Khalil Gibran Men Quotations

The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into silver and gold.

No man can reveal to you nothing but that which already lies half-asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.

Am I less man because I believe in a greater man?

When a man's hand touches the hand of a woman, they both touch the heart of eternity.

What the soul knows is often unknown to the man who has a soul. We are infinitely more than we think.

He was gentle, like a man mindful of his own strength. In my dreams I beheld the kings of the earth standing in awe in His presence.

That deed which in our guilt we today call weakness, will appear tomorrow as an essential link in the complete chain of Man.

The fool sees naught but folly; and the madman only madness. Yesterday I asked a foolish man to count the fools among us. He laughed and said, "This is too hard a thing to do, and it will take too long. Were it not better to count only the wise?"

When God created Man, he gave him Music as a language different from all other languages. And early man sang his glory in the wilderness; and drew the hearts of kings and moved them from their thrones.

I once heard a learned man say, "Every evil has its remedy, except folly. To reprimand an obstinate fool or to preach to a dolt is like writing upon the water. Christ healed the blind, the halt, the palsied, and the leprous. But the fool He could not cure."

Spiritual awakening is the most essential thing in man's life, and it is the sole purpose of being. Is not civilization, in all its tragic forms, a supreme motive for spiritual awakening?

The soul is an embryo in the body of Man, and the day of death is the Day of awakening, for it is the Great era of labour and the rich Hour of creation.

All men love you for themselves. I love you for yourself.

Happiness is a myth we seek, If manifested surely irks; Like river speeding to the plain, On its arrival slows and murks. For man is happy only in His aspiration to the heights; When he attains his goal, he cools And longs for other distant flights.

Remember, one just man causes the Devil greater affliction than a million blind believers.

They say: 'If a man knew himself, he would know all mankind.' I say: 'If a man loved mankind, he would know something of himself.

There is a space between man's imagination and man's attainment that may only be traversed by his longing.

The first thought of God was an angel. The first word of God was a man

Vain are the beliefs and teachings that make man miserable, and false is the goodness that leads him into sorrow and despair, for it is man's purpose to be happy on this earth and lead the way to felicity and preach its gospel wherever he goes. He who does not see the kingdom of heaven in this life will never see it in the coming life. We came not into this life by exile, but we came as innocent creatures of God, to learn how to worship the holy and eternal spirit and seek the hidden secrets within ourselves from the beauty of life.

Who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed? See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an instrument of giving.

And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.

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?

The human heart cries out for help; the human soul implores us for deliverance; but we do not heed their cries, for we neither hear nor understand. But the man who hears and understands we call mad, and flee from him. Thus the nights pass, and we live in unawareness; and the days greet us and embrace us. But we live in constant dread of day and night.

But you who walk facing the sun, what images drawn on the earth can hold you? You who travel with the wind, what weathervane shall direct your course? What man's law shall bind you if you break your yoke but upon no man's prison door? What laws shall you fear if you dance but stumble against no man's iron chains? And who is he that shall bring you to judgment if you tear off your garment yet leave it in no man's path? People of Orphalese, you can muffle the drum, and you can loosen the strings of the lyre, but who shall command the skylark not to sing?

You cannot lay remorse upon the innocent nor lift it from the heart of the guilty. Unbidden shall it call in the night, that men may wake and gaze upon themselves.

Do not be merciful, but be just, for mercy is bestowed upon the guilty criminal, while Justice is all that the innocent man requires.

The significance of a man is not in what he attains, but rather what he longs to attain.

Like the ocean is your god-self; It remains for ever undefiled. And like the ether it lifts but the winged. Even like the sun is your god-self; It knows not the ways of the mole nor seeks it the holes of the serpent. But your god-self does not dwell alone in your being. Much in you is still man, and much in you is not yet man, But a shapeless pigmy that walks asleep in the mist searching for its own awakening.

Perhaps a man may commit suicide in self-defense.

Have you not heard of the man who was digging in the earth for roots and found a treasure?

In truth you owe naught to any man. You owe to all men.

Man is like the foam of the sea, that floats upon the surface of the water. When the wind blows, it vanishes, as if it had never been. Thus are our lives blown away by Death.

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

Reason is not like the goods sold in the market places--the more plentiful they are, the less they are worth. Reason's worth waxes with her abundance. But were she sold in the market, it is only the wise man who would understand her true value.

Men would bless you or curse you; The curse, a protest against failure, The blessing, a hymn of the hunter Who comes back from the hills With provision for his mate.

Your thought describes laws, courts, judges, punishments. Mine explains that when man makes a law, he either violates it or obeys it. If there is a basic law, we are all one before it. He who disdains the mean is himself mean. He who vaunts his scorn of the sinful vaunts his disdain of all humanity.

God has bestowed upon you intelligence and knowledge. Do not extinguish the lamp of Divine Grace and do not let the candle of wisdom die out in the darkness of lust and error. For a wise man approaches with his torch to light up the path of mankind.

Only once have I been made mute. It was when a man asked me, 'Who are you?'

A man can be free without being great, but no man can be great without being free.

Every man loves two women;the one is the creation of his imagination and the other is not yet born

For the vision of one man lends not its wings to another man.

He who does not seek advice is a fool. His folly blinds him to Truth and makes him evil, stubborn, and a danger to his fellow man.

Where can I find a man governed by reason instead of habits and urges?

Remember that Divinity is the true self of Man. It cannot be sold for gold; neither can it be heaped up as are the riches of the world today. The rich man has cast off his Divinity, and has clung to his gold. And the young today have forsaken their Divinity and pursue self-indulgence and pleasure.

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.

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.

Miserable is the man who loves a woman and takes her for his wife, pouring at her feet the sweat of his skin and the blood of his body and the life of his heart, and placing her in the hands of the fruit of his toil and the revenue of his diligence; for when he slowly wakes up, he finds that the heart that he endeavored to buy is given away freely and in sincerity to another man for the enjoyment of its hidden secrets and deepest love.

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

A truly religious man does not embrace a religion; and he who embraces one has no religion.

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

Money is like love; it kills slowly and painfully the one who withholds it, and enlivens the other who turns it on his fellow man.

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

You cannot judge any man beyond your knowledge of him, and how small is your knowledge.

For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger.

If your knowledge teaches you not to rise above human weakness and misery and lead your fellow man on the right path, you are indeed a man of little worth and will remain such till Judgment Day.

Every man is two men; one is awake in the darkness, the other asleep in the light.

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

God created music as a common language for all men. It inspires the poets, the composers and the architects. It lures us to search our souls for the meaning of the mysteries described in ancient books.

A thief is a man in need. A liar is a man in fear.

There is a desire deep within the soul which drives man from the seen to the unseen, to philosophy and to the divine.

Spare me the political events and power struggles, as the whole earth is my homeland and all men are my fellow countrymen.

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.

Man struggles to find life outside himself, unaware that the life he is seeking is within him.

A man's true wealth is the good he does in the world.

The nearest to my heart are a king without a kingdom and a poor man who does not know how to beg.

The best of man is he who blushes when you praise him and remains silent when you defame him.