Logic is one thing, the human animal another. You can quite easily propose a logical solution to something and at the same time hope in your heart of hearts it won't work out.
Luigi PirandelloRead
Anyone can be heroic from time to time, but a gentleman is something you have to be all the time.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Being heroic is occasional, but true gentlemanly behavior is a constant quality.
This quote conveys the distinction between episodic acts of heroism and the consistent character required to be a gentleman. It suggests that while anyone might display bravery or nobility in specific situations, being a true gentleman demands a daily commitment to integrity, respect, and honorable conduct.
Themes
HeroismGentlemanCharacterIntegrityBehavior
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about moral integrity, one might quote Pirandello to emphasize the importance of consistent ethical behavior.
More from Luigi Pirandello
All quotes βWe're like so many puppets hung on the wall, waiting for someone to come and move us or make us talk.
Luigi PirandelloRead
Woe to him who doesn't know how to wear his mask, be he king or pope!
Luigi PirandelloRead
THE FATHER: But don't you see that the whole trouble lies here? In words, words. Each one of us has within him a whole world of things, each man of us his own special world. And how can we ever come to an understanding if I put in the words I utter the sense and value of things as I see them; while you who listen to me must inevitably translate them according to the conception of things each one of you has within himself. We think we understand each other, but we never really do.
Luigi PirandelloRead
Whoever has the luck to be born a character can laugh even at death. Because a character will never die! A man will die, a writer, the instrument of creation: but what he has created will never die!
Luigi PirandelloRead
A fact is like a sack - it won't stand up if it's empty. To make it stand up, first you have to put in it all the reasons and feelings that caused it in the first place.
Luigi PirandelloRead
Similar quotes
I care not where my body may take me as long as my soul is embarked on a meaningful journey.
Dante AlighieriRead
If the Bible is not the Word of God and inspired, the whole of Christendom for 1800 years has been under an immense delusion; half the human race has been cheated and deceived, and churches are monuments of folly. If the Bible is the Word of God and inspired, all who refuse to believe it are in fearful danger; they are living on the brink of eternal misery. No man, in his sober senses, can fail to see that the whole subject demands most serious attention.
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We must first peer into the darkness, feel strangled and entombed in the hopelessness of living without God, before we are ready to feel the presence of His living light.
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When the highwayman holds his gun to your head, you turn your valuables over to him. You 'consent' alright, but you do so because you cannot help yourself, because you are compelled by his gun. Are you not compelled to work for an employer? Your need compels you, just as the highwayman's gun.
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War can only be qualified by its object, and there is neither foreign war nor civil war, there is only just or unjust war.
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When death comes, it's just like winter. We don't say, "There ought not to be winter." That the winter season, when the leaves fall and the snow comes, is some kind of defeat, something which we should hold out against. No. Winter is part of the natural course of events. No winter, no summer. No cold, no heat.
Alan WattsRead