Action is consolatory. It is the enemy of thought and the friend of flattering illusions.
Joseph Conrad

Attachment is the great fabricator of illusions; reality can be attained only by someone who is detached.
Simone Weil

Belief in the absence of illusions is itself an illusion.
Barbara Grizzuti Harrison

By that I mean, I think that it is true that politics and political heroes have to satisfy our need to be greater than mortal in some way, and that's led them into creating illusions, sound bites, focus groups that tell you what to do.
Sydney Pollack

Conduct, which involves a decision of the ultimate fate of the agent cannot be based on illusions.
Muhammed Iqbal

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.
Mark Twain

Experience comprises illusions lost, rather than wisdom gained.
Joseph Roux

Friendship has its illusions no less than love.
Stendhal

God is not disillusioned with us. He never had any illusions to begin with.
Luis Palau

He who desires to worship God must harbor no childish illusions about the matter but bravely renounce his liberty and humanity.
Mikhail Bakunin

History is one of those marvelous and necessary illusions we have to deal with. It's one of the ways of dealing with our world with impossible generalities which we couldn't live without.
Howard Nemerov

I actually feel sorry for people who have a lot of illusions in their head about what gay is. I mean, I know some gay people who are really wonderful people.
Richard Chamberlain

I can imagine that the Iraqis undertake the destruction out of fear. If they had denied it, if they had said no, that certainly would have played into the hands of those that would like to take armed action immediately. I have no illusions in that regard.
Hans Blix

I don't have any illusions that what we are doing is sticking the the bottle. I don't think that's what we are doing. We are trying to make sure that the genie has friends, has food to eat, a way to grow.
Hilary Rosen

I don't think the human mind can comprehend the past and the future. They are both just illusions that can manipulate you into thinking theres some kind of change.
Bob Dylan

I had great faith in Irish actors, that they'd be hip to the whole theatre thing, and they are. I had no illusions of coming over here as some kind of big shot. It's been a learning experience for me too.
Christopher Meloni

I have had four happy days in my life, and three of them turned out to be illusions.
Taylor Caldwell

I have no illusions about my art. I am what the public made me and, consequently, I am not likely to forget my debt to them.
Conrad Veidt

I have no illusions at all about being a sex symbol. None of my former girlfriends ever thought of me that way, and I don't have any packs of women chasing me down the street like a Brad Pitt or someone like that.
Tobey Maguire

I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.
Alan Watts