Henrik Ibsen quotes:

A community is like a ship; everyone ought to be prepared to take the helm.

A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed.

It is inexcusable for scientists to torture animals; let them make their experiments on journalists and politicians.

Your home is regarded as a model home, your life as a model life. But all this splendor, and you along with it... it's just as though it were built upon a shifting quagmire. A moment may come, a word can be spoken, and both you and all this splendor will collapse.

Home life ceases to be free and beautiful as soon as it is founded on borrowing and debt.

I'm afraid for all those who'll have the bread snatched from their mouths by these machines. What business has science and capitalism got, bringing all these new inventions into the works, before society has produced a generation educated up to using them!

What business has science and capitalism got, bringing all these new inventions into the works, before society has produced a generation educated up to using them!

The man whom God wills to slay in the struggle of life - he first individualizes.

These heroes of finance are like beads on a string; when one slips off, all the rest follow.

Castles in the air - they are so easy to take refuge in. And so easy to build too.

A woman cannot be herself in the society of the present day, which is an exclusively masculine society, with laws framed by men and with a judicial system that judges feminine conduct from a masculine point of view.

Never wear your best trousers when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

You see, there are some people that one loves, and others that perhaps one would rather be with.

A forest bird never wants a cage.

Really to sin you have to be serious about it.

A marriage based on full confidence, based on complete and unqualified frankness on both sides; they are not keeping anything back; there's no deception underneath it all. If I might so put it, it's an agreement for the mutual forgiveness of sin.

People who don't know how to keep themselves healthy ought to have the decency to get themselves buried, and not waste time about it.

The majority is always wrong; the minority is rarely right.

To live is - to war with trolls In the holds of the heart and mind

Whenever I take up a newspaper, I seem to see Ghosts gliding between the lines. There must be Ghosts all the country over, as thick as the sand of the sea.... We are, one and all, so pitifully afraid of the light.

Don't use that foreign word 'ideals.' We have that excellent native word 'lies.'

The spirit of truth and the spirit of freedom - these are the pillars of society.

The majority is never right. Never, I tell you! That's one of these lies in society that no free and intelligent man can help rebelling against. Who are the people that make up the biggest proportion of the population -- the intelligent ones or the fools?

One of the qualities of liberty is that, as long as it is being striven after, it goes on expanding. Therefore, the man who stands in the midst of the struggle and says, 'I have it,' merely shows by doing so that he has just lost it.

Most critical fault-finding, when reduced to its essentials, simply amounts to reproach of the author because he is himself -- thinks, feels, sees, and creates, as himself, instead of seeing and creating in the way the critic would have done.

In great memories there lies the seed of growth.

It's not only what we have inherited from our father and mother that walks in us. It's all sorts of dead ideas, and lifeless old beliefs, and so forth. They have no vitality, but they cling to us all the same, and we can't get rid of them.

Money may be the husk of many things but not the kernel. It brings you food, but not appetite; medicine, but not health; acquaintance, but not friends; servants, but not loyalty; days of joy, but not peace or happiness.

Money brings you food, but not appetite; medicine, but not health; acquaintances, but not friends.

You see, the point is that the strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone.

The spirit of truth and the spirit of freedom-they are the pillars of society.

I'm plotting revolution against this lie that the majority has a monopoly of the truth. What are these truths that always bring the majority rallying round? Truths so elderly they are practically senile. And when a truth is as old as that, gentlemen, you can hardly tell it from a lie.

To live is to war with trolls.

I am in revolt against the age-old lie that the majority is always right.

I don't imagine you will dispute the fact that at present the stupid people are in an absolutely overwhelming majority all the world over.

It is the very mark of the spirit of rebellion to crave for happiness in this life

A party is like a sausage machine, it grinds up all sorts of heads together into the same baloney ...

The spectacles of experience; through them you will see clearly a second time.

The State is the curse of the individual... The State must go! That will be a revolution which will find me on its side. Undermine the idea of the State, set up in its place spontaneous action, and the idea that spiritual relationship is the only thing that makes for unity, and you will start the elements of a liberty which will be something worth possessing.

The strongest man in the world is he who stands most alone.

The pillars of truth and the pillars of freedom - they are the pillars of society.

A minority may be right, and a majority is always wrong.

The worst enemy of truth and freedom in our society is the compact majority.

Look into any man's heart you please, and you will always find, in every one, at least one black spot which he has to keep concealed.

Do you know what we are those of us who count as pillars of society? We are society's tools, neither more nor less.

...every man shares the responsibility and the guilt of the society to which he belongs.

...I'm no longer prepared to accept what people say and what's written in books. I must think things out for myself, and try to find my own answer.

A friend married is a friend lost.

A thousand words can't make the mark a single deed will leave.

Ah, I fancy it is just the same with most of what you call your emancipation. You have read yourself into a number of new ideas and opinions. You have got a sort of smattering of recent discoveries in various fields - discoveries that seem to overthrow certain principles which have hitherto been held impregnable and unassailable. But all this has only been a matter of intellect, Miss West - superficial acquisition. It has not passed into your blood.

Almost everyone who has gone to the bad early in life has had a deceitful mother.

An unromantic poem I mean to make, of one who only lives for duty's sake.

And what if I did run my ship aground; oh, still it was splendid to sail it!

Before I write down one word, I have to have the character in my mind through and through. I must penetrate into the last wrinkle of his soul.

Bigger things than the State will fall, all religion will fall.

But a scientific man must live in a little bit of style.

Different people have different duties assigned them by Nature; Nature has given one the power or the desire to do this, the other that. Each bird must sing with his own throat.

