God exists in eternity. The only point where eternity meets time is in the present. The present is the only time there is.
—Marianne Williamson (b.1952) American Activist, Author, Lecturer
The day which we fear as our last is but the birthday of eternity.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
Every situation, every moment—is of infinite worth; for it is the representative of a whole eternity.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
The created world is but a small parenthesis in eternity, and a short interposition for a time, between such a state of duration as was before it, and may be after it.
—Thomas Browne (1605–82) English Author, Physician
Eternity looks grander and kinder if time grows meaner and more hostile.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
The disappointed man turns his thoughts toward a state of existence where his wiser desires may be fixed with the certainty of faith.—The successful man feels that the objects he has ardently pursued fail to satisfy the craving of an immortal spirit. The wicked man turneth away from his wickedness, that he may save his soul alive.
—Robert South (1634–1716) English Theologian, Preacher
Everything is changeable, everything appears and disappears; there is no blissful peace until one passes beyond the agony of life and death.
—Buddhist Teaching
Eternity stands always fronting God; a stern colossal image, with blind eyes, and grand dim lips, that murmur evermore, “God—God—God!”
—Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1806–61) English Poet
Eternity—waste of time.
—Natalie Clifford Barney (1876–1972) American Playwright, Poet, Novelist
One never ends. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
What we call eternity may be but an endless series of the transitions which men call deaths, abandonments of home, going ever to fairer scenes and loftier heights.—Age after age, the spirit—that glorious nomad—may shift its tent, carrying with it evermore its elements, activity and desire.
—Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton (1803–73) British Novelist, Poet, Politician
Eternity is a mere moment, just long enough for a joke.
—Hermann Hesse (1877–1962) German-born Swiss Novelist, Poet
In time there is no present, In eternity no future, In eternity no past.
—Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–92) British Poet
All great natures delight in stability; all great men find eternity affirmed in the very promise of their faculties.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Eternity is not something that begins after you’re dead. It is going on all the time. We are in it now.
—Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) American Feminist, Writer
Forever is a long bargain.
—German Proverb
The eternal world is not merely a world beyond time and the grave. It embraces time; it is ready to realize itself under all the forms of temporal things. Its light and power are latent everywhere, waiting for human souls to welcome it, ready to break through the transparent veil of earthly things and to suffuse with its ineffable radiance the common life of man.
—John Ciardi (1916–86) American Poet, Teacher, Etymologist, Translator
The wish falls often, warm upon my heart, that I may learn nothing here that I cannot continue in the other world; that I may do nothing here but deeds that will bear fruit in heaven.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
Space is to place as eternity is to time.
—Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French Writer, Moralist
Eternity, thou pleasing dreadful thought! through what variety of untried being! through what new scenes and changes must we pass! The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me; but shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
—Joseph Addison (1672–1719) English Essayist, Poet, Playwright, Politician
Eternity is in love with the productions of time.
—William Blake (1757–1827) English Poet, Painter, Printmaker
Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death. If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) Austrian-born British Philosopher
All that is not eternal is eternally out of date.
—C. S. Lewis (1898-1963) Irish-born British Academic, Author, Literary Scholar
Scientists are peeping toms at the keyhole of eternity.
—Arthur Koestler (1905–83) British Writer, Journalist, Political Refugee
In eternity there is indeed something true and sublime. But all these times and places and occasions are now and here. God himself culminates in the present moment and will never be more divine in the lapse of the ages. Time is but a stream I go a-fishing in. I drink at it, but when I drink I see the sandy bottom and detect how shallow it is. Its thin current slides away but eternity remains.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
If one understands eternity as timelessness, and not as an unending timespan, then whoever lives in the present lives for all time.
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) Austrian-born British Philosopher
There is, I know not how, in the minds of men, a certain presage, as it were, of a future existence, and this takes the deepest root, and is most discoverable, in the greatest geniuses and most exalted souls.
—Cicero (106BCE–43BCE) Roman Philosopher, Orator, Politician, Lawyer
Love is the emblem of eternity; it confounds all notion of time; effaces all memory of a beginning, all fear of an end.
—Anne Louise Germaine de Stael (1766–1817) French Woman of Letters
No man can pass into eternity, for he is already in it.
—Frederic William Farrar (1831–1903) English Clergyman, Writer
Eternity is really long, especially near the end
—Woody Allen (b.1935) American Film Actor, Director