I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little further down our particular path than we have yet gone ourselves.
Tags: self-discovery, literature, books

Other Quotes by "E.M. Forster"

Mr. Ansell was not merely a man of some education; he had what no education can bring — the power of detecting what is important. Like many fathers, he had spared no expense over his boy, — he had borrowed money to start him at a rapacious and fashionable private school; he had sent him to tutors; he had sent him to Cambridge. But he knew that all this was not the important thing. The important thing was freedom.
Tags: knowledge-is-power, important-things-in-life, freedom, education
Books have to be read (worse luck, for it takes a long time); it is the only way of discovering what they contain.
Tags: scholorship, reading, learning, education, books
Science is better than sympathy, if only it is science.
Tags: sympathy, science, comfort, advice
Science explained people, but could not understand them.
Tags: science, humanity
For human intercourse, as soon as we look at it for its own sake and not as a social adjunct, is seen to be haunted by a spectre. We cannot understand each other, except in a rough and ready way; we cannot reveal ourselves, even when we want to; what we call intimacy is only a makeshift; perfect knowledge is an illusion.
Tags: truth, relationships, knowledge-education
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