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No tribal rite has yet been recorded which attempts to keep winter from descending; on the contrary: the rites all prepare the community to endure, together with the rest of nature, the season of the terrible cold.

— Joseph Campbell The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949)

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More quotes by Joseph Campbell

It's only when a man tames his own demons that he becomes the king of himself if not of the world.

Comments on a passage in Where the Wild Things Are (1963)

The achievement of the hero is one that he is ready for and it's really a manifestation of his character.

The Power of Myth (1988)

Wherever the hero may wander, whatever he may do, he is ever in the presence of his own essence — for he has the perfected eye to see. There is no separateness.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949)

The happy ending of the fairy tale, the myth, and the divine comedy of the soul, is to be read, not as a contradiction, but as a transcendence of the universal tragedy of man.

The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1949)

People say that what we're all seeking is a meaning for life. I don't think that's what we're really seeking.

The Power of Myth (1988)

All Joseph Campbell quotes →

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Utu, shepherd of the land, father of the black-headed, when you go to sleep, the people go to sleep with you; youth Utu, when you rise, the people rise with you.

Lugalbanda

The winds and waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.

Edward Gibbon The History of the Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire (1776)

Matter gave birth to a passion that has no equal, which proceeded from something contrary to nature. Then there arises a disturbance in its whole body.

Jesus

Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

Martin Luther King Jr.

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Joseph Campbell (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.