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		"The hearth in the home, the altar in the temple, is the hub of the wheel of the earth, the womb of the Universal Mother whose fire is the fire of life." Hero With A Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell)

2		"The Divine Life and Will is the centre of the whole universe." The Meaning of Masonry (W. L. Wilmshurst)

3		"The unconscious can be reached and expressed only by symbols, and art, myth, dream, and fantasy, with their symbolic propensities, are effective psychopomps, leading the mind to an anamnesis of the origins of psychic life. The result of this anamnesis (an 'unforgetting' or rediscovery) is, on the one hand, an accession to power and vitality resultant from this integration. On the other hand, the mind experiences a perception of something akin to essential form and divinity at the heart of the creation and begins to sense an underlying acausal pattern of continuous creation. The two aspects coalesce in spontaneous images, often taking the form of a mandala and emphasizing a unifying centrality surrounded by a symmetrical quaternary or circular structure suggesting a microcosmic-macrocosmic identity between creature and the cosmic creation." The Strong Eye of Shamanism, A Journey Into the Caves of Consciousness (Robert E. Ryan, Ph.D.)

4		"God is central in each part of the universe, down to the tiniest atom." Mysticism, Its History and Challenge (Bruno Borchert)

5		"In the Beginning was the Center: the center of the mind of God, the eternal Creator, the Dream of Brahman, the galaxies that swirl beyond the lenses of our great telescopes. In all of these the center is one, and in the center lies eternity." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

6		"Everywhere are to be found centres of force, and the idea can be extended from such a force centre as a chemical atom, on and up through varying grades and groups of such intelligent centres, to humanity, and thence to the Life which is manifesting through the system. Thus is demonstrated a marvellous and synthesised Whole." The Consciousness of the Atom (Alice A. Bailey)

7		Always in the centre shall come a new Word." Mexican aphorism From Bethlehem to Calvary (Alice A. Bailey)

8		"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)

9		"There is a root or depth in you from whence all these faculties come forth as lines from a centre, or as branches from the body of a tree. The depth is called the centre, the fund, or bottom of the soul. This depth is the unity, the Eternity, I had almost said the infinity of your soul, for it is so infinite that nothing can satisfy it, or give it any rest, but the infinity of God." William Law (1688-1761), English clergyman, 'The Spirit of Prayer' Mysticism (Evelyn Underhill)

10		"The sphere is a whole, and hence it underlies the symbolic significance of all those images which partake of this wholeness, from the idea of the mystic 'Centre' to that of the world and eternity, or , more particularly, of the world-soul. In neo-platonic philosophy, the soul is explicitly related to the shape of the sphere, and the substance of the soul is deposited as quintessence around the concentric spheres of the four Elements. The same is true of the primordial man of Plato's Timaeus….Another important association is that of perfection and felicity. The absence of corners and edges is analogous to the absence of inconveniences, difficulties, and obstacles." A Dictionary of Symbols (J. E. Cirlot)

11		"By going to my center, my central axis, I can experience the central axis, pole, or pillar of the world – the cosmic hub, the navel of the world (omphalos)." The Unfolding Self: Varieties of Transformative Experience (Ralph Metzner)

12		“One can reach the center directly from any point of the compass.” C. G. Jung, ‘Approaching the Unconscious’ Man and His Symbols (Carl Jung)

13		"The idea of rotation is the keystone of most transcendent symbols: of the mediaeval 'Rota'; of the Wheel of Buddhist transformations; of the zodiacal cycle; of the myth of the Gemini; and of the 'opus' [work] of the alchemists. The idea of the world as a labyrinth or of life as a pilgrimage leads to the idea of the 'centre' as a symbol of the absolute goal of Man – Paradise regained….Pictorially, this central point is sometimes identified with the geometric centre of the symbolic circle." A Dictionary of Symbols (J. E. Cirlot)

14		"The individual who reaches out from the seemingly separated center of being can, if he will, contact the cosmic center of life. From there he may reach out to the periphery of all reality as easily as the miracle of the radiant, expanding mind of God penetrates the universe with light." Understanding Yourself: A Spiritual Approach to Self-Discovery and Soul-Awareness (Mark L. and Elizabeth Clare Prophet)

15		"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)

16		"Black Elk's word, 'The center is everywhere', is matched by a statement from a hermetic, early medieval text, 'The Book of the Twenty-four Philosophers': 'God is an infinite sphere, whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere." The Inner Reaches of Outer Space, Metaphor as Myth and as Religion (Joseph Campbell)

17		"There is a Center to the personality that includes the whole Self….This whole Self is in each of us as a potentiality and seeks to be realized in the life process." The Kingdom Within, the Inner Meaning of Jesus' Sayings (John Sanford)

18		"As a magnet has its magnetic field, an area within which all its forces play, larger or smaller according to its strength, so has every man a field of influence within which play the forces he emits, and these forces work in curves that return to their forthsender, that re-enter the centre whence they emerged." The Ancient Wisdom (Annie Besant)

19		"In the process of evolution atoms themselves gravitate towards other and greater central points, becoming in their turn electrons. Thus, every form is but an aggregate of smaller lives." The Consciousness of the Atom (Alice A. Bailey)

20		"Smaller than the small, I am that centre within you, the needle's eye through which all the threads of the universe are drawn." Paul Murray (b. 1947), Dominican priest and lecturer on mystical theology God, A Companion for Seekers (David Schiller)

21		"The life of the Logos abiding in each form is its central, controlling, and directing energy." The Ancient Wisdom (Annie Besant)

22		"When we are acting from a centered place – the open heart – we can access our own inner wisdom and open to divine healing energy as well." Who Do You Think You Are? The Healing Power of Your Sacred Self (Carlos Warter, M.D., Ph.D.)

23		"Though the principle of the center is One, the patterns, the swirls and eddies of form and process which are generated by and through the center are infinite; and though infinite in number, the centers are essentially one, for each is the same irreducible point, the primary syllable, the word, the Logos, through which all is uttered." Mandala (Jose and Miriam Arguelles)

24		"God…is the center of all selves." Covenant of the Heart, Meditations of a Christian Hermeticist on the Mysteries of Tradition (Valentin Tomberg)

25		"Goodwill abides at the centre. This centre... is everywhere, and is hence, in a certain sense, to be found in all." Lamps of Western Mysticism (Arthur Edward Waite)