# Quote — Thomas Mann, The Magic Mountain

> The ancients adorned their sarcophagi with the emblems of life and procreation, and even with obscene symbols; in the religions of antiquity the sacred and the obscene often lay very close together. These men knew how to pay homage to death. For death is worthy of homage as the cradle of life, as the womb of palingenesis.

- Author: [Thomas Mann](https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann.md)
- Book: [The Magic Mountain](https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann/the-magic-mountain.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Thomas_Mann#The_Magic_Mountain_(1924)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann/the-magic-mountain/the-ancients-adorned

## More from this book

> Asia surrounds us — wherever one's glance rests, a Tartar physiognomy.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann/the-magic-mountain/asia-surrounds-us-wherever.md)

> Rough translation of this passage written in French: The body, love, death, these three are just one. For the body, this is the disease and exquisite delight, and this that does die, yes, they are carnal both of them, love and death, and thus their terror and their great magic!

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann/the-magic-mountain/rough-translation-of-this.md)

> Translation: What we call mourning for our dead is perhaps not so much grief at not being able to call them back as it is grief at not being able to want to do so.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/thomas-mann/the-magic-mountain/translation-what-we-call.md)