INSANITY QUOTES II
quotations about insanity
All humanity could share a common insanity and be immersed in a common illusion while living in a common chaos. That can't be disproved, but we have no choice but to follow our senses.
ISAAC ASIMOV
Foundation's Edge
Insanity is an irresistible desire to do something you cannot help doing; when a spirit comes over you, and overpowers you, that is insanity.
CHARLES J. GUITEAU
attributed, Day's Collacon
The sanity of society is a balance of a thousand insanities.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
"Nominalist and Realist," Essays
Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of the week.
WILLIAM DEMENT
Newsweek, November 30, 1959
First sign of madness, talking to your own head.
J. K. ROWLING
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity.
EDGAR ALLAN POE
letter to George W. Eveleth, January 4, 1848
I was walking among the fires of Hell, delighted with the enjoyments of Genius; which to Angels look like torment and insanity.
WILLIAM BLAKE
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
There are so many kinds of madness, so many ways in which the human brain may go wrong; and so often it happens that what we call madness is both reasonable and just. It is so. Yes. A little reason is good for us, a little more makes wise men of some of us--but when our reason over-grows us and we reach too far, something breaks and we go insane.
JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD
"The Case of Beauvais,", Back to God's Country and Other Stories
A sick thought can devour the body's flesh more than fever or consumption.
GUY DE MAUPASSANT
Le Horla et autres contes fantastiques
The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you.
RITA MAE BROWN
Starting from Scratch
Insanity is contagious.
JOSEPH HELLER
Catch-22
I guess if everybody went crazy together nobody would notice.
CORMAC MCCARTHY
Cities of the Plain
No man is sane who does not know how to be insane on proper occasions.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Funny thing about insane people ... is that it is kind of the opposite of being a celebrity. Nobody envies you.
ROBERT M. PIRSIG
The Observer, Nov. 18, 2006
I have seen mad people, and I have known some who were quite intelligent, lucid, even clear-sighted in every concern of life, except on one point. They could speak clearly, readily, profoundly on everything; till their thoughts were caught in the breakers of their delusions and went to pieces there, were dispersed and swamped in that furious and terrible sea of fogs and squalls which is called MADNESS.
GUY DE MAUPASSANT
"The Horla"
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
ALBERT EINSTEIN
There is a pleasure sure,
In being mad, which none but madmen know!
JOHN DRYDEN
The Spanish Friar
If you're going to be crazy, you have to get paid for it or else you're going to be locked up.
HUNTER S. THOMPSON
interview, November 1, 2004
Great wits are sure to madness near allied;
And thin partitions do their bonds divide.
JOHN DRYDEN
Absalom and Achitophel
While in the West, the insane are so many that they are put in an asylum, in China the insane are so unusual that we worship them.
LIN YUTANG
The Importance of Living