[1]: I remember when we were young, everyone spoke sincerely, and every word was true. In the early morning, the long street near the train station was dark and deserted. The little shop selling soy milk was steaming. The days of the past were slow. Cars, horses, and mail were slow. A lifetime was only enough to love one person. The locks of the past were also beautiful. The keys were exquisite and had their own style. When you locked it, people understood. -- Mu Xin, "The Past
Was Slow" [2]: Time waits for no one, and I have never let time go unpunished either. --
Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day" [3]: I haven't felt that kind of joy of running to greet someone in a long time. -- Mu Xin, "Qiong Meika's Random Thoughts"
[4]: Many people's disappointment is that they have gone against the ambitions they made in their youth. They think they are mature, experienced, and shrewd. How naive they were before. They finally see through things and understand them. So, we become the kind of people we hated most in our youth. -- Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish"
[5]: The best state of life is a quiet and bustling life. --Mu Xin
[6]: The so-called bottomless abyss, even if you go down, is a journey of ten thousand miles. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[7]: Don't look for me where there are crowds of people and dazzling lights. If you want to see me, I am at the place where joy and sorrow intertwine. All I can do is travel a long way back to simplicity. --Mu Xin
[8]: The days used to be slower. Carriages, horses, and mail were all slow. A lifetime was only enough to love one person. --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[9]: I pursued the depth of the human heart but saw its shallowness. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[10]: If you don't come, it will snow. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[11]: I am used to being cold and determined to become ice. --Mu Xin, "David"
[12]: Seeing the absurdity of the world is the basic level of a wise person. Seeing it clearly does not make you feel disgusted, but you smile knowingly. --Mu Xin
[13]: There are many kinds of sadness. Sadness that can be suppressed may not be called sadness. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[14]: Your eyes and laughter made me sick. The fever subsided, and I regained my lonely health. If I don't see you again, it feels like someone is walking on the horizon. After walking, only the horizon remains. The fog of early spring is hazy. Fortunately, you are not beautiful after all. I am seriously ill and it is difficult to recover. Your talent and appearance are only enough for me to be sick for nineteen days. On the twentieth day, you will look rough and ugly. The highlight of your life will be over. How can others treat you as a treasure? The weeds are overgrown, the drizzle is like powder, and the partridge cries. I will migrate and settle in the corner of the forest hill, quietly waiting for the arrival of the person I love enough. --Mu Xin, "Eyebrows and Eyes"
[15]: Ignorant people are always heartless. The essence of ignorance is heartlessness. --Mu Xin
[16]: People in the past were so serious about seducing others, so serious about losing their virginity, and so devastated by unexpected turns--Mu Xin, "My Tumultuous Desires"
[17]: Time was slow back then, so slow that one could only spend a lifetime loving one person--Mu Xin
[18]: Pessimism is a kind of foresight. --Mu Xin
[19]: I am a person in the darkness where snow is falling heavily. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[20]: Utter despair is also a kind of transcendence--Mu Xin
[21]: A person who is arrogant without being humble will not be arrogant at all; a person who is humble without being arrogant, I really don't know what he is being humble about. --Mu Xin
[22]: What is life? Life is not knowing what to do at any moment. --Mu Xin, "Reflections of Columbia"
[23]: If the former me came to find the present me, I would be treated very well--Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[24]: I often think that people are a kind of container, holding happiness and holding sorrow. But man is not a container, man is a conduit. Happiness flows through, sorrow flows through, the conduit is just a conduit. All kinds of happiness and sorrow flow through, until death, the conduit is empty. Madness is the blockage and rupture of the conduit. --Mu Xin, "The Sobbing of Fellow Travelers"
[25]: After the rain, it always seems as if someone has left. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[26]: Some people say that time is the best medicine for healing wounds. This is not right. Anyway, time is not the medicine, the medicine is in time. --Mu Xin, "Good Brother Ai Huali"
[27]: It is not surprising that one is unfaithful, but that one was sincere before being unfaithful. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[28]: I do not make enemies, enemies will make themselves. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[29]: Watching one ambitious young person after another fall into depravity with familiarity, many "individuals" added together make up the "era". --Mu Xin
[30]: A first-rate lover never has to die for love, never loses love, because "I love you, what does it have to do with you?" --Mu Xin
[31]: To be the director of life is no good. Next best is to be an actor. Next best is to be an audience member. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[32]: You blow coolly and gently, and I know it is not you who blows back. --Mu Xin, "May"
[33]: Behind the rules, fate is laughing coldly. --Mu Xin
[34]: Love also has three realms. Youth is driven by curiosity, young adulthood by aesthetics, middle age by the pursuit of knowledge. When old age approaches, there is no turning back. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[35]: The highest realm of Chinese cultural spirit is wanting to argue but forgetting the words. The overall expression of European cultural spirit is forgetting the words but still wanting to argue. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[36]: When things are recalled, they are as real as if they were fake. --Mu Xin, "Istanbul"
[37]: People are afraid of loneliness, afraid to the point of shamelessness. In other words, some shameless acts are committed out of fear of loneliness. -- Mu Xin
[38]: Life is good because it is meaningless, so that each person can give meaning to it. If life is meaningful, but this meaning does not suit my interests, then it would be embarrassing and pathetic. -- Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[39]: Pessimism is an attitude, the attitude of a brave person. -- Mu Xin
[40]: It is a pity that you read too few books. Not only few, but also too few times. I have read Shakespeare fifty or sixty times. Why? Every year during the Mid-Autumn Festival, I eat mooncakes. How many mooncakes? Last week, I read the Gospels more than a hundred times. Every time I read it, it is different, and I will never fully understand it when I get old. Some people show off as soon as they read a book. Read it a few more times before showing off... Read it a few more times and you will not show off. -- Mu Xin
[41]: Love is actually a kind of self-education. -- Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[42]: The lives I have seen are all just passing through, without any sense of completion. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice"
[43]: If you wish to see
me, I am at the intersection of all kinds of joy and sorrow. --Mu Xin [44]: Do not lean on me, I am used to the cold, I am determined to become ice, do not lean on me. Do not come near me, I am rising in flames, burning all the trees, do not come near me. Come and embrace me, I am warm and cool, come and embrace me. Please support me, I am old, I am like a sick beast, please support me. You wait for me, I pass away and you come, you are like me, you are like me. --Mu Xin, "David"
[45]: I am a person in the darkness where snow is falling heavily, if you do not come, I will snow. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[46]: Living in the beauty of nature, people become lazy, and laziness leads to goodness. --Mu Xin
[47]: No matter if it is a humble dwelling or a thorny door, it will become my triumphal arch because of your leaning door. --Mu Xin
[48]: In mid-November, the weather is sunny and warm like spring, clearly referring to love. --Mu Xin
[49]: A dream, without resentment or hatred, fooled by imagination--Mu Xin, Windsor Cemetery Diary
[50]: I know what life is, it is not knowing what to do at any moment, so I let the fragrance of flowers drift in the wind, I am used to gazing at the tower with its ambiguous proposition, and I loudly satirize the battlefield in the rain under a small umbrella. When anything loses its first meaning, a second meaning emerges. I often feel that the second meaning is easier for me to approach and more suitable for me, like a stroller leaning against a tombstone, hot bread pressing down on three pages of a will. So, on a sunny afternoon, I wander in the second meaning and seem to get lost. I have no other pleasure. Whenever I have a little pleasure, sorrow rises first. What is sorrow? If you know what sorrow is, you will not be sorrowful. What is life? Life is like this: there are some things that have not been done yet, things that must be done... and some things that have been done, but not done well. I will not take a walk tomorrow. --Mu Xin, "Reflections of Columbia"
[51]: A wise person is one who is surprised by everything but not alarmed. --Mu Xin
[52]: All eternal and great love must experience despair, disappear, and die once before it can regain love and rediscover the value of life. --Mu Xin, Literary Memoirs
[53]: Finding good books to read is like finding a high vantage point. --Mu Xin
[54]: Unfreedom is unnaturalness. Unnaturalness is unfreedom. --Mu Xin, The Lark Sang All Day
[55]: Giving them face is me wanting face. --Mu Xin, The Lark Sang All Day
[56]: Sometimes, life is not as good as a line from Tao Yuanming. --Mu Xin
[57]: Genius is discovered by another genius. --Mu Xin, The Lark Sang All Day
[58]: Stubbornness is the hardest temper to change. If you want to change it, you have to change it stubbornly. You don't need to change it; only stubborn people are gentle. How so? For example, dressing well is being gentle to yourself. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[59]: A person's character is revealed after just a few steps. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[60]: What is life? Life is a process before death. --Mu Xin
[61]: Jesus' words have hidden meanings. I am neither a good person nor a bad person, so I feel particularly strongly about them. If someone who loves me speaks in a stuttering and incoherent way, I know he loves me. All true prophets are sometimes eloquent and sometimes stuttering. I love him most when he can't speak. False prophets are all fluent. I don't believe them at all. I know he doesn't love. --Mu Xin
[62]: When a fool comes to you to discuss matters, don't waste your energy -- he has already made up his mind. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[63]: All that can be done is to travel a long way back to simplicity. --Mu Xin
[64]: Fifteen years ago, the cool morning was hazy and clear. Every night, you were in my dreams. I was awake with my pillow and felt that it was not you. Other people played you in my dreams. Where are you? You are so good. Where are you? --Mu Xin, "Where are you?"
