A Quote by Margaret Oliphant

All perfection is melancholy. — © Margaret Oliphant
All perfection is melancholy.
Our sadness won’t be of the searing kind but more like a blend of joy and melancholy: joy at the perfection we see before us, melancholy at an awareness of how seldom we are sufficiently blessed to encounter anything of its kind. The flawless object throws into perspective the mediocrity that surrounds it. We are reminded of the way we would wish things always to be and of how incomplete our lives remain.
But in the expression of the countenance, which was beaming all over with smiles, there still lurked (incomprehensible anomalyl) that fitful strain of melancholy which will ever be found inseparable from the perfection of the beautiful.
I don't see perfection as far as a visual image of perfection. "Perfection" to me is, I walk away from a situation and say, "I did everything I could do right there. There was nothing more that I could do." Like, I worked as hard as I possibly could have. That's perfection.
As we have said, robust souls are sometimes almost, but not entirely, overthrown by strokes of misfortune....Despair has steps leading upward. From total depression we rise to despondency, from despondency to affliction, from affliction to melancholy. Melancholy is a twilight state in which suffering transmutes into a somber joy....Melancholy is the enjoyment of being sad.
Freedom is only to be found where there is burden to be shouldered. In creative achievements this burden always represents an imperative and a need that weighs heavily upon man’s mood, so that he comes to be in a mood of melancholy. All creative action resides in a mood of melancholy, whether we are clearly aware of the fact or not, whether we speak at length about it or not. All creative action resides in a mood of melancholy, but this is not to say that everyone in a melancholy mood is creative.
What is the purpose for which Masonry exists? Its ultimate purpose is the perfection of humanity. Mankind it self is still in a period of youth. We are only now beginning to acquire a consciousness of the social aim of civilization, which is man's perfection. Such perfection can never end with physical perfection, which is only the means to the end or spiritual perfection.
The perfection of the effect demonstrates the perfection of the cause, for a greater power brings about a more perfect effect. But God is the most perfect agent. Therefore, things created by Him obtain perfection from Him. So, to detract from the perfection of creatures is to detract from the perfection of divine power.
My sweet spot, the stuff I like the most, is hopeful melancholy. Optimistic melancholy.
Melancholy is not one of my emotions. Quite seriously, I don't do melancholy. It's a miserable way to be.
I was not always free from melancholy; but even melancholy had its charms.
In this world, perfection is an illusion. Reagrdless of all those who utter the contrary, this is the reality. Obviously mediocre fools will forever lust for perfection and seek it out. However, what meaning is there in perfection? None. Not a bit. ...After perfection there exists nothing higher. Not even room for creation which means there is no room for wisdom or talent either. Understand? To scientists like ourselves, perfection is despair. - Kurotsuchi Mayuri (Bleach 306)
Melancholy redeems this universe, and yet it is melancholy that separates us from it.
In my great melancholy, I loved life, for I love my melancholy.
Youth, however, can afford to enjoy even its melancholy; for the ultimate fact of which that melancholy is a prophecy is a long way off.
If you are melancholy for the first time, you will find, upon a little inquiry, that others have been melancholy many times, and yet are cheerful now.
Hence, all you vain delights, As short as are the nights Wherein you spend your folly! There's naught in this life sweet But only melancholy; O sweetest melancholy!
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