Paradise is a religious or metaphysical term for a place in which existence is positive, harmonious and eternal; in contrast to the miseries of normal existence, in paradise there is only peace, prosperity, and happiness. It is a place of contentment, but it is not necessarily one of luxury or idleness, and often described as a "higher" place, the holiest place, in contrast to the normal world, or an underworlds such as Hell.
- In the nine heavens are eight Paradises;
Where is the ninth one? In the human breast.
Only the blessed dwell in th' Paradises,
But blessedness dwells in the human breast.
- William R. Alger, "The Ninth Paradise", Poetry of the Orient (1865), p. 223.
- If you want to view paradise
Simply look around and view it
Anything you want to, do it
Wanta change the world?
- I would gladly wander in Paradise,
But it is far away and there is no road.
- T'ao Ch'ien, Substance, Shadow, and Spirit, "Shadow replies" (transl. by Arthur Waley).
- This is the Church’s destination: it is, as the Bible says, the “new Jerusalem”, “Paradise”. More than a place, it is a “state” of soul in which our deepest hopes are fulfilled in superabundance and our being, as creatures and as children of God, reach their full maturity. We will finally be clothed in the joy, peace and love of God, completely, without any limit, and we will come face to face with Him! (cf. 1 Cor 13:12). It is beautiful to think of this, to think of Heaven. We will all be there together. It is beautiful, it gives strength to the soul.
- The meanest floweret of the vale,
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies,
To him are open paradise.
- Thomas Gray, Ode on the Pleasure Arising from Vicissitudes (1754), line 53.
- Aus dem Paradies, das Cantor uns geschaffen, soll uns niemand vertreiben können.
- No one shall expel us from the Paradise that Cantor has created.
- David Hilbert Über das Unendliche (On the Infinite), Math. Ann. 95.
- A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!
- "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you" is the greatest phrase ever written. If everyone followed that creed, this world would be a paradise.
- A limbo large and broad, since call'd
The Paradise of Fools to few unknown.
- So on he fares, and to the border comes,
Of Eden, where delicious Paradise,
Now nearer, crowns with her enclosure green,
As with a rural mound, the champain head
Of a steep wilderness.
- Know ye that at the right hand of the Indies there is an island called California, very close to that part of the Terrestrial Paradise, which was inhabited by black women without a single man among them, and they lived in the manner of Amazons. They were robust of body with strong passionate hearts and great virtue. The island itself is one of the wildest in the world on account of the bold and craggy rocks.
- One morn a Peri at the gate
Of Eden stood disconsolate.
- Thomas Moore, Lalla Rookh (1817), Paradise and the Peri.
- He who builds a mosque in the way of Allah, God will build a house for him in the paradise.
- In the paradise, made by God, all the plants were endowed in the souls and reason, producing for their fruit the different virtues, and, moreover, imperishable wisdom and prudence. ... These statements appear to me to be dictated by a philosophy which is symbolical rather than strictly accurate. For no trees of life or of knowledge have ever at any previous time appeared upon the earth, nor is it likely that any will appear hereafter. But I rather conceive that Moses was speaking in an allegorical spirit, intending by his paradise to intimate the dominant character of the soul, which is full of innumerable opinions as this figurative paradise was of trees.
- Philo, On the Creation of the World.
- The word paradise comes from the Persian word pairidaeza, which means "walled garden." ...There never was a Garden of Eden, but there was, perhaps, a Garden of Ediacara... blob-like creatures that lived in the sea...
- Stanley A. Rice, Life of Earth: Portrait of a Beautiful, Middle-aged Stressed-out World (2011)
- She approached the gates of Paradise on earth, and saw the Cherubim guarding the gates of Paradise, and sat down facing the Flaming Sword, for she originated from that flame. When that flame revolved, she fled.
- Zohar 1:119b
Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations
- Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 578-79.
- Or were I in the wildest waste,
Sae bleak and bare, sae bleak and bare,
The desert were a paradise
If thou wert there, if thou wert there.
- Robert Burns, Oh! Wert Thou in the Cold Blast.
- In this fool's paradise, he drank delight.
- George Crabbe, The Borough Players, Letter XII.
- Nor count compartments of the floors,
But mount to paradise
By the stairway of surprise.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson, Merlin.
- Unto you is paradise opened.
- II Esdras, VIII. 52.
- Dry your eyes—O dry your eyes,
For I was taught in Paradise
To ease my breast of melodies.
- John Keats, Fairy Song.
- Mahomet was taking his afternoon nap in his Paradise. An houri had rolled a cloud under his head, and he was snoring serenely near the fountain of Salsabil.
- Ernest L'Epine, Croquemitaine, Book II Chapter IX. Hood's translation.
- The loves that meet in Paradise shall cast out fear,
And Paradise hath room for you and me and all.
- Christina G. Rossetti, Saints and Angels, Stanza 10.
- There is no expeditious road
To pack and label men for God,
And save them by the barrel-load.
Some may perchance, with strange surprise,
Have blundered into Paradise.
- Francis Thompson, Epilogue, Stanza 2.