[65]: Youth is really like a reason, a reason that is actually useless. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish"
[66]: Consult with yourself more often when you encounter problems. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[67]: Kant's judgment: "A direct interest in natural beauty is always a sign of a kind heart." This can be reversed. Those who are no longer kind have lost a direct interest in natural beauty. --Mu Xin
[68]: If a person who loves me speaks in a stuttering and incoherent way, I know that he loves me. --Mu Xin, *Literary Memoirs*
[69]: When parting, the one who leaves is too busy dealing with new encounters and accepting new impressions to think much, while the one seeing off remains in the same place, clearly feeling that one person is missing, thus triggering a chilling loneliness everywhere—I only realized the greater desolation of the one seeing off after experiencing countless "farewells." --Mu Xin, *Windsor Cemetery Diary*
[70]: This is my misconception. I often thought that a person is a container, holding happiness and sorrow. But a person is not a container, a conduit; happiness flows through, sorrow flows through, the conduit is just a conduit. All kinds of happiness and sorrow flow through until death, only then is the conduit empty. Madness is the blockage and rupture of the conduit. …A person who is easily saddened is easily happy, and therefore easily survives. A person with thickened conduit walls experiences happiness and sorrow more slowly. A blocked conduit will rupture. What truly constitutes the world are countless unobstructed conduits, like the man in blue with a black umbrella. --Mu Xin, "Reflections of Columbia"
[71]: People's mistakes are all in trying to explain and control everything with a doctrine. --Mu Xin
[72]: Lend me your initial and final fear, lend me your unspoken absence. Lend me an autumn, but you say it's already winter. --Mu Xin, "Lend Me"
[73]: People depend on you, and if you make the slightest mistake, they get angry, resentful that you are unreasonable and have betrayed your trust in them; life is extremely ridiculous because it is so close to death; when talking about their shortcomings, they hug those shortcomings tightly, with a simple and honest smile—the shortcomings are their pets; there are people like this, if you look down on them, they will look up to you, if you look up to them, they will look down on you; when you have to deal with hypocrites, you pretend to be evil, you pretend to be evil in a thorough way, so that the hypocrites will back down, stop smiling, and turn away; being good at speaking in social situations is a skill. Being silent, kind, and aloof, yet appearing very harmonious, is a skill. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[74]: I stopped in the corridor and asked myself what I had left. I said I had nothing and there was no need to. --Mu Xin
[75]: I was in pain no matter what era I was born in, so don't blame the era or me. --Mu Xin, "Kafka's Old Notebooks"
[76]: I loved someone but had no chance to confess. Later, I decided to give up. Later, I heard news of him from time to time and we met occasionally... Fortunately, I didn't say it then, fortunately, I couldn't really be considered to have fallen in love. I loved another person and had many opportunities to confess. I thought about it and became lazy. I became friends with him and we are still friends now... Time flies. We talk and laugh on the phone. I am secretly glad that... otherwise, I would have suffered. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[77]: I have already unintentionally extricated myself from the grudges and understand that there is no strategy to be used in the realm of love. To be a king or a slave is all vanity, all chasing the wind. Happiness gained through open and covert schemes is all filth and mire, unfit for the cup. Under the sun, all are repetitions; under the moonlight, all are old dreams. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[78]: What does a person come into this world to do? To love the most lovable, the most beautiful, the most lovely, and the most delicious. --Mu Xin
[79]: Profound topics are disgraced in shallow exchanges. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[80]: Talent, heart, and mind are all indispensable. It is difficult to balance all three; well, that's good, it also fosters style. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[81]: I have reaped the bitter fruit of my own actions, so I need not be sad; I have no hope, so I am not desperate; I find my own path and walk alone, so I am not rebellious. I also have tempers to vent, but I will only say witty things. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[82]: Those without aesthetic sense are bound to be boring. --Mu Xin
[83]: Youth is like a series of fresh and delicious dishes; although some may be less than perfect, the plate is always good. --Mu Xin
[84]: Fortunately, the you in my dream is not you, and I am not that me. --Mu Xin
[85]: Your good intentions are multifaceted, but my belief is singular; no matter how long the journey, it will arrive. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[86]: There are those who are sweet-tongued but treacherous, but there are also those who are treacherous but sweet-tongued. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[87]: Endure first, then enjoy --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
【88】: Frivolous, loving whatever comes along, is called promiscuity. Loving indiscriminately in multiple directions without a clear focus is called promiscuity. Exaggerating and showing off one's skills is called promiscuity. Unconditionally devoted to one person is also called promiscuity. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
【89】: An ideology is always a prejudice, even a sophistry, ultimately a form of self-expansion, excluding those who are different. --Mu Xin
【90】: The cold wind at the street corner is more desolate than the cold wind in the wilderness. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
【91】: Ice is water that has fallen asleep. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
【92】: Seeking a person with enduring charm. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
【93】: The handkerchiefs of the past were also beautiful, especially those of women with lowered brows, exquisite, stitch by stitch. Love in the past was slow, slow enough to wait a lifetime for one person, slow enough to love only one person in a lifetime. --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[94]: No matter how slow it was in the past, no matter how fast it is now, I know that the land beneath my feet and the loved ones beside me, whether in the past or now, must be protected with all my might. --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[95]: When you reach middle age, think about whether the middle-aged person you admired so much in your youth is the same person you are now -- Yes, that's good. No, then it's probably too late. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[96]: Carriages, horses, and mail are all slow --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[97]: There is nothing gentler than porridge. Thinking of my life wandering in the mortal world, I have never found a person as gentle as porridge. --Mu Xin, "A Young Man's Breakfast"
[98]: The tragedy of life is aging and death. Before that, no one should look down on anyone else. --Mu Xin
[99]: In the West, when it rains, pedestrians with umbrellas use them, and those without umbrellas walk as usual. I have never seen anyone hunching over in a sorry state. In the West, when two cars collide on the road, both parties get out, assess the situation, make a phone call, and the police arrive to handle the matter (from the time of the accident until the police arrive, neither party utters a single word). These two simple examples, things that can be done immediately, may not be achievable in China even a hundred years from now.
--Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes" [100]: Excessive pessimism or excessive optimism towards life and humanity is dishonest. To take the absurdity of the world lightly is a basic level of wisdom. To see clearly is not to feel disgusted, but to smile knowingly. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[101]: Each has its own voice, each has its own kindred spirit. A fights with B, C supports A, D supports B. Later, A and B negotiate peace, the first clause being: to execute C and D. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[102]: "Elegance" is a limit; exceeding it slightly becomes vulgarity. This world is vulgar, but there are two kinds of vulgarity: tolerable vulgarity and unbearable vulgarity. Excessive elegance is unbearable vulgarity. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[103]: What makes the stage of love colorful and chaotic are all kinds of abnormal love, second-rate and third-rate roles. First-rate lovers never have to die for their country, never lose love, because "I love you, what does it have to do with you?" --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[104]: To talk about rules is optimism. To talk about fate is pessimism. --Mu Xin
[105]: Here comes another shy and shameless person. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[106]: People without a self have a particularly good self-esteem. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[107]: I have never seen an eagle fly down and squat on the ground to watch ants move house. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[108]: Humanism, its depth is no less than pessimism; when pessimism stops, it then dances, which is the spirit of tragedy. It goes without saying that pessimism is the beginning and the end of knowledge. Who doesn't live a life of self-reflection and self-satisfaction through sweet despair? --Mu Xin, "Qiongmeika's Random Thoughts"
[109]: Movies can be edited, novels can be paused and skipped... Life is truly pathetic. Only when you are happy, life is like a movie—it passes in an instant. --Mu Xin
[110]: A thinker becomes a poet when drunk and a dancer when angry. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[111]: It's not just artists who are lonely, but artworks are even lonelier. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[112]: Cowardice becomes baseness. Cowardice, if alone, is nothing. But if you come into contact with the outside world, or even engage in fierce struggles, it becomes base, because cowardice is mostly incompetence. Cowardice can't use any other means, so it only has one: baseness. And, wonderfully, cowardice claims to be gentle and kind, and cowards recommend and elevate each other with gentleness and kindness. In the end, they return to that nature, baseness. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[113]: Literature is lovely, life is fun, and art requires sacrifice. Don't say that literature is sublime and great, or that literature is lovely. Don't give up on literature after class. Literature is the study of humanity. At least, read every day. I read while cooking, eating, and taking a bath. Westerners call television an idiot's lantern; the television screen is getting bigger and bigger, but the brain is getting smaller and smaller. --Mu Xin
[114]: The universe we live in is a ruthless material environment. In this objectively ruthless and subjectively hopeless environment, the highest pleasure for man is the stimulation of the physical senses, the pursuit and satisfaction of sexual desire. This moment of satisfaction is enough to contend with the nothingness and despair of the universe. In this one moment, there is no question of existence or non-existence, no question of emptiness or non-emptiness, no question of despair or non-despair. Sex is the only possibility of the magical and precious life. --Mu Xin
[115]: Knowledge and learning make people enlightened and peaceful. --Mu Xin
[116]: Why are we not excited when we encounter a deformed body, but find it unbearable and infuriating when we encounter a mind with unclear thinking? ----Because a lame person admits that we walk normally, while a lame spirit says that we are lame. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[117]: Shallow knowledge makes people more uneasy than ignorance, while profound knowledge makes people feel at ease. We are nothing more than falling into such a shallow and profound state. --Mu Xin, "Feast of Fish and Rice" [118]
: Any belief that forcibly fools the people will, after a certain period, make the people fool themselves. --Mu Xin
[119]: Looking back, each generation is more sentimental than the last; looking to the future, each generation is more heartless than the last. Sentimentality can be boundless, while heartlessness is limited, just heartlessness. The transition from sentimentality to heartlessness is just like that, and the transition from heartlessness to sentimentality is... From the perspective of an individual, no one has ever gone from heartless to sentimental. Once the fruit rots, it will continue to rot. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[120]: The wise men of ancient China were pessimistic yet happy. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[121]: I gained nothing. She lost nothing. The most apt analogy is: I picked up a ring in a dream, and I lost a ring in a dream. --Mu Xin, "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[122]: Life is trivial, and it is the trivial that makes it alive and vibrant—small generosity, small stinginess, small vows, small breaches of promise. Anything too big is beyond the capacity of human nature to withstand. Occasionally, one might hang oneself or swallow gold or poison in the houses along the small street, but there is no pessimism on the small street. People are excitedly busy making profits and proliferating. The small street is the human world in God's eyes. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[123]: Sincerity is neither too much nor too little, neither too sufficient nor too lacking. Only without sincerity will one be bewildered by sincerity. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[124]: Goodness is lovable because it is unrewarding; evil is detestable because it has no retribution. --Mu Xin
[125]: Lend me an old age, lend me fragments, lend me foresight and hindsight, lend me the stubbornness of youth. --Mu Xin, "Lend Me"
[126]: Four attitudes: If someone is good but indifferent to me, respect them. If someone is good but kind to me, reciprocate. If someone is bad but indifferent to me, ignore them. If someone is bad but kind to me, stay away from them. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[127]: Most of a person's happiness is what they perceive as happiness. Plants and animals, if they are happy, are truly happy. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[128]: Beauty is an expression. Other expressions await a response, but beauty is inactive and purposeless, leaving people without a specific obligation to respond, thus attracting them involuntarily, in fact, being moved... As people age, beauty fades, and this expression finally tires. The elderly wear makeup and undergo cosmetic surgery, "forced" to persist without fatigue, sometimes appearing exhausted instead... The ruins of beauty are not as good as the ruins of stone; the sunset in Rome is for people to mourn, but the remnants of beauty are unbearable to behold... Only extremely superior wisdom can replace beauty. And so it is a reward for philosophers, scientists and artists who were not so great in their youth. When they get old, they become decent, they develop a style, and they can be said to look good -- it is a painful thing after all. -- Mu Xin, Reflections of Columbia
[129]: In the past, some people thought that the infatuated would be pleased by the infatuated. In the future, some people will realize that the infatuated would be pleased by the wise. The wise means that the infatuation has been lost. This loss is stripped away and cut off. Infatuation is innate, while wisdom is of course a matter of later life. Wisdom is just a melancholy with a higher brightness. -- Mu Xin, Reflections of Columbia
[130]: Love itself does not have much meaning. It is all about wisdom and morality to create a magnificent landscape. If wisdom and morality are lost because of love, then it can be judged that this is not love, but lust, the tyranny of lust. -- Mu Xin
[131]: "True love is the dashing Goethe's clear judgment." Let's record it here as well. It is often said that the friendship between petty people is as sweet as honey, while the friendship between gentlemen is as bland as water. This is still somewhat plausible, as the sweetness is not too absurd and the blandness is not too lonely. However, it gradually became absurd. The friendship between petty people is so sweet that they fight over honey, while the friendship between gentlemen is as bland as water. Petty people fight each other to steal honey, while gentlemen remain detached, never meeting, writing letters, or making phone calls. The friendship is so bland that it is completely dry. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[132]: You often laugh so hard that I can't see clearly. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day" [133]:
Some books, once read, will make you illiterate. --Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[134]: I advise everyone: except for disasters and illnesses, be happy at all times. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[135]: Walking on the right path while keeping your eyes on the wrong path, this is called profound knowledge. --Mu Xin
[136]: In the world of good people, there is always a kind of confusion. --Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[137]: Image is indeed above all else. Humans have nothing else to pursue besides image. In my youth, what I instinctively acquired was the aesthetic concept later confirmed by reason. Knowledge didn't give me anything extra. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[138]: Human history gradually reveals its direction: passionate -- heartless. Looking back, each generation is more passionate than the last; looking to the future, each generation is more heartless than the last. Passion can be boundless, but heartlessness is limited; it's simply heartlessness. --Mu Xin, "Rotten Away"