Each bird must sing with his own throat.

Everything I touch seems destined to turn into something mean and farcical.

Friends are to be feared, not so much for what they make us do as what they keep us from doing.

Happiness is above all things the calm, glad certainty of innocence.

Happiness is worth a daring deed; we are both free if we but will it, and then the game is won.

Helmer: "Before all else you are a wife and a mother." Nora: "That I no longer believe. I believe that before all else I am a human being."

Helmer: I would gladly work night and day for you. Nora- bear sorrow and want for your sake. But no man would sacrafice his honor for the one he loves. Nora: It is a thing hundreds of thousands of women have done.

HELMER; But this is disgraceful. Is this the way you neglect your most sacred duties? NORA: What do you consider is my most sacred duty? HELMER: Do I have to tell you that? Isn't it your duty to your husband and children? NORA:I have another duty, just as sacred. HELMER: You can't have. What duty do you mean? NORA: My duty to myself.

I am sticking as closely to my subject as I can; for my subject is precisely this, that it is the masses, the majority

I believe that before anything else I'm a human being -- just as much as you are... or at any rate I shall try to become one. I know quite well that most people would agree with you, Torvald, and that you have warrant for it in books; but I can't be satisfied any longer with what most people say, and with what's in books. I must think things out for myself and try to understand them.

I believe that, before all else, I'm a human being, no less than you.

I go to scale the Future's possibilities! Farewell!

I have other duties equally sacred ... Duties to myself.

I hold that man is in the right who is most closely in league with the future.

I propose to raise a revolution against the lie that the majority has the monopoly of the truth.

If I cannot be myself in what I write, then the whole is nothing but lies and humbug.

If only I could master that demon of procrastination that goes about like a roaring lion and devours all my good intentions, I should become the most punctual man in the world.

If you doubt yourself, then indeed you stand on shaky ground.

I'm inclined to think we are all ghosts-every one of us. It's not just what we inherit from our mothers and fathers that haunts us. Its all kinds of old defunct theories, all sorts of old defunct beliefs, and things like that.

In the decisive moment I won the victory over myself. I chose to live. And believe me, it takes courage to choose life under those circumstances.

It is no use lying to one's self.

It is not by spectacular achievements that man can be transformed, but by will.

It is not for a care-free existence I am fighting, but for the possibility of devoting myself to the task which I believe and know has been laid upon me by God -- the work which seems to me more important and needful in Norway than any other, that of arousing the nation and leading it to think great thoughts.

It was then that I began to look into the seams of your doctrine. I wanted only to pick at a single knot; but when I had got that undone, the whole thing raveled out. And then I understood that it was all machine-sewn.

It's a release to know that in spite of everything a premeditated act of courage is still possible.

It's a liberation to know that an act of spontaneous courage is yet possible in this world. An act that has something of unconditional beauty.

Ive had the best possible chance of learning that what the working-classes really need is to be allowed some part in the direction of public affairs, Doctorto develop their abilities, their understanding and their self-respect.

Labor and trouble one can always get through alone, but it takes two to be glad.

Many a man can save himself if he admits he's done wrong and takes his punishment.

Marriage is something you have to give your whole mind to.

Marriage! Nothing else demands so much of a man

Mrs LINDE: When you've sold yourself once for the sake of others, you don't do it second time.

Nobody can put a character on paper without - at any rate in part and at times - sitting as a model for it himself.

NORA: I must stand on my own two feet if I'm to get to know myself and the world outside. That's why I can't stay here with you any longer.

Nothing is impossible that one desires with an indomitable will.

Now I am steel-set: I follow the call to the clear radiance and glow of the heights.

Oh courage...oh yes! If only one had that...Then life might be livable, in spite of everything.

Oh, law and order! I often think it is that that is at the bottom of all the misery in the world.

Oh, life would be all right if we didn't have to put up with these damned creditors who keep pestering us with the demands of their ideals.

Oh, one soon makes friends with invalids; and I need so much to have someone to live for.

Oh, yes--you can shout me down, I know! But you cannot answer me. The majority has might on its side--unfortunately; but right it has not.

One should never put on one's best trousers to go out to fight for freedom.

Our whole being is nothing but a fight against the dark forces within ourselves.

Poetry is to hold judgment on your soul.

Public opinion is an extremely mutable thing

Rob the average man of his life-illusion, and you rob him of his happiness at the same stroke.

Take the life-lie away from the average man and straight away you take away his happiness.

That is the accursed thing about small surroundings -- they make the soul small.

The costliness of keeping friends does not lie in what one does for them, but in what one, out of consideration for them, refrains from doing.

The devil is compromise.

The great secret of power is never to will to do more than you can accomplish.

The great task of our time is to blow up all existing institutions to destroy.

The greatest victory is defeat.

The majority never has right on its side.

The majority never has right on its side. Never, I say! That is one of these social lies against which an independent, intelligent men must wage war. Who is it that constitute the majority of the population in a country? Is it the clever folk, or the stupid? I don't imagine you will dispute the fact that at present the stupid people are in an absolutely overwhelming majority all the world over.

The man-at-arms is the only man.

The most dangerous enemy of the truth and freedom amongst us is the compact majority

The old terms must be invented with new meaning and given new explanations. Liberty, equality, and fraternity are no longer what they were in the days of the late-lamented guillotine. This is what the politicians will not understand; and that is why I hate them. They want only their own special revolutions- external revolutions, political revolutions, etc. But that is only dabbling. What is really needed is a revolution of the human spirit.

The sea possesses a power over one's moods that has the effect of a will. The sea can hypnotize. Nature in general can do so.

The strong must learn to be lonely.