Clock Quote by Dava Sobel
““Time is to clock as mind is to brain. The clock or watch somehow contains the time. And yet time refuses to be bottled up like a genie stuffed in a lamp. Whether it flows as sand or turns on wheels within wheels, time escapes irretrievably, while we watch. Even when the bulbs of the hourglass shatter, when darkness withholds the shadow from the sundial, when the mainspring winds down so far that the clock hands hold still as death, time itself keeps on.””
About This Quote
Source Book: The Glass Universe by Dava Sobel, 1999
Time is an elusive force that cannot be captured, unlike a clock that merely measures it.
In simple terms: Time cannot be contained.
Key Takeaway
Accept time’s flow, don’t try to trap it.
Themes
philosophy
science
impermanence
Mood
contemplative
melancholic
Type
aphilosophical
poetic
When to use this quote
- writing
- scientific research
- personal reflection
Key Concepts
entropy
subjectivity
perception
Questions to Reflect On
- How do you experience time’s passage?
- Can you ever truly control time?
A Different Perspective
Time’s abstract nature resists precise definition.
![“[John] Harrison [could not] express himself clearly in writing… No matter how brilliantly ideas formed in his mind, or crystallized in his clockworks, his verbal descriptions failed to shine with the same light… The first sentence [of his last published work] runs on, virtually unpunctuated, for…” quote by Dava Sobel](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/43f/dava-sobel-29490_writing_john-harrison-could-not-express-himself_340218.jpg)