[139]: I am a slave by day. A prince by night. --Mu Xin
[140]: Playing with things leads to the loss of ambition; such ambition is small. Those with great ambition cultivate their ambition through play. --Mu Xin
[141]: Life should maintain a minimum level of elegance; don't end up like Oscar Wilde, losing all face and dying in a hotel. --Mu Xin
[142]: Writing a novel requires strong personal character and profound skill. Lu Xun's poetry and philosophy foundation were insufficient, so he couldn't write long works. --Mu Xin
[143]: To say that Nietzsche was a philosopher is too simplistic. I think he was: an artist striving to think. --Mu Xin
[144]: My existence is already a ceremonial existence--Mu Xin "The Lark Sang All Day"
[145]: Now it's fast, so fast that we always recall the beauty of the past, and then frantically miss those pure worlds. In fact, let's put aside our current troubles for now, go to the North Square, close our eyes, and let those beautiful things overwhelm us. Empty that beautiful world and enjoy it. --Mu Xin "The Past Was Slow"
[146]: The pace of the past was so slow, it took a whole day to walk from one village to another. The days of the past were slow and warm, wrapped in the faint smoke, day after day, year after year. --Mu Xin "The Past Was Slow"
[147]: Life is about experience, how can the present compare to the past? --Mu Xin "Roadside Vegetables"
[148]: Keep a normal mind, don't speak normal words. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[149]: The man's skin was slightly dark and lustrous, his body strong and vigorous, his face with the so-called chiseled features of a Roman warrior. His eyebrows and eyes were war, his smile was peace after the war. The woman was tall and fair, as smooth as jade, with large eyes that held a hidden spirit, and light eyebrows that reached her temples. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[150]: I could clearly recognize any bird that had visited last year. That was my greater happiness. --Mu Xin, "The Painter in the Lighthouse"
[151]: I am a connoisseur of Japanese literature and art, a connoisseur, but I do not know their hearts --they do not have big hearts. Japan misunderstands Chinese culture. But this misunderstanding is a good one. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[152]: The flesh of angels is thin, so thin that it is transparent. --Mu Xin, "Whispering"
[153]: If you love, embrace love. --Mu Xin, "Riverside Building"
[154]: Where there is an oath, there is a broken oath. --Mu Xin, *Literary Memoirs*
[155]: To judge a beautiful person, whether male or female, one must pass two tests: First, a smile. Second, eating. Only those who smile broadly, radiating charm, and whose eating is exceptionally beautiful, are truly exquisite. --Mu Xin, *Walking in Plain Shoes*
[156]: When love seems good, it is not love, but wisdom and morality. --Mu Xin
[157]: Understanding that there is absolutely no strategy to be used in the world of love, being a king or a slave is all vanity, all chasing the wind. --Mu Xin
[158]: Genius has two rules: one is to make things grand. The other is to make sorrow eternal. --Mu Xin, *Literary Memoirs*
[159]: Literature is still good, good because it can be used to explain some things, to explain some events. Literature is also good because it can be used to pay attention to rhetoric, and can reach exquisite, refined, excellent, and precise. --Mu Xin, *Qiongmeika's Random Thoughts* [160]:
The more you know, the more you love. The more you love, the more you know. --Mu Xin
[161]: First there was literature and art, then there was the affected manner of literature and art, then literature and art disappeared, leaving only the affected manner, and then even the affected manner disappeared, literature and art disappeared long ago. --Mu Xin
[162]: All these things that are unpaid, helpless, and hopeless are dear to me. Alas, life is just a fleeting dream, alas, I love ukiyo-e. --Mu Xin, Ukiyo-e
[163]: The Renaissance was a feeling, a feeling that permeated the whole of Europe. --Mu Xin, Big Feelings
[164]: If you ask a ninety-year-old what the happiest time of their life was, they will say: the 1930s, because we shared joys and sorrows. --Mu Xin, America in the 1930s
[165]: Life is about hunting for things you like and can afford, the key is desire, and you can't be stingy with time to satisfy your desires. --Mu Xin, The Spaniard
[166]: At the same time, you can sit by a spring, bend down and sip, wetting your nose and beard, and imagine who you are kissing. --Mu Xin, "The Sketch Traveler"
[167]: Our courage is innate, not acquired through training. Whenever needed, we rise up bravely, fearless, and victorious. --Mu Xin, "The Speech of Berlusconi"
[168]: I also had an indistinct feeling, which I vaguely sensed at the time, but thought I couldn't express it clearly, so I remained silent -- Now I can perhaps express it: Xi Dejin was a lover who died for love, but he had no love to die for, so he died for something else. --Mu Xin, "Christopher of This Shore"
[169]: Writing poetry is like taking off your socks and showing your bare feet. --Mu Xin, "The Bullfighter's Socks"
[170]: Welcoming spring and bidding farewell to spring are just words; spring is not alone. --Mu Xin, "Spring"
[171]: Honor and disgrace are all things that pass, nobility and lowliness are both one's own. --Mu Xin, "Like a Verse"
[172]: Passion can be boundless, but indifference is limited; it is simply indifference. --Mu Xin
[173]: Because I was used to eating "roasted cakes" as a child, I feel affection for cakes and dumplings as soon as I see them. --Mu Xin, "Wet Snacks"
[174]: Because I have proven that it is possible for people to have a simple love without desire or utilitarian concepts, even if it is just a sincere thought, it has indeed happened, and an innocent young person might put it into practice. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[175]: There are probably not many Chinese philosophers with eternal and universal qualities, maybe one and a half to two. Lao Tzu is one, Zhuangzi is half. --Mu Xin
[176]: The highest is not God, but fate. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[177]: That matter, that person, that was determined in a previous life whether to love or not. --Mu Xin
[178]: Loneliness is mostly false loneliness. --Mu Xin
[179]: The first half of human history was theistic, and the later history is based on the theory of truth. I think that the existence of truth is theism. Only when it is said that there is no truth, does man truly stand up. --Mu Xin
[180]: The illusion of heaven and hell lies in the fact that in eternal joy there is no joy, and in eternal suffering there is no suffering. --Mu Xin
[181]: A sailboat has character and a destiny. Because a sailboat has a soul, it is beautiful in every part, and every detail is tied to the sea and the voyage. A dilapidated sailboat is left on the shore, where a family of honest and kind people live. The sailboat can sail into fairy tales and myths, but the steamship cannot. --Mu Xin, "Ode to the Sailboat"
[182]: The reason why one cannot write love poems is because of the companionship day and night --Writers and the world should avoid this, but it happens every time. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[183]: "Seeking eternal life in despair." It is common for people to drive their "youth" and "adolescence" to become their "old age." My "old age" and "adolescence" obey my "youth". If it is logical, then it is even more logical --A sentence I said when I was young is enough for me to benefit for a lifetime. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice"
[184]: Beer was born by chance, just as I discovered you by chance. --Mu Xin, "There's a Restaurant in Quebec, Canada"
[185]: Perhaps there were "depressed people" in old Russia, such as Leo Tolstoy—he had a habit of getting to the bottom of everything since childhood. According to his own confession, lying on the sofa, chewing chocolate, and reading English novels could cure his depression (in his youth). Or, walking in the fields in the early morning and watching the dewdrops glistening on the tips of the grass could also cure his depression (in his old age). He was frank, he was fearless, and he had many things he kept silent about; the number of unwritten diaries far exceeded the number of written ones. This is the Leo Tolstoy I know. In the presence of great men, we all seem to be deceived. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[186]: Good and evil are both excessive indulgence and cruelty; good also has ulterior motives, and evil also has ulterior motives. In clothing, food, housing, and transportation, people focus on luxurious details, wielding power and influence while forgetting the true purpose of their needs. Human love and desire are not just a matter of a few people becoming abnormal, but the entire population has lost its normalcy (this could fill a thick book). Look at the animal world; where is love and desire used as a career, capital, weapon, bait, collectible, or spy tool? --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[187]: Life and speed should be in proportion. Our world is becoming increasingly unnatural; humanity is extinguishing the poetry on Earth. --Mu Xin, "The Lost Atmosphere"
[188]: Fame is like a horse race in a dream. Once you become famous, it's impossible to remain anonymous. Once you become famous, it's like a horse race in a dream; it's impossible to remain anonymous. --Mu Xin, "Dream of Horse Racing"
