“The development of the faculty of attention forms the real object and almost the sole interest of studies.”

— Simone Weil, Waiting for God (1951)

About Simone Weil

1909 – 1943

French philosopher and political activist.

“I also am other than what I imagine myself to be. To know this is forgiveness.”

“Art is the symbol of the two noblest human efforts: to construct and to refrain from destruction.”

“Every atheist is an idolater — unless he is worshipping the true God in his impersonal aspect.”

“Who is everywhere is nowhere.”

“Confine yourself to the present.”

“No one ever reads a book. He reads himself through books, either to discover or to control himself.”

“The value of a college education is not the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think.”

“There is the love of knowing without the love of learning; the beclouding here leads to dissipation of mind.”

“Finally, from so little sleeping and so much reading, his brain dried up and he went completely out of his mind.”