Many / One

A database of 11,000+ illuminated guiding quotations in 40 categories from 600+ inspired books by our most brilliant and influential authors.
Compiled by JoAnn Kite

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1		"Never during its pilgrimage is the spirit of man completely adrift and alone. From start to finish its nucleus is the Atman – the self-luminous abiding point, boundless as the sky, indivisible, absolute, the only reality." Huston Smith, 'Karma, Rebirth and Freewill' Reincarnation: The Phoenix Fire Mystery (Cranston/Head, editors)

2		“All the radii of a circle are brought together in the unity of the center which contains all the straight lines brought together within itself. These are linked one to another because of this single point of origin and they are completely unified at this center.” Pseudo-Dionysius, The Complete Works (John Farina, Editor-in-Chief)

3		"From what source will human individuals ultimately draw the desire to accept one another and draw one another towards joyful unity? There is only one conceivable source: a growing attraction to the centre of consciousness in which their fibres and their bundle must complete themselves by reuiniting." The Vision of the Past (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)

4		"There is always a centre – such as the sun with the planets, or the cell with its nucleus; that is, a point of power which gives life and energy to the whole of the structure." Regents of the Seven Spheres (H. K. Challoner)

5		"Every point is equally the center of a circle whose radius is infinite." The Inner Life (Charles W. Leadbeater)

6		"God fashioned the sphere of light round himself. 'God is an intelligible sphere whose centre is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere'(cf. St. Bonaventure, Itinerarium, 5). The point symbolizes light and fire, also the Godhead in so far as light is an 'image of God' or an 'exemplar of the Deity.' This spherical light modelled on the point is also the shining or illuminating body that dwells in the heart of man." Collected Works (Carl Jung)

7		"So long as man shall exist, perfection will continue to appear as the circle, sphere, and the round; and the Primal Deity who is sufficient unto himself, and the self who has gone beyond the opposites, will reappear in the image of the round, the mandala." Erich Neumann, 'The Origins and History of Consciousness' Ariadne's Clue, A Guide to the Symbols of Humankind (Anthony Stevens)

8		"The exchange of love between the contemplative person and the sacred center of all things keeps one on the path." One Spirit, Many Peoples, A Manifesto for Earth Spirituality (Stephen Harrod Buhner)

9		"The organizing center from which the regulatory effect stems seems to be a sort of 'nuclear atom' in our psychic system. One could also call it the inventor, organizer, and source of dream images. Jung called this center the 'Self'….Throughout the ages people have been intuitively aware of the existence of such an inner center. The Greeks called it man's inner 'daimon'; in Egypt it was expressed by the concept of the 'Ba-soul'; and the Romans worshiped it as the 'genius' native to each individual. In more primitive societies it was often thought of as a protective spirit embodied within an animal or a fetish." Marie Louise vonFranz Man and His Symbols (Carl Jung)

10		"The world we know does not develop haphazardly, but is structurally dominated by a Personal Centre of universal convergence." Science and Christ (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)

11		"We never actually get away from the center and circumference where God put us." The Child Within Us Lives!, A Synthesis of Science, Religion and Metaphysics (William Samuel)

12		"The center is the nameless, the most supreme, the oldest, yet is ever-present and continually pours forth its energy – it is self-renewing." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

13		"The image of the triune God is in the sphere, namely of the Father in the center, of the Son in the outer surface and of the Holy Ghost in the uniformity of connection between point and intervening space or surroundings." Johannes Kepler, 'Mysterium Cosmographicum', quoted by Wolfgang Pauli (1900-1958) in 'Embracing the Rational and the Mystical' Quantum Questions, Mystical Writings of the World's Great Physicists (Ken Wilber, editor)

14		"Work with symbols will be found of real value if you persevere. I would give you a hint about them which your intuition will reveal. Where the converging lines of any symbol meet and where the many lines cross there is a point of force and of illumination, a focussed centre through which the illumined mind can pierce. Ponder on this." Discipleship in the New Age (Alice A. Bailey)

15		"Every substance is held up by a series of Substances-of-Substance that support one another, step by step, up to the Supreme Centre at which everything converges." Science and Christ (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)

16		"Go to the center and know the Whole. Follow this path." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

17		"In being one with the Divine, or what the Native Americans of the plains might call the Great Spirit, we are also at the center of the cosmos. In relationship with the Great Spirit, we share this same center. Let us find peace in this unity." The Mystic Hours, A Daybook of Interspiritual Wisdom & Devotion (Wayne Teasdale)

18		"In all symbols expressive of the mystic Centre, the intention is to reveal to Man the meaning of the primordial 'paradisal state' and to teach him to identify himself with the supreme principle of the universe. This centre is in effect Aristotle's 'unmoved mover'…Hindu doctrine declares that God resides in the centre, at that point where the radii of a wheel meet at its axis. In diagrams of the cosmos, the central space is always reserved for the Creator…Among the Chinese, the infinite being is frequently symbolized as a point of light with concentric circles spreading outwards from it." A Dictionary of Symbols (J. E. Cirlot)

19		"The presence of the Incarnate Word penetrates everything, as a universal element. It shines at the common heart of things, as a centre that is infinitely intimate to them." Science and Christ (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)

20		"The pair of opposites is always there until one can find the center. Then in the center one can move and then go freely." Jean Erdman, Joseph Campbell's wife The Hero's Journey (Phil Cousineau, editor)

21		"However vast the divine milieu may be, it is in reality a centre. It therefore has the properties of a centre, and above all the absolute and final power to unite (and consequently to complete) all beings within its breast." The Divine Milieu (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)

22		"The centre of a circle is regarded as the indivisible source of all the radii extending from it;…pre-existing in God are all the inner essences of created things." St. Maximos the Confessor, 'Second Century on Theology' The Philokalia, volume 2 (various authors, compiled by St. Nikodimos of the Holy Mountain)

23		"Man remains forever free at the centre." The Ancient Wisdom (Annie Besant)

24		"In a sense each human being is the center of the universe, for God lives equally in all." Reincarnation: A Hope of the World (Irving S. Cooper)

25		"Each cell divides (by mitotic or amitotic division) and gives birth to another cell similar to itself. First, a single centre; then two. Everything in the subsequent development of life stems from this potent primordial phenomenon." The Phenomenon of Man (Pierre Teilhard deChardin)