beautiful is directly attended with a feeling of the furtherance of life, and thus is compatible with charms and a playful imagination. On the other hand, the feeling of the sublime is a pleasure that only arrises indirectly, being brought about by the feeling of a momentary check of the vital forces followed all at once by discharge all the more powerful, and so it is an emotion that seems to be no play, but a serious matter of the imagination. Hence charms are also incompatible with it; and, since the mind is not simply attracted by the object, but is also alternately repelled thereby, the delight in the sublime does not show how much involve positive pleasure as admiration or respect, i.e. merits the name of a negative pleasure.”
― Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgment

“That is Andrema, the lyricist- the lover- he whose quill would pulse as he wrote and fill with a blush of blue, like a bruised nail. His verses, Fuschia, his verses open out like flowers of glass, and at their centre, between the brittle petals lies a pool of indigo, translucent and as huge as doom. His voice is unmuffled- it is like a bell, clearly ringing in the night of our confusions; but the clarity of imponderable depth- depth- so that his lines float on for evermore, Fuchsia- on and on, for evermore.”
― Mervyn Peake, The Gormenghast Novels

“Jesus give me equanimity;
To be rooted in Your sublimity.”
― Cali Willette, Fractures of Gold