[189]: The political road, the religious road, the philosophical road, the artistic road... I have witnessed people constantly walking straight downhill out of a strong desire to improve themselves... --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[190]: He does not belong to his family, does not belong to France, does not belong to the world, and this is not sad. What is sad is that he does not belong to himself. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[191]: Worldly success and fame are obviously limited, and it is through these limitations that success is proven to be real and true. --Mu Xin, "Rest in Peace, Enemies"
[192]: The earth originally flew with the fragrance of people. --Mu Xin, "Fragrance of People"
[193]: Lamb said, "Childhood friends are like childhood clothes; you can't wear them when you grow up—after you can no longer regret your childhood friends, you can only stop regretting the streets you saw in your childhood." --Mu Xin, "That Street Is Still the Same"
[194]: Myths are what adults say to children, and what they say to adults. --Mu Xin
[195]: The ones who hate with gnashing teeth and cherish with deep sorrow are the lovers--Mu Xin [
196]: Cars are square, streets are gas-powered, we are delusional, and then we all grow old without prior agreement...--Mu Xin
[197]: Carriages, horses, and mail are all slow, a lifetime is only enough to love one person--Mu Xin, "Slowly in the Past"
[198]: One can imagine the regret and disgust after being drunk, or the determination to stop drinking after a moment of clarity. I do not think her sense of happiness is absurd, nor do I think she is wrong or I am wrong. Even if it is not a permanent promise, why leave so resolutely?--Mu Xin, "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[199]: Others, playing the role of you in my dreams, how can you be so good? How can you be so good?--Mu Xin, "JJ"
[200]: Human hell is created by human beings themselves. --Mu Xin
[201]: I couldn't sleep last night, so I called Li. I asked him about this, and he replied, "Because a woman's hair is hair inside." I pressed, "And inside that?" He replied, "Still hair." --Li is really cunning. It seems he is not entirely ignorant of prehistory, extrahistory, and posthistory. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[202]: As the head of the Chinese language teaching and research group, I gave a welcoming speech. Teacher Zhao said a few humble words, but her words were full of confidence, which instantly filled the teaching and research group, which was originally composed of five old women and three old men, with light and heat. --There are often such moments of light and heat caused by words and expressions in the world, followed by the usual coldness and twilight. --Mu Xin, "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[203]: Therefore, the "self-consciousness" that Andersen had tasted and had tasted enough of also exhausted me at the time. I really wished to blend in with the world and never exist again. Later, I deeply sympathized with Michelangelo and Tolstoy on this point, drinking this inescapable cup of bitterness throughout their lives. No amount of artistic achievement could compensate for their lifelong regret. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[204]: The ultimate evaluation of beauty is based on one's smile. A beautiful person reaches the pinnacle of charm when they smile; this is true beauty. Conversely, if someone is beautiful in ordinary times, but becomes less beautiful when they smile, then they are not true beauty. This "imperfection" is too great, too serious, too fatal, negating their original function and value. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[205]: The Greek people were not ruled by priests; they were guided by poets and created by artists. --Mu Xin, Ancient Greece
[206]: Perhaps because when people are depressed, they cannot pick up a pen, cannot concentrate, are bored, and find everything annoying and superfluous -- it can be seen that literary works are created before "depression" arrives, or after "depression" has passed. --Mu Xin, The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House
[207]: When meeting a famous person, one should see the person, not the name... Most people only see the name, not the person. --Mu Xin, Literary Memoirs
[208]: An artist gradually matures as a person through his works. --Mu Xin, Walking in Plain Shoes
[209]: Being overly humble and self-disciplined easily leads to gloom and aridity. Being wild and unrestrained throughout life often results in frivolity and ridicule. There are not many people who are both humble and wild. Living a life with a mixture of humility and wildness is quite magnificent. A person who is wild without humility will not be wild enough, and a person who is humble without wildness is truly unknowable in what he is being humble about. --Mu Xin, "The Sword Hilt"
[210]: Many things, if fabricated, immediately become tasteless. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[211]: I used to never feel tired, and I saw that others also never felt tired. One day, I suddenly felt tired, and I saw that others were also tired, extremely tired. I lay down and thought, what is heaven like? If you walk in heaven for a day, the socks you take off will smell purely of roses. Heaven is boring, what is interesting is the human world. Only ordinary things have profound meaning, and everything else is mysterious and enigmatic. Mystery and enigma are our own ignorance. Only when mystery and enigma become ordinary because of our knowledge can we hope to obtain their profound meaning. --Mu Xin, "Except for This"
[212]: Despotism makes people thick-skinned, and openness makes people black-hearted. --Mu Xin
[213]: I am who I am only in the presence of other people. --Mu Xin
[214]: The moonlight of the past was slow, a little leisurely, a little lazy, whiled away the whole dusk in a cup of tea, and watched the stars fill the sky in half a dream. --Mu Xin "The Past Was Slow"
[215]: Gradually growing old and withered, the branches under the clear sky are slender and numerous, forming stars. The blue sky behind is actually dead. Only when the clear sky is blue and the withered branches are clear can the distant view be hazy, gray and purple. A winter tree. Other trees have bird nests. Yellow ribbons, broken kites. I have none. --Mu Xin "A Tree in the Wilderness"
[216]: In the busy days and nights of banquets, dressing up, and handling procedures, Fangfang's letter made me peaceful... It is no longer love, no longer virtue, but gratitude for the inextinguishable light of the soul. --Mu Xin "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[217]: There are two kinds of laymen. Those who cannot enter the door and are unwilling to leave the door are seen by others and are called laymen. If they do not linger at the door, there is no such thing as inside or outside, just laymen. Another type is those who sneak in, look around, and suddenly see another door inside, which they gladly push open—that's the back door, making them outsiders to the back door. There are no fewer outsiders to the back door than to the front door. A new interpretation of "Harvard University" is: someone "ha"ed here, but didn't become a "Buddha." --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[218]: My sadness often stems from events unrelated to me that force me to think. The result of my thinking is that I am still unrelated to those times. Only this sadness can be considered as having had contact with those times. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[219]: Chinese history is a long scroll interwoven with and permeated by humanities. Western sages, traveling by boat through the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, are amazed by the humanistic spirit contained in every blade of grass, every tree, every mountain, and every stream. Chinese culture originated in the Northwest, flowing southeastward with the changing seasons, only to stagnate in the Jiangnan region. My childhood and adolescence were spent struggling amidst the sediment of Chinese culture, but it is a joy to see the world through the eyes given to me by ancient Chinese culture, for one is the eye of a debater, and the other is the eye of a lover—what exactly is art? Art is an open and honest privacy. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice"
[220]: The depth of friendship lies in the inherent depth of both parties. The friendship of the shallow has no depth whatsoever. Cicero and others believed that "friendship only exists between good people," which is too simplistic. -- Mu Xin, *Qiongmeika's Random Thoughts*
[221]: When a person has experienced all the joys and sorrows of love and hate, and then returns to a state of purity, preferring to be whole rather than broken, and deeply understands rhetoric—that is, using a few appropriate words to manage the vast and chaotic affairs of the world—this is how men in ancient times spent their later years. Although they said, "I am not happy, so how can I care about my descendants?" they still knew how to leisurely pass the years. In short, they were very good at writing, saving themselves word by word. Only after saving themselves could they die peacefully. And there are epitaphs, which do not use a single word of love or hate, yet still explain their life experiences. They were truly very good at collaboration. -- Mu Xin, *Qiongmeika's Random Thoughts*
[222]: There can be no truth, only passion, no thought, at most some feeling. --Mu Xin
[223]: I gradually discovered that the greatness of "Dream of the Red Chamber" lies not only in its multiple values that have been discussed, but also in a subtle truth: any group of one or two hundred people living together daily has a structure like that of "Dream of the Red Chamber." Our small research institute has a little over one hundred members but less than two hundred. Everyone sees a lot of nails in their eyes. This state of being unable to see clearly or grasp the boundaries, and being anxious all day long, has been constantly evolving. So everyone is a role player, acting every day, harming others for personal gain, and harming others even if it doesn't benefit oneself, because the pleasure of personal gain is not always available, while the pleasure of harming others is always available and comes without any effort. --Mu Xin, "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[224]: Pride is natural, humility is only artificial. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[225]: Happiness is loving art with a clear conscience. -- Mu Xin
