England and the English governing class never did call on this absurd deity of race until it seemed, for an instant, that they had no other god to call on… the truth of the whole matter is very simple. Nationality exists, and has nothing in the wor...
If you try to talk about a truth that’s merely moral, people always think it’s merely metaphorical. A real live man with two legs once said to me: ‘I only believe in the Holy Ghost in a spiritual sense.’ Naturally, I said: ‘In what other se...
Some information is classified legitimately; as with military hardware, secrecy sometimes really is in the national interest. Further, military, political, and intelligence communities tend to value secrecy for its own sake. It's a way of silencing c...
Our current contempt for poverty stems from information overload--this is the enabler---our over education as privileged people-- perhaps the real culprit--and our secret assurance that we ourselves owe no one anything beyond the exhausting daily rou...
Sometimes love finds you when it’s ready. And when you’re ready too. How that happens is anybody’s guess. Love is the great mystery stew, its secrets well kept, its ingredients known to providence alone. While both people are being prepared, ma...
Every day it got swept. All of the dirt each piece of dust and even the tiniest bread crumb of secret midnight snacks. It lay under that rug. Years went by nobody noticed it’s more defeated crumbled appearance with all the misshaped lumps and bumps...
It is the illusion of magic and the magic of illusion that we are primarily interested in- not the privy tricks or the key to the secrets themselves. We seek the bafflement, the contradictions, the amusements, and the innumerable emotions that ripple...
Even religious people are vulnerable to this longing. Those who belong to communities of faith have acquired a certain patience with what is sometimes called organized religion. They have learned to forgive themselves. They do not expect their instit...
there's a bluebird in my heart that wants to get out but I'm too clever, I only let him out at night sometimes when everybody's asleep. I say, I know that you're there, so don't be sad. then I put him back, but he's singing a little in there, I haven...
I took off my sweatshirt and dropped it on the grass and set off around the track. As soon as I started running, the world changed. The bodies spread out across the green of the football field were parts of a scene remembered, not one real at this mo...
Nearly everyone has had a box of secret pain, shared with no one. Will [Hamilton] had concealed his well, laughed loud, exploited perverse virtues, and never let his jealousy go wandering [...] He was always on the edge, trying to hold on to the rim ...
We all love after-the-bomb stories. If we didn't, why would there be so many of them? There's something attractive about all those people being gone, about wandering in a depopulated world, scrounging cans of Campbell's pork and beans, defending one'...
It is a bad world, Donatus, an incredibly bad world. But I have discovered in the midst of it a quiet and good people who have learned the great secret of life. They have found a joy and wisdom which is a thousand times better than any of the pleasur...
The black widow, who had dispatched a lover or two, was sought out for her wisdom. The young spider asked her, "Did you keep his harmful secret under the threat of danger, or did you spin a web so confusing that he didn't know if you were friend or f...
[Wayne Enterprises accountant Coleman Reese believes that he's discovered Batman's secret identity] Lucius Fox: Let me get this straight. You think that your client, one of the wealthiest, most powerful men in the world, is secretly a vigilante who s...
M. Gustave: What is a lobby boy? A lobby boy is completely invisible, yet always in sight. A lobby boy remembers what people hate. A lobby boy anticipates the client's needs before the needs are needed. A lobby boy is, above all, discreet to a fault....
[first lines] Hiccup: [narrating] This is Berk, the best kept secret this side of, well, anywhere. Granted, it may not look like much, but this wet heap of rock packs more than a few surprises. Life here is amazing, just not for the faint of heart. Y...
William of Baskerville: [after finding the secret room of books in the tower] How many more rooms? Ah! How many more books? No one should be forbidden to consult these books freely. Adso of Melk: Perhaps they are thought to be too precious, too fragi...
Dr. Lull: [after Quaid goes crazy at Rekall] Listen to me, he's been going on and on about Mars. He's really been there. Bob McClane: Use your head, you dumb bitch! He's just acting out the secret agent portion of his Ego Trip. Dr. Lull: I'm afraid t...
Lewis Bodine: We never found anything on Jack... there's no record of him at all. Old Rose: No, there wouldn't be, would there? And I've never spoken of him until now... Not to anyone... Not even your grandfather... A woman's heart is a deep ocean of...
But most of the time, with a contented resignation that comes normally to a man only at the end of a long and busy life, he sat before the keyboard and filled the air with his beloved Bach. Perhaps he was deceiving himself, perhaps this was some merc...
