1
" How little we have, I thought, between us and the waiting cold, the mystery, death--a strip of beach, a hill, a few walls of wood or stone, a little fire--and tomorrow's sun, rising and warming us, tomorrow's hope of peace and better weather . . . What if tomorrow vanished in the storm? What if time stood still? And yesterday--if once we lost our way, blundered in the storm--would we find yesterday again ahead of us, where we had thought tomorrow's sun would rise? "
― Robert Nathan , Portrait of Jennie
4
" What is it which makes a man and a woman know that they, of all other men and women in the world, belong to each other? Is it no more than chance and meeting? no more than being alive together in the world at the same time? Is it only a curve of the throat, a line of the chin, the way the eyes are set, a way of speaking? Or is it something deeper and stranger, something beyond meeting, something beyond chance and fortune? Are there others, in other times of the world, whom we should have loved, who would have loved us? Is there, perhaps, one soul among all others--among all who have lived, the endless generations, from world's end to world's end--who must love us or die? And whom we must love, in turn--whom we must seek all our lives long--headlong and homesick--until the end? "
― Robert Nathan , Portrait of Jennie
14
" We think of God, we think of the mystery of the universe, but we do not think about it very much, and we do not really believe that it is a mystery, or that we could not understand it if it were explained to us. Perhaps that is because when all is said and done, we do not really believe in God. In our hearts, we are convinced that it is our world, not His.
How stupid of us. Yet we are created stupid—innocent and ignorant; and it is this ignorance alone which makes it possible for us to live on this earth, in comfort, among the mysteries. Since we do not know, and cannot guess, we need not bother our heads too much to understand. It is innocence which wakes us each morning to a new day, a fresh day, another day in a long chain of days; it is ignorance which makes each of our acts appear to be a new one, and the result of an exercise of will. Without such ignorance, we should perish of terror, frozen and immobile; or, like the old saints who learned the true name of God, go up in a blaze of unbearable vision. "
― Robert Nathan , Portrait of Jennie
16
" No, my friend; if I do not turn Christian like so many others, it is not because of the religious practices. It is because I do not want my grandchildren to hate the Jews. There is too much hate in the world as it is; in this country it flourishes like the weed. Here even the poets hate one another. Very well, I stay a Jew, I do not go over on the side of the haters. I do not buy my way up, so that I too, can spit down on my people. Do you think I love the Jews so much? How can I tell, when I am one? But I am sick of those who hate them, because I am sick of hate. What we need is more politeness in the world. Let people shake hands and say, Come in. "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
17
" I grieve for your grandparents,” continued Michael. “But after all, that was in another land, and in a different time. I need not point out to you the advantages of the Church to this country in which you operate. It is the Church which saves the home, by confronting with a determined mien the practices of immorality. The home, following the Church, conforms to design, and consists of the father, the mother, and the child. That home, Mr. Cohen, furnishes the basis for your credit in the markets of the world. The father produces, the mother buys, the child consumes. I ask you: can you do without it? Do you wish to see this country sunk in wickedness, the father drunk, the mother divorced, the child debauched? Would you like to see the mills idle, the mines closed, the farms overgrown with weeds? "
― Robert Nathan , The Bishop's Wife
19
" Sonnet
I am no stranger in the house of pain;
I am familiar with its every part,
From the low stile, then up the crooked lane
To the dark doorway, intimate to my heart.
Here did I sit with grief and eat his bread,
Here was I welcomed as misfortune’s guest,
And there’s no room but where I’ve laid my head
On misery’s accomodating breast.
So, sorrow, does my knocking rouse you up?
Open the door, old mother; it is I.
Bring grief’s good goblet out, the sad, sweet cup;
Fill it with wine of silence, strong and dry.
For I’ve a story to amuse your ears,
Of youth and hope, of middle age and tears. "
― Robert Nathan
20
" How little we have, I thought, between us and the waiting cold, the mystery, death—a strip of beach, a hill, a few walls of wood or stone, a little fire—and tomorrow’s sun, rising and warming us, tomorrow’s hope of peace and better weather "
― Robert Nathan , Portrait of Jennie