[226]: The deepest resentment stems from the deepest gratitude. The degree of resentment should be carefully examined; it is precisely the past kindness that makes up for any shortcomings. Only then can one realize that there was originally no resentment, because the original kindness is clearly identifiable, yet within that clarity lies a blur, a bitter wind and rain, the life-and-death struggle of old films in a small street corner cinema. -- Mu Xin, *Qiongmeika's Random Thoughts*
[227]: Each has its own sound, each has its own kindred spirit -- Mu Xin
[228]: Art is compassion without object -- Mu Xin
[229]: Wild fruits complete the orchard, the great river fertilizes the land, cattle and sheep enter the pen, the five grains are plentiful, then the orioles fly in all directions, and moss grows on the secluded steps overnight -- a nation with a short history, even if it is heartfelt joy or sorrow, is always considered frivolous and superficial, after all, it has not experienced many prosperous years and famine years, many celebrations of heavenly joy and the mourning of the sea, especially not the daily joys and sorrows of sharing joys and sorrows in countless details, even there When the time is right, the land is favorable, and people are in harmony, yet the mountains, rivers, grasses, and trees always seem indifferent and lacking in spirit. There, people are people, and nature is nature; they haven't yet merged, haven't yet blossomed together… Overseas, there are spring breezes, fragrant grasses, the barking of dogs in the dead of night, the crimson maples of autumn, extending to the aroma of frying fish, the night cries of a neighbor's baby, and Cantonese and Suzhou-style mooncakes. Everyone mutters to themselves: It's not like that, it's not like that. A sigh escapes their hearts: It's as if all of that is wrong. Because one cannot say "the spring breeze is wrong, the fragrant grass is wrong," one can only say it's not entirely true, not completely… --Mu Xin, *Reflections of Columbia*
[230]: Lend me your simple worldliness and clear-headed folly, lend me your foreseeable danger. Lend me your tragic magnanimity, lend me your gentle recklessness and the solemnity of your joke. --Mu Xin, "Lend Me"
[231]: In the ancient nation, in every street corner, alley, pavilion, and bridge, one can see glimpses of human stories. Famous cities and historical sites are even more like layers upon layers of past dreams, accumulating so much that they can't hold back. Fortunately, there are always spring flowers and autumn moons there to soothe and relieve, to let out a breath, to let out a breath, which is already the breath of history. --Mu Xin, "Reflections of Columbia"
[232]: When talking about his shortcomings, he would hug those shortcomings tightly, with a simple and honest smile on his face -- shortcomings are his pets. --Mu Xin
[233]: Classicism is what later generations call it. Romanticism is what we call it. Aestheticism is actually a private matter; to say it out loud would be inappropriate. Aestheticism is flawed because it doesn't understand beauty. Symbolism doesn't need to be explicitly stated either, otherwise it becomes a riddle with the answer before the riddle. Realism is clumsy in its witty remarks, witty but not witty. Imagism, my dear, what kind of "ism" is "imagism"? It's just the Imagist school. Surrealism, can it transcend "ism" like this? --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[234]: If Michelangelo knew that his work would be destroyed three days later when he was sculpting David, he would have stopped and gone to drink. The concept of "eternity" confuses artists. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[235]: Cultured upper-class people never treat coachmen, bathhouse attendants, or anyone who delivers items perfunctorily. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[236]: Cosmology determines worldview, and worldview determines outlook on life. --If your worldview doesn't come from a cosmology, where is your world? If your philosophy of life doesn't come from a worldview, don't you live in the world? So, if you think you have a philosophy of life, but don't have, and don't need, a worldview, and certainly don't have, and don't need, a cosmology -- then you have nothing. --Mu Xin, "Literary Memoirs"
[237]: The details of things are regular, the whole of things is fateful. --Mu Xin
[238]: All that is great is rebellious. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[239]: In the past, carriages and horses were slow, letters took a long time, and a lifetime was only enough to love one person. --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[240]: On fate, gods, all people are governed by fate. Ancient Greece knew this, and I know it too. For half a century, I was anxious, but fate was not anxious. This is the temperament of fate. Now, seeing that fate is anxious, I am not anxious. This is my temperament. --Mu Xin, "On Fate"
[241]: As the years have passed, I have forgotten that romanticism is a human affair. In my impression, it is like a naturally formed spiritual history. In a late-night chat, Tolstoy hesitated, saying, "When we arrive in a strange city, don't we identify it by the spires of a few buildings? And when we leave, all we remember are those spires." Maps are flat, history is long, art is sharp. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[242]: A light judgment is a kind of happiness, a vague foresight is a kind of happiness. If one cannot enjoy these two kinds of happiness, then there is only sorrow. However, it is only appropriate to be light and vague; going too far will slip into arbitrariness and prejudice. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[243]: Your eyes and laughter made me sick; the fever subsided, leaving me with a lonely health. --Mu Xin, "Eyebrows and Eyes"
[244]: What is lonely is that in life, there is not a single friend. What is even lonelier is that those who are understood cannot be great people. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[245]: Beauty is an expression. The meaning of this expression is love. --Mu Xin
[246]: The conciseness of writing comes from the sincerity of the heart. I love you 120,000 times more than I love you. -- Mu Xin
[247]: A scene that cannot be associated with another scene is a scene worth gazing at. -- Mu Xin, Evening Prayer
[248]: It is of course most pleasant to vent one's anger with music. -- Mu Xin, Impromptu Judgment
[249]: "Small cleverness" will never grow up. -- Mu Xin, Walking in Plain Shoes
[250]: Immoral behavior is usually judged by the nature of harming others, ignoring that it has already harmed itself before harming others, and continues to harm itself after harming others. Idealism means having good patience. God does not play dice, and nature never makes a witty remark. Man is vain in gambling with himself and indulging in self-deception. As far as "life" is concerned, "death" is ugly, and the living are not worthy of discussing the beauty of "death". Seeing one ambitious young person after another fall into depravity with familiarity, many "individuals" added together constitute "the era". --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[251]: The despair of frivolous recklessness is always better than the despair of arduous pioneering. --Mu Xin, "My Tumultuous Desires"
[252]: The sacredness of art may lie in its ability to tolerate all kinds of misinterpretations and misunderstandings. --Mu Xin
[253]: The wise man is nothing more than a mischievous child who is good at finding excuses to disappear safely. --Mu Xin
[254]: It is not happy when other people's torrential happiness drips onto my shoulder. --Mu Xin, "Ten Single Lines Involving Love"
[255]: Light judgment is a kind of happiness, and vague foresight is a kind of happiness. If one cannot enjoy these two kinds of happiness, knowledge is sorrow. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[256]: The Chinese are always noisy. When they are quiet, they are brewing an even noisier noise. This is true in military camps, temples, and funeral homes... --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[257]: Once you identify with something, you will gradually become foolish, eventually reaching a state of unimaginable foolishness. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[258]: So many rich but ignorant people turn birth, marriage, and death into elaborate dreams. As I gradually come to understand human affairs, I observe these extravagant creations of "birth," "marriage," and "death." Even if I cannot explain them clearly at the moment, I am increasingly aware that this is not happiness or comfort, but a futile and pointless display. --Mu Xin, "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
[259]: Religion always starts with reason and emotion, but ends up being unreasonable and forcing people to fabricate. --Mu Xin
[260]: Philosophy is this thing, you can talk about it however you want. --Mu Xin
[261]: Beauty is happiness. --Mu Xin
[262]: I have a perverse thought: if this child faces disaster, I can sacrifice myself for him, and I think that would complete my life -- This is a strange thought of a young man tormented by unexpressed love, filled with jealousy, cruelty, and malice. I wonder if there is another person in the world who has had such an experience. If there is, I am gratified; if not, I am still gratified, because I have proven that it is possible for a person to have a pure love without desire or utilitarian concept. Even if it is just a sincere thought, it has indeed happened, and an innocent young man might put it into practice. --Mu Xin, "The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House"
[263]: What can look down on the universe without gods is a kiss. --Mu Xin, "Eighteen Nights of Clear Skies"
[264]: May is the month of birds, the month of bees, the month of lilacs, and the month Whitman was born. --Mu Xin, Whitman
