The angry men know that this golden age (of fossil fuels) has gone; but they cannot find the words for the constraints they hate. Clutching their copies of Atlas Shrugged, they flail around, accusing those who would impede them of communism, fascism,...
Jesus said, "If those who lead you say to you, 'See, the kingdom is in the sky,' then the birds of the sky will precede you. If they say to you, 'It is in the sea,' then the fish will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outsi...
You know, people call mystery novels or thrillers 'puzzles.' I never understood that, because when I buy a puzzle, I already know what it is. It's on the box. And even if I don't, if it's a 5,000-piece puzzle of the 'Mona Lisa', it's not like I put t...
The only thing that science cannot discover is that we all have an unconscious Heart just like an unconscious mind. There comes a moment in our life when our mind and heart says one thing but still we do the other one because in our heart of hearts w...
I have thought the difference might be that my Mary knows she will live forever, that she will step from the living into another life as easily as she slips from sleep to wakefulness. She knows this with her whole body, so completely that she does no...
You don't know me; you never knew my heart. No man knows my history. I cannot tell it: I shall never undertake it. I don't blame any one for not believing my history. If I had not experienced what I have, I would not have believed it myself. I never ...
We seem to live in a world where forgetting and oblivion are an industry in themselves and very, very few people are remotely interested or aware of their own recent history, much less their neighbors'. I tend to think we are what we remember, what w...
When I have too much information or too many choices, I often get confused. • When one wants to encourage another to learn what ”I know that you don’t know,” encourage them to engage in deep thought on a topic you suggest. Deep thought is a p...
That we can never know," answered the wolf angrily. "That's for the future. But what we can know is the importance of what we owe to the present. Here and now, and nowhere else. For nothing else exists, except in our minds. What we owe to ourselves, ...
Reading history is good for all of us. If you know history, you know that there is no such thing as a self-made man or self-made woman. We are shaped by people we have never met. Yes, reading history will make you a better citizen and more appreciati...
But there is no doubt that to attempt a novel of ideas is to give oneself a handicap: the parochialism of our culture is intense. For instance, decade after decade bright young men and women emerge from their universities able to say proudly: 'Of cou...
Besides, who is to say that the feelings he writes in his diary are his true feelings? Who is to say that at each moment while the pen moves he is truly himself? At one moment he might truly be himself, at another he might simply be making things up....
I believe that man is here to grow into the fullest, the best that he can be. At least this is what I want to do. As I am growing to become whatever I become, this will just come out on the horn. Whatever that's going to be, it will be. I am not so m...
I mean in the community that I grew up in, you know, a very, you know, mixed, almost entirely African Diaspora community, one of the things that we were not ever supposed to say was how much self-hatred and colorism determined and guided what we woul...
You know, I was a kid who had difficulty speaking English when I first immigrated. But in my head, when I read a book, I spoke English perfectly. No one could correct my Spanish. And I think that I retreated to books as a way, you know, to be, like, ...
And then I notice the music flooding out of every part of the apartment at once — the couch, the walls, even the floor — and I know Bennies alone in Lou’s studio, pouring music down around us. A minute ago it was “Don’t Let Me Down”. Then...
There were so many of us who would have to live with things done and things left undone that day. Things that did not go right, things that seemed OK at the time because we could not see the future. If only we could see the endless string of conseque...
It’s a sort of furtiveness … Like we were a generation of furtive. You know, with an inner knowledge there’s no use flaunting on that level, the level of the ‘public’, a kind of beatness – I mean, being right down to it, to ourselves, bec...
Hank Palmer: Did you know 90% of the country believes in ghosts? less than a third in evolution? 35% can correctly identify Homer Simpson's fictional town in which he resides, less than 1% knows the name Thurgood Marshall. But... when you put 12 Amer...
[first lines] Bess McNeill: His name is Jan. The Minister: I do not know him. Bess McNeill: [coyly] He's from the lake. The Minister: You know we do not favor matrimony with outsiders. An Elder: Can you even tell us what matrimony is? Bess McNeill: I...
[Dr. Goose is tending to Adam] Adam Ewing: I don't know what would have happened without you there. Dr. Henry Goose: Well, for starters, you would have died! [laughs] Adam Ewing: I don't know how to repay you. Dr. Henry Goose: Adam, I am a doctor. A ...
