Enigma Quotes

• I've put in so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant, and that's the only way of insuring one's immortality.

  James Joyce

  Writing, Way, Arguing

  James Joyce, Jeri Johnson (2008). “Ulysses”, p.10, Oxford Paperbacks

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• We are caught inside a mystery, veiled in an enigma, locked inside a riddle

  Terence McKenna

  Mystery, Caught, Riddle

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• I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.

  Umberto Eco

  Life, Witty, Powerful

  Umberto Eco (2007). “Foucault's Pendulum”, p.104, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• I'm an enigma, an unknown. You can't really figure out what I'm going to do next. I like it like that.

  Emmitt Smith

  Next, Figures

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• If we understood the enigmas of life there would be no need for art.

  Albert Camus

  Art, Would Be, Needs

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• I'm a conundrum. Or an enigma. I forget which.

  James A. Owen

  Forget, Conundrums

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• Ma vie est une énigme dont ton nom est le mot. (My life is an enigma, of which your name is the word.)

  Victor Hugo

  Names, Life Is

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• How very paltry and limited the normal human intellect is, and how little lucidity there is in the human consciousness, may be judged from the fact that, despite the ephemeral brevity of human life, the uncertainty of our existence and the countless enigmas which press upon us from all sides, everyone does not continually and ceaselessly philosophize, but that only the rarest of exceptions do.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Philosophy, Doe, Ephemeral

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2004). “On the Suffering of the World”, p.87, Penguin UK

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• Establish enigmas, not explanations.

  Robert Smithson

  Explanation

  Robert Smithson, Jack D. Flam (1996). “Robert Smithson, the Collected Writings”, p.63, Univ of California Press

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• A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know.

  Diane Arbus

  Inspirational, Photography, Philosophical

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• Time is an amazing enigma in which seeds that were planted can turn into a vibrant garden if properly pruned.

  Alyssa Milano

  Garden, Turns, Seeds

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• Each person is an enigma. You're a puzzle not only to yourself but also to everyone else, and the great mystery of our time is how we penetrate this puzzle.

  Theodore Zeldin

  Mystery, Persons, Penetrate

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• It may well be doubted whether human ingenuity can construct an enigma... which human ingenuity may not, by proper application, resolve.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Doubt, May, Resolve

  "The Gold-Bug" (1843).

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• The artist needs to understand the truth that lies at the bottom of an enigma.

  John Maeda

  Lying, Artist, Needs

  "If Design's No Longer the Killer Differentiator, What Is?" by John Maeda, www.wired.com. September 21, 2012.

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• It doesn’t matter how smart you are, Enigma is always smarter.

  Joan Clarke

  Smart, Science, Matter

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• Society bristles with enigmas which look hard to solve. It is a perfect maze of intrigue.

  Honore de Balzac

  Perfect, Mazes, Looks

  Honore de Balzac (2011). “Letters of Two Brides”, p.39, The Floating Press

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• I have always knocked at the door of that wonderful and terrible enigma which is life.

  Eugenio Montale

  Doors, Wonderful, Terrible

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• No power of genius has ever yet had the smallest success in explaining existence. The perfect enigma remains.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Success, Perfect, Genius

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1983). “Essays and Lectures”, p.653, Library of America

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• I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma: but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest.

  Winston Churchill

  Keys, Russia, Action

  Radio broadcast, 1 Oct. 1939

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• The child is an enigma… He has the highest potentialities, but we do not know what he will be.

  Maria Montessori

  Children, Knows, Highest

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• Without the spiritual world the material world is a disheartening enigma.

  Joseph Joubert

  Spiritual, Soul, World

  Joseph Joubert (1867). “Some of the "Thoughts" of Joseph Joubert”, p.32

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• Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.

  Winston Churchill

  Russia, Mystery, Riddle

  Radio broadcast, 1 Oct. 1939

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• Mystery is the wine of this universe. It makes us dizzy and makes us feel happy! Man needs enigma so that he can get rid of the dullness of the reality!

  Mehmet Murat Ildan

  Wine, Reality, Men

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• I'm tired of being this solemn poet of the masses, the enigma shrouded in a mystery.

  Michael Stipe

  Tired, Mystery, Poet

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• To say that I have found the answer to all riddles of the soul would be inaccurate and presumptuous. But in the knowledge I have developed there must lie the answers to that riddle, to that enigma, to that problem - the human soul - for under my hands and others, was seen the best in man rehabilitated. I discovered that a human being is not his body and demonstrated that through Scientology an individual can attain certainty of his identity apart from that of the body. We cannot deal in the realm of the human soul and ignore the fact.

  L. Ron Hubbard

  Lying, Men, Hands

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