“The moon and the stars were beautiful, the brook, the shore, the forest and rock, the goat and the golden beetle, the follower and butterfly were beautiful. It was beautiful and pleasant to go through the world like that, so childlike, so awakened, so concerned with the immediate, without any distrust” (39).

“To obey no other external command, only the voice, to be prepared—that was good, that was necessary. Nothing else was necessary” (39)

“It tasted of woman and man, of sun and forest, of animal and flower, of every fruit, of every pleasure” (41)

“ ‘I have learned from the river too; everything comes back. You, too, Samana, will come back too” (40)

“Her body was as supple as a jaguar and a hunter’s bow; whoever learned about love from her, learned many pleasures, many secrets. She played with Siddhartha for a long time, repulsed him, overwhelmed him, conquered him, rejoiced at her mastery, until he was overcome and lay exhausted at her side” (59).

“Gradually his face assumed the expressions which are so often found among rich people—the expressions of discontent, of sickliness, of displeasure, of idleness, of lovelessness” (63)

“Property, possessions, and riches had also finally trapped him. They were no longer a game and a toy; they had become a chain and a burden” (63).

“And whenever he awakened from this hateful spell, when eh saw his face reflected in the mirror on the wall of his bedroom, grown older and uglier, whenever shame and nausea overtook him, he fled again, fled to a new game of chance, fled in confusion to passion, to wine, and from there back again to the urge for acquiring and hoarding wealth” (64).

“But above all he was nauseated with himself, with his perfumed hair, with the smell of wine from his mouth, with the soft, flabby appearance of his skin” (66).

“The little bird was dead and lay stiff on the floor.” (66).

“When she heard the first news of Siddhartha’s disappearance, she went to the window where she kept a rare songbird in a golden cage. She opened the door of the cage, took the bird out and let it fly away” (69)

“The songbird was dead; its death, which he had dreamt about, was the bird in his own heart” (70)

“At the first moment of his return to consciousness his previous life seemed to him like a remote incarnation, like an earlier birth of his present Self” (73).

“Now, when I am no longer young, when my hair is fast growing gray, when strength begins to diminish, now I am beginning again like a child” (77).

“I have had to experience so much stupidity, so many vices, so much error, so much nausea, disillusionment, and sorrow, just in order to become a child again and begin anew” (78).

“His Self had crawled into this priesthood, into this arrogance, into this intellectuality” (81)

“He saw that the water continually flowed and flowed and yet it was always there; It was always the same and yet every moment it was new” (83)

“Have you also learned that secret from the river; that there is no such thing as time?” (87)

“No, a true seeker could not accept any teachings, not if he sincerely wished to find something” (90)

“He saw the face of a newly born child, red and full of wrinkles, ready to cry. He saw the face of a murderer, saw him plunge a knife into the body of a man; at the same moment he saw this criminal kneeling down, bound, and his head cut off by this executioner” (121)

“Each one was mortal, a passionate, painful example of all that is transitory” (121)