Such places exist among the endless abodes of every major city, places that seem to be sanctuaries from the present, immune to the hustle and bustle, the sound and fury that in the end change nothing. Like long unopened books sitting upon dusty shelv...
I went to a concert upstairs in Town Hall. The composer whose works were being performed had provided program notes. One of these notes was to the effect that there is too much pain in the world. After the concert I was walking along with the compose...
In general, I try and distinguish between what one calls the Future and “l’avenir” [the ‘to come]. The future is that which – tomorrow, later, next century – will be. There is a future which is predictable, programmed, scheduled, foreseea...
Know ye not that there is here in this world a secret confraternity, which one might call the Company of Melancholiacs? That people there are who by natural constitution have been given a different nature and disposition than the others; that have a ...
Christopher McCandless: Two years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road. Escaped from Atlanta. Thou shalt not return, 'cause "the West is the best." ...
Christian: [after testing some explosives] Fuck! That was sick! Imagine if we use one of the big ones. His car will be blown to pieces. Elias: Whose car? Christian: That asshole, Lars. Elias: You want to blow up his car? Christian: Sure. Elias: Someo...
Kim: You're here... They didn't hurt you, did they? [Edward shakes his head] Kim: Were you scared? I tried to make Jim go back, but, you can't make Jim do anything. Thank you for not telling them that we... Edward: You're welcome. Kim: It must have b...
[Marge is interviewing the two hookers whose clients were the two suspects] Hooker No. 1: Well, the little guy was kinda funny-lookin'. Marge Gunderson: In what way? Hooker No. 1: I dunno... just funny-lookin'. Marge Gunderson: Can you be any more sp...
Gandhi: I want to welcome you all. Every one of you. We have no secrets. Let us begin by being clear... about General Smuts' new law. All Indians must now be fingerprinted... like criminals. Men and women. No marriage other than a Christian marriage ...
Aragorn: [to the corsair ships] You may go no further! You will not enter Gondor. Captain: Who are you to deny us passage? Aragorn: Legolas, fire a warning shot past the bosun's ear. Gimli: Mind your aim! [Legolas aims; Gimli knocks the bow as he sho...
William of Baskerville: I too was an Inquisitor, but in the early days, when the Inquisition strove to guide, not to punish. And once I had to preside at a trial of a man whose only crime was to have translated a Greek book that conflicted with the H...
Frank: [sings] Oh say can you see / By the dawn's early light / What so proudly we hail / In the twilight's last gleaming? / Whose bright stripes and broad stars / In the perilous night / For the ramparts we watched / uh, da-da-da-da-da-daaaa. / And ...
[Alvy is asked to try cocaine] Alvy Singer: I don't want to put a wad of white powder in my nose. There's the nasal membrane... Annie Hall: You never want to try anything new, Alvy. Alvy Singer: How can you say that? Whose idea was it? I said that yo...
[Judah, Esther, Miriam and Tirzah enter the city to find it deserted except for a blind beggar] Judah Ben-Hur: [to Blind Man] Why are the streets deserted? Blind Man: They have gone to the trial. Alms for the blind? Judah Ben-Hur: Trial? Whose trial?...
You have truly gained the mastery of the very stronghold of philosophy, Mother. For without doubt only for