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Fame
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Fame is an illusive thing -- here today, gone tomorrow. The fickle, shallow mob raises its heroes to the pinnacle of approval today and hurls them into oblivion tomorrow at the slightest whim; cheers today, hisses tomorrow; utter forgetfulness in a few months.
-Henry Miller
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Fashion
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The new always carries with it the sense of violation, of sacrilege. What is dead is sacred; what is new, that is different, is evil, dangerous, or subversive.
-Henry Miller
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Fate & Destiny
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Every man has his own destiny: the only imperative is to follow it, to accept it, no matter where it leads him.
-Henry Miller, The Wisdom of the Heart
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No man is great enough or wise enough for any of us to surrender our destiny to. The only way in which anyone can lead us is to restore to us the belief in our own guidance.
-Henry Miller
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Fear
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There is nothing strange about fear: no matter in what guise it presents itself it is something with which we are all so familiar that when a man appears who is without it we are at once enslaved by him.
-Henry Miller
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Food
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You can travel fifty thousand miles in America without once tasting a piece of good bread.
-Henry Miller
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Forgiveness
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Remorse is impotence, it will sin again. Only repentance is strong, it can end everything.
-Henry Miller
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Greatness & Great Things
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The world isn't kept running because it's a paying proposition. (God doesn't make a cent on the deal.) The world goes on because a few men in every generation believe in it utterly, accept it unquestioningly; they underwrite it with their lives.
-Henry Miller
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Growth
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All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous, unpremeditated act without benefit of experience.
-Henry Miller
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Heroes/Heroism
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The ordinary man is involved in action, the hero acts. An immense difference.
-Henry Miller
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History
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History is the myth, the true myth, of man's fall made manifest in time.
-Henry Miller, Plexus, 1949
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Hope
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Hope is a bad thing. It means that you are not what you want to be. It means that part of you is dead, if not all of you. It means that you entertain illusions. It's a sort of spiritual clap, I should say.
-Henry Miller
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Humanity
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Man has demonstrated that he is master of everything -- except his own nature.
-Henry Miller
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The man who is forever disturbed about the condition of humanity either has no problems of his own or has refused to face them.
-Henry Miller
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Imagination
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Imagination is the voice of daring. If there is anything Godlike about God it is that. He dared to imagine everything.
-Henry Miller
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Innovation
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No one asks you to throw Mozart out of the window. Keep Mozart. Cherish him. Keep Moses too, and Buddha and Lao Tzu and Christ. Keep them in your heart. But make room for the others, the coming ones, the ones who are already scratching on the window-panes.
-Henry Miller
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Inspirational
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I didn't have to think up so much as a comma or a semicolon; it was all given, straight from the celestial recording room. Weary, I would beg for a break, an intermission, time enough, let's say, to go to the toilet or take a breath of fresh air on the balcony. Nothing doing!
-Henry Miller
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Integrity
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I will never again go to people under false pretenses even if it is to give them the Holy Bible. I will never again sell anything, even if I have to starve. I am going home now and I will sit down and really write about people.
-Henry Miller
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Knowledge
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Sin, guilt, neurosis --they are one and the same, the fruit of the tree of knowledge.
-Henry Miller
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Land
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Topographically the country is magnificent -- and terrifying. Why terrifying? Because nowhere else in the world is the divorce between man and nature so complete. Nowhere have I encountered such a dull, monotonous fabric of life as here in America. Here boredom reaches its peak.
-Henry Miller
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Leadership
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The real leader has no need to lead -- he is content to point the way.
-Henry Miller
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Letters (writing)
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It does me good to write a letter which is not a response to a demand, a gratuitous letter, so to speak, which has accumulated in me like the waters of a reservoir.
-Henry Miller
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Life
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Life is constantly providing us with new funds, new resources, even when we are reduced to immobility. In life's ledger there is no such thing as frozen assets.
-Henry Miller
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Life moves on, whether we act as cowards or heroes. Life has no other discipline to impose, if we would but realize it, than to accept life unquestioningly. Everything we shut our eyes to, everything we run away from, everything we deny, denigrate or despise, serves to defeat us in the end. What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy, and strength, if faced with an open mind. Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.
-Henry Miller
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Madness
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Madness is tonic and invigorating. It makes the sane more sane. The only ones who are unable to profit by it are the insane.
-Henry Miller
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Books by and about Henry Miller