Primo Levi Quotes (14 Quotes)


    After the planet becomes theirs, many millions of years will have to pass before a beetle particularly loved by God, at the end of its calculations will find written on a sheet of paper in letters of fire that energy is equal to the mass multiplied by the square of the velocity of light. The new kings of the world will live tranquilly for a long time, confining themselves to devouring each other and being parasites among each other on a cottage industry scale.

    The butterfly's attractiveness derives not only from colors and symmetry deeper motives contribute to it. We would not think them so beautiful if they did not fly, or if they flew straight and briskly like bees, or if they stung . . .

    The aims of life are the best defense against death.

    Is he out of his senses Does he not see Beppo the Greek next to him Beppo whos 20 years old and is going to the gas chamber tomorrow, and knows it, and lies there staring up at the light, without saying anything, without even thinking anymore.

    In order for the wheel to turn, for life to be lived, impurities are needed, and the impurities of impurities in the soil, too, as is known, if it is to be fertile. Dissension, diversity, the grain of salt and mustard are needed Fascism does not want them


    The future of humanity is uncertain, even in the most prosperous countries, and the quality of life deteriorates and yet I believe that what is being discovered about the infinitely large and infinitely small is sufficient to absolve this end of the century and millennium. What a very few are acquiring in knowledge of the physical world will perhaps cause this period not to be judged as a pure return of barbarism.

    The bond between a man and his profession is similar to that which ties him to his country it is just as complex, often ambivalent, and in general it is understood completely only when it is broken... by retirement in the case of a trade or profession.

    Anyone who has obeyed nature by transmitting a piece of gossip experiences the explosive relief that accompanies the satisfying of a primary need.

    Monsters exist, but they are few in number to be truly dangerous

    For me chemistry represented an indefinite cloud of future potentialities which enveloped my life to come in black volutes torn by fiery flashes, like those which had hidden Mount Sinai. Like Moses, from that cloud I expected my law, the principle of order in me, around me, and in the world. I would watch the buds swell in spring, the mica glint in the granite, my own hands, and I would say to myself ''I will understand this, too, I will understand everything.''

    I live in my house as I live inside my skin: I know more beautiful, more ample, more sturdy and more picturesque skins: but it would seem to me unnatural to exchange them for mine.

    Darwin was not afraid to look deeply into the void. His bold view can be seen as either noble and pessimistic or noble and admirable. For people of science, he is a hero. Denying man a privileged place in creation, ... he reaffirms with his own intellectual courage the dignity of man.

    To accuse another of having weak kidneys, lungs, or heart, is not a crime on the contrary, saying he has a weak brain is a crime.

    Human memory is a marvelous but fallacious instrument. The memories which lie within us are not carved in stone; not only do they tend to become erased as the years go by, but often they change, or even increase by incorporating extraneous features.


    More Primo Levi Quotations (Based on Topics)


    Energy - Life - World - Astronomy & Cosmology - God - Light - Fire - Man - Letters - Spring - Future - Quality - Crime - Memory - Business & Commerce - Humanity - Time - Science - Fascism - View All Primo Levi Quotations

    Related Authors


    Steven Pinker - Stephen Jay Gould - Richard Dawkins - Nicolaus Copernicus - Julian Huxley - Johannes Kepler - Gregor Mendel - Fred Hoyle - Alexis de Tocqueville - Alexander Fleming


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