It is man who has introduced a little grace, beauty, unknown charm and mystery into creation by singing about it, interpreting it, by admiring it as a poet, idealizing it as an artist and by explaining it through science, doubtless making mistakes, but finding ingenious reasons, hidden grace and beauty, unknown charm and mystery in the various phenomena of Nature. God created only coarse beings, full of the germs of disease, who, after a few years of bestial enjoyment, grow old and infirm, with all the ugliness and all the want of power of human decrepitude.

~ Guy De Maupassant

Guy De Maupassant Ageing Animal Art Charm Creation Decrepitude Disease God Humanity Infirmity Mankind Mystery Nature Poetry Science

Ambition: it is the last infirmity of noble minds.

~ J.m. Barrie

J.m. Barrie Ambition Infirmity Mind Noble

The names of entities that have the power to constrain us change with time. Convention and authority are replaced by infirmity. But my attitude toward them has not changed. Has not changed.

~ Cormac Mccarthy

Cormac Mccarthy Attitude Authority Change Constraints Convention Infirmity Power Time

Our reverence for independence takes no account of the reality of what happens in life: sooner or later, independence will become impossible. Serious illness or infirmity will strike. It is as inevitable as sunset. And then a new question arises: If independence is what we live for, what do we do when it can no longer be sustained?

~ Atul Gawande

Atul Gawande Ageing Independence Infirmity Sickness