A straight path never leads anywhere except to the objective.
Andre Gide

Art begins with resistance - at the point where resistance is overcome. No human masterpiece has ever been created without great labor.
Andre Gide

Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.
Andre Gide

Art is the collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.
Andre Gide

Be faithful to that which exists within yourself.
Andre Gide

Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
Andre Gide

Complete possession is proved only by giving. All you are unable to give possesses you.
Andre Gide

Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.
Andre Gide

Fish die belly upward, and rise to the surface. Its their way of falling.
Andre Gide

God depends on us. It is through us that God is achieved.
Andre Gide


Great authors are admirable in this respect: in every generation they make for disagreement. Through them we become aware of our differences.
Andre Gide

I owe much to my friends; but, all things considered, it strikes me that I owe even more to my enemies. The real person springs life under a sting even better than under a caress.
Andre Gide

In hell there is no other punishment than to begin over and over again the tasks left unfinished in your lifetime.
Andre Gide

It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for something you are not.
Andre Gide

It is easier to lead men to combat, stirring up their passion, than to restrain them and direct them toward the patient labors of peace.
Andre Gide

It is good to follow one's own bent, so long as it leads upward.
Andre Gide

It is not always by plugging away at a difficulty and sticking to it that one overcomes it; often it is by working on the one next to it. Some things and some people have to be approached obliquely, at an angle.
Andre Gide

It is only in adventure that some people succeed in knowing themselves - in finding themselves.
Andre Gide

It is unthinkable for a Frenchman to arrive at middle age without having syphilis and the Cross of the Legion of Honor.
Andre Gide

Know thyself. A maxim as pernicious as it is ugly. Whoever studies himself arrest his own development. A caterpillar who seeks to know himself would never become a butterfly.
Andre Gide