[265]: Looking back, each generation is more sentimental than the last; looking to the future, each generation is more heartless than the last. Sentimentality can be boundless, but heartlessness is limited; it is simply heartlessness. --Mu Xin
[266]: I ask questions, but my eyes and heart are secretly amazed by her prosperity. --Mu Xin, Windsor Cemetery Diary
[267]: He said that the scenery of a place lies in its sadness. --Mu Xin, Istanbul
[268]: When I was young, I thought that once I grew old, I would be old forever. Now I know that there is one thing in a person that never grows old: the heart, the heart that was only young. --Mu Xin, May Window
[269]: When someone says, "This is too profound, I don't understand it!" don't think that they are inferior or have any regrets. When they say this, they are looking down on you. --Mu Xin, Impromptu Judgment
[270]: Everything that should be will disappear. Everything that can exist is something that should not exist. --Mu Xin, "Revisiting Pascal"
[271]: I am the saw going up, you are the saw going down, together we sawed the tree down, both sides revealing the annual rings, a pile of fragrant shavings. Only after sawing it down did I realize love is a tree, and the tree is already very big. --Mu Xin
[272]: A French friend said, when a place is too similar to you, that place is no longer beneficial to you. --Mu Xin, "Germany"
[273]: The rain is still falling, and all the willows are in bloom. -- Mu Xin, "Random Thoughts on Qiongmeika"
[274]: Fate is terrifying. Fate is exquisite. -- Mu Xin, "Anecdotes of Bingyin Year"
[275]: Religion is a dream, and in the dream, one must remain awake. -- Mu Xin, "Egypt. Ramadan"
[276]: Where the heart leads, even in simple shoes, one can go. -- Mu Xin
[277]: Only those who are extremely clever can hope to regain their honesty. -- Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgments"
[278]: One side of the strait has severed itself from traditional culture and misinterpreted world culture; the other side of the strait has misinterpreted traditional culture and severed itself from world culture. -- A cultural break inevitably leads to the severing of customs, habits, and interpersonal relationships, thus leading to irrecoverable loss. This phenomenon is truly unique to China. Other ancient cultural countries would not have experienced such a severe and brutal decline. The cause is that the two sides of the Taiwan Strait each have their own ideologies, but what they have in common is the confusion of value judgments. The result of this confusion is the death of value judgments. There is no value, no need for judgment, just a muddled, gritting-teeth mentality, and a shrewd pursuit of the "those who obey me prosper, those who oppose me perish"
mentality. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice" [279]: Love itself has little meaning; it is all created by wisdom and morality to form a magnificent spectacle. If wisdom and morality are lost because of love, then it can be judged that this is not love, but lust, the unbridled indulgence of lust. Those who lose their wisdom and morality because of love always say, "Look, for love, I did not hesitate to abandon wisdom and morality." -- Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[280]: This is a perverse trend. Everyone borrows a line of Tang poetry as the title of their articles and collections. The ancients would never be so shameless. During the May Fourth Movement, there were no such bored people. How pedantic and vulgar
it is to make the elegant into the vulgar. I really don't know who started it. -- Mu Xin, "Feast of Fish and Rice" [281]: Idealism means having good patience. -- Mu Xin
[282]: Westerners are good at dancing, and Chinese are good at calligraphy. The way of Chinese "calligraphy" is the most intelligent behavior that shows genius and skill among all artistic expressions. -- Mu Xin, "Feast of Fish and Rice"
[283]: Don't be surprised by anything, and don't push things to extremes. -- Mu Xin
[284]: Happiness comes from wisdom and nourishes wisdom. --Mu Xin
[285]: Fate has always been kind to me. Its patience is too good. Long and tragic arrangements of good fortune. It also said, if you want extraordinary beauty, I can only make it exquisite. --Mu Xin, "My Tumultuous Desires"
[286]: The road I have walked is not the road of faith. Along the way, I have seen generations of religious figures who have deviated from the original intention of the founder, hypocritical and perfunctory, distorted and exaggerated, and even committed many evils. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice"
[287]: The truth of life is unacceptable to art. Therefore, at a certain point, we cannot accept art either. Art is superficial, futile excitement, and fruitless agitation. --Mu Xin
[288]: Love is like snow. New snow is abundant and beautiful. Residual snow is helpless. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[289]: Such a person is not easy to see through. Try to see through him -- there is only a sense of justice, but no justice. --Mu Xin, "Impromptu Judgment"
[290]: Individualism is treating everyone as a poet. --Mu Xin, Paris-Frankfurt
[291]: Love is life, and then life can love. --Mu Xin, Love Poems on a Train
[292]: I insist that if a person wants to go, he should go far. --Mu Xin, The Sound of Repairing a Ship
[293]: The autumn wind blows from the past. --Mu Xin
[294]: Truth is a parable that everyone agrees on. --Mu Xin, Impromptu Judgment
[295]: China used to be like this. As a child, I was already aware of traditional culture. It flowed slowly in the city and the countryside in the poems inscribed on the white walls of my male servant's house. My maternal grandmother was proficient in the Book of Changes, and my paternal grandmother taught me the Mahayana Five Aggregates Treatise. Here and there, I would always meet people who truly loved reading. When we talked, they were insightful and had pure taste, but they didn't bother with writing. They had no ideals, so why bother with plans? They were simply clear, vigorous, elegant, and serene. If you asked them to go to buy books together, they would walk twenty miles without complaining. Reading masterpieces and talking all night without showing any signs of fatigue—this kind of literary believer, literary confidant, has emerged generation after generation, everywhere. So Emerson would also have noticed the existence of this great "undercurrent." He said something and then stopped, Emerson was always like that. Actually, he could have continued: If there is a period when several literary geniuses are born, a very, very large one, and the "undercurrent" rises up to escort the "genius," what will that become? That will be the "Renaissance," or the "golden age" of literature. --Mu Xin, "The Feast of Fish and Rice"
[296]: I have found that many people's loss is that they have forgotten and betrayed their youthful aspirations, thinking themselves sophisticated and shrewd, how naive they were before, finally seeing through everything, understanding everything—and thus becoming the kind of person they hated most in their youth. I am ashamed to say that I have any particularly strong ambition, but I dare to say that I never belittle myself. When I first read "The Biography of Michelangelo," I trembled all over. That's it, that's it. --Mu Xin
[297]: In the end, they always gave in a little more because of their foolishness. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[298]: They all possess a pure, passionate, upward, beauty-loving, lively, and innocent artistic conception, which is the essence of romance. It can almost be said that every young person is a potential artist, a potential poet, and a potential hero. As youth fades, the capital of talent is gradually exhausted, while the physical and mental expenses are enormous, and the devil comes to lend money at high interest rates. This inescapable law is unknown to everyone, just as one feels the passing of childhood. Youth is also unaware of this, much less aware of it, because the process from childhood to youth is one of gentle growth and flourishing, while once youth ends, it turns to dryness and aridity, its momentum declining. The pure passion, upward striving, and love of beauty of the past are all natural. -- Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[299]: The rose wishes to live and die with Mozart's music. -- Mu Xin, "The Lark Sang All Day"
[300]: I can resist any temptation until I am tempted. -- Mu Xin, "On Temptation"
[301]: The flowers here are all deep purple. I am not sad, but I want to cry out loud. -- Mu Xin, "Crying"
[302]: Knowledge and love are always proportional. --Mu Xin, "Knowledge and Love"
[303]: In the past, the days were slower, carriages, horses, and mail were slower, and a lifetime was only enough to love one person. In the past, locks were also beautiful, and keys were exquisite and had style. When you locked it, people understood. --Mu Xin, "The Past Was Slow"
[304]: Cosmology determines worldview, worldview determines outlook on life, and outlook on life determines outlook on art, politics, and love. --Mu Xin
[305]: The destiny of art is rebellious, skeptical, heretical, unrealistic, inactive, personal, and unsociable. The destiny of religion is autocratic, obedient, sacrificing the individual, active, teleological, collective, and faith-based; in fact, it is politics. --Mu Xin
[306]: Art is originally just a dream, but it is more beautiful and more lasting than the dream of power, the dream of wealth, and the dream of lust. Art is the best dream. --Mu Xin
[307]: In addition (there are inevitably some other things), the Chinese are both gentle and fierce, with incredible patience, able to endlessly contend with any fortune or misfortune. In the heart, it goes without saying; ten years is like this, a hundred years is just ten decades, and suddenly it's a thousand years. --Mu Xin, *Reflections of Columbia*
[308]: He understood my infatuation, a fleeting glance, like mockery or pity, occasionally showing me affection, which I resolutely avoided—knowing my love was hopeless, willing to seek no fame, and unworthy of reward. Love is in the heart, and dies in the heart. --Mu Xin, *The Unwelcome Guest at Emerson's House*
【 309 】: A wise father always secretly favors his rebellious son; A wise brother always favors his rebellious younger brother. --Mu Xin's "Journey of Su Lu"
【 310 】: Speaking of which: What did a person come into this world for? Love the cutest, most beautiful, most attractive, and most delicious things. Helplessly unable to find so many cute, pleasant, and good-looking ones, then I know what is good. I didn't die during the Cultural Revolution, but survived with this last thought - I have seen, heard, eaten, and loved. ”During the Cultural Revolution, they wanted to shoot me. I wasn't afraid, I had no regrets, I loved everyone. But I still had to do something. I was deeply educated by art, and I couldn't repay it. I didn't even care about emotions or love anymore. Whether it was love or not, whether it was good or bad for me, the price had been paid. Only in this way can I be happy, treat the world like a ball, and play. If you decide your life with art, you can't live like an ordinary person. "- Mu Xin," Literary Memoirs "
【 311 】: In love, thinking that relying solely on one heart can lead to no harm is completely wrong! The attractiveness of the image is so cruel that it makes people want to grab the sky and earth and have to remain silent. By virtue, by sorrow, in short, by everything that is not love, one can give pity and respect, and then squeeze pity and respect into love. Such drunkenness cannot intoxicate oneself or others, and such drunkenness is bitter and can only be pushed away. You may also fall into the dilemma of being unable to push and drink. Therefore, it does not mean that it is obvious to all, nor does it mean that it is a rare treasure, but rather that the person I love must be a charming person. Being ugly and cute is beauty, and a couple is nothing but a pair with unique eyes and hearts. Even thinking that 'others cannot see, only I can see', proud and stable, what could be happier. --Muxin's "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
The first thought of the way of being a person is to understand that people are going to die. What is life? Life is a process before death. With this, with this thought, religion, philosophy, culture, and art emerged. But religion, philosophy, culture, and art are also doomed... Churches, museums, art galleries, and libraries, with their solemn and dignified appearance, are actually landscapes before destruction. I look at things without knowing sadness with sad eyes. --Mu Xin's Literary Memoirs
【 313 】: Physical health balances the mind. Health is a numbness. --Mu Xin
【 314 】: Absurdist writers are pretentious. Pretend to commit suicide and have the world as a burial companion. These critics and viewers are all pretending to be buried. They write the world in darkness on stage, but they live well on their own. --Mu Xin's Literary Memoirs
【 315 】: Stubbornness is the most difficult temper to change. If you want to change, you will also stubbornly try to change. No need to change, only stubborn people are gentle. --Muxin's "Improvisational Judgment"
【 316 】: Nowadays, when others tease each other like a play, I sit on one side and don't feel jealous. Now, on the streets, who hugs me, I feel lost and don't know how to hold back. --Muxin's "On the Eve of Going to Adams Pavilion"
【 317 】: First time meeting you, it's like a glimpse at the corner of a night staircase. There's a slight feature on my lips or eyebrows that I feel like needles might have given rise to some kind of madness. The iron gate of a mental hospital, where I sweep fallen leaves with my feet. Who knew last autumn that there was a moment when you couldn't catch your breath? I let out a cowardly cry in my heart, and when I caught my breath, I laughed proudly - Mu Xin
【 318 】: If only I were darkness, I could throw myself into the arms of light. --Mu Xin's "Night Dance"
【 319 】: A person who always refuses to betray themselves, even if they have suffered a lot, can still smile in the end. --Mu Xin
The pyramid is too heavy, robbers cannot move it, eternity is too expensive, no one can afford me to take care of your rough beauty - Mu Xin
【 321 】: Life is always about not knowing what to do! --Mu Xin's "Qiongmeika Random Thoughts"
【 322 】: To conquer the world with goodness, to govern the world with hypocrisy, to be impatient with falsehood, to be full of loopholes, and to be directly evil - Looking back on when we were about to conquer the world but did not, everyone thought that the good in the past was not good, but this time it was truly good, so they all sought refuge and joined together in the great cause. Looking back at the beginning when hypocrisy began to operate, everyone refined their skills in making falsehoods. Small falsehoods were no match for big falsehoods, literary falsehoods were no match for martial falsehoods, and big falsehoods and martial falsehoods were ultimately defeated by truth and evil. No one believes in the concept of "goodness" anymore, and the trick of "hypocrisy" has been mastered. When one is about to lose but has not lost the world, those who have suffered losses must first understand that the theoretical premise of the concept of "goodness" is delusional and unrealistic, which is not in line with human nature and physics. --Mu Xin's "Journey of Su Lu"
[323]: When I heard Gide say, 'Love, not love a single person' - I was taken aback. I thought he had eavesdropped on my inner confession. When Goethe said, 'If I love you, what does it have to do with you?'. ”--I was too calm, thinking that the only thing I could do was this step, which is extremely difficult to achieve ... - Mu Xin's "Feast of Fish Beauty"
【 324 】: When discussing matters without involving personal feelings and emotions, it is called humility; when one lives without considering personal gains and losses, it is called madness. This kind of humble and arrogant collaboration is cute and feasible. --Mu Xin's "Qiongmeika Random Thoughts"
What you say is equivalent to not saying at all is love talk. The cup that is equivalent to not doing is the Holy Grail. A night that is still is a good night. --Muxin's "Some Nights Fourteen Years Ago"
【 326 】: Philosophical career was originally a dream. Those who wake up and ponder deeply are no longer philosophers. They still have a faint body fragrance, like orchids or sandalwood. In addition to their ideas, there is a kind of virtuous life. --Mu Xin's "Journey of Su Lu"
The process of life is a self-education process, often an ineffective self-education process. However, it is always a process of self-education. --Mu Xin
【 328 】: Confrontation, irreconcilable, is childish. --Mu Xin
【 329 】: Walking casually in the morning of a sunny autumn doesn't necessarily have to be happy - Mu Xin's "Walking with Su Lu"
Missing you in letters to others is not enough. --Muxin's "Improvisational Judgment"
【 331 】: The tolerant night covers up the pollution of the river water. --Mu Xin's "Tolerant Night"
【 332 】: When you reach middle age, think about whether the middle-aged person you envied during your youth is your current self - yes, that's great. No, that's probably too late. When it comes to old age and disability, those who say 'no' don't have to think about it. Those who say 'yes' should think about it again. Is the elderly person who was envied during their middle age and disability their current self? Yes, that's great. No, then it's too late no matter what. For those who have been "yes" twice, they must also be cautious of losing their integrity in the moment before death. --Muxin's "Improvisational Judgment"
【 333 】: I used to be a leisurely crane like a cow or a horse. If you want to meet me, I am at the intersection of various joys and sorrows. Time changes everything and also changes people's temperament. Unfortunately, I am an exception. All I can do is to travel a long distance to return to simplicity. -- Mu Xin
Religion aims to fabricate a purpose in an aimless universe. --Mu Xin
【 335 】: Scientific knowledge is enough to bury theology, and the next step is to end philosophy. --Mu Xin
【 336 】: In her thirties, she was at the age of being deceived. She thought she wasn't as easily fooled as a girl, but also felt guilty that others didn't want her to be deceived. --Muxin's "Windsor Cemetery Diary"
Yesterday, she and I were sitting by the fountain on the street. The weather in May was already very hot, and the bag of cherries we just bought didn't taste good. We were smoking and said, 'We should smoke less.'. The streets were filled with people coming and going, and she sighed and asked, 'What is life?' I blurted out, 'Life is always about not knowing what to do.'. ”--Muxin's' Very Good '
Without the fullness of character, knowledge is just a disguise. --Mu Xin
Behind a foolish man, there must be a foolish woman - Mu Xin's "The Skylark Cried All Day"
A person must return from a distance, descend from a high place, and emerge from a deep place. --Mu Xin's Literary Memoirs
【 341 】: The most unsightly thing is something that has been made crude in the eagerness to achieve refinement. --Muxin's "Improvisational Judgment"
[342]: Because I like simplicity, I also like splendor. --Mu Xin
[343]: When I cannot deal with hypocrites, I feign evil, I feign evil thoroughly, so that the hypocrites will back down, stop laughing, and turn away. If other things are not this, they can be that; if works of art are not art, they are nothing. --Mu Xin, "Walking in Plain Shoes"
[344]: There were once nine major cultural systems in the world. The Arabic culture was once called "magical culture," but that was a long time ago. After "One Thousand and One Nights" was banned in its homeland as "obscene books," the Arabic culture was left with only 1234567890, which is strangely pure and lovely. --Mu Xin
[345]: Borrow my acquired innate qualities, borrow my transformation as if it had never changed. --Mu Xin
[346]: When I sit with my enemy, I am clear-headed. When I forget myself, I am with my friends. --Mu Xin, "My Tumultuous Desires"
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