Khalil Gibran Quotes

My loneliness was born when men praised my talkative faults and blamed my silent virtues.

Inspiration is in seeing a part of the whole with the part of the whole in you.

The silence of the envious is too noisy.

Let there be no purpose in friendship save the deepening of the spirit.

Oh heart, if one should say to you that the soul perishes like the body, answer that the flower withers, but the seed remains.

You are good when you are one with yourself. Yet when you are not one with yourself you are not evil. For a divided house is not a den of thieves; it is only a divided house. And a ship without rudder may wander aimlessly among perilous isles yet sink not to the bottom.

If aught I have said is truth, that truth shall reveal itself in a clearer voice, and in words more kin to your thoughts.

Enthusiasm is a volcano on whose top never grows the grass of hesitation.

Make me, oh God, the prey of the Lion, ere you make the rabbit my prey

Men who do not forgive women their little faults will never enjoy their great virtues.

If a man loses a dear friend, he looks around and sees many friends come to console and comfort him. If a man loses his wealth, after a little thought he will realize that the delight that came from wealth will be restored by finding more. Thus he forgets his loss and is consoled. But if a man's heart is deprived of peace, where will he find it again, how will he replace it?

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

If you are poor, shun association with him who measures men with the yardstick of riches.

It is not the image you would see nor the song you would hear, but rather an image you see though you close your eyes and a song you hear though you shut your ears.

You would know the secret of death. But how shall you find it unless you seek it in the heath of life? The owl whose night-bound eyes are blind unto the day cannot unveil the mystery of light. If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide unto the body of life. For life and death are one, even as the river and sea are one. For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?

Zeal is a volcano, the peak of which the grass of indecisiveness does not grow.

When life does not find a singer to sing her heart she produces a philosopher to speak her mind.

Love is life sharing, not for hurt, Love is alive both not ambiguous. Love is whole life, not an affair.

To barter and lose is better than not to go forth.

My proof convinces the ignorant, and the wise man's proof convinces me. But he whose reasoning falls between wisdom and ignorance, I neither can convince him, nor can he convince me.

Saying this, he turned his head toward the window as if he were trying to solve the problems of human existence by concentrating on the beauty of the universe.

They consider me to have sharp and penetrating vision because I see them through the mesh of a sieve.

The bird has an honor that man does not have. Man lives in the traps of his abdicated laws and traditions; but the birds live according to the natural law of God who causes the earth to turn around the sun.

Vague and nebulous is the beginning of all things, but not their end.

Let passion fill your sails, but let reason be your rudder.

Love descends upon our souls by the will of God and not by the demand or the plea of the individual.

Behold, I have reached the peak of the mountain and my spirit has taken flight in the heavens of freedom and liberation. I have gone far, far away, O children of my mother; the hills beyond the mists are now hidden from my view, the last traces of the valleys have been flooded by the ocean of serenity, and the paths and trails have been erased by the hand of oblivion. The roar of ocean waves has faded. I no longer hear anything but the anthem of eternity, which harmonizes with the spirit.

A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?

There is within me a friend who consoles me every time that troubles overwhelm me and misfortunes afflict me. The man who does not feel friendship towards himself is a public enemy, and he who finds no confidant within himself will die of despair. For life streams out of man's inner self and in no way from what surrounds him.

The only time a juggler / Appeals to me / Is when I see him / Miss the ball.

Mother: the most beautiful word on the lips of mankind.

You, the strong, have I loved, though the marks of your iron hoofs are yet upon my flesh.

In the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures. For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.

He who passes not his days in the realm of dreams is the slave of the days.

They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.

Yet has not Man wept at the sounds? And are not his tears eloquent understanding?

Tears have cleansed my eyes, and errors have taught me the language of the hearts.

When you see a man led to prison say in your heart, "Mayhap he is escaping from a narrower prison." And when you see a man drunken say in your heart, "Mayhap he sought escape from something still more unbeautiful.

I had a second birth when my soul and my body loved one another and were married.

Love one another, but make not a bond of love.

The truly great man is he who would master no one, and who would be mastered by none.

He alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.

You may forget with whom you laughed, but you will never forget with whom you wept.

My Lebanon is a flock of birds fluttering in the early morning as shepherds lead their sheep into the meadow & rising in the evening as farmers return from their fields and vineyards.You have your Lebanon and its people. I have my Lebanon and its people.

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

If it were not for guests all houses would be graves.

At ebb tide I wrote a line upon the sand, and gave it all my heart and all my soul. At flood tide I returned to read what I had inscribed and found my ignorance upon the shore.

When your friend speaks his mind you fear not the 'nay' in your own mind, nor do you withhold the 'ay. And when he is silent your heart ceases not to listen to his heart; For without words, in friendship, all thoughts, all desires, all expectations are born and shared, with joy that is unacclaimed. When you part from your friend, you grieve not; For that which you love most in him may be clearer in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is clearer from the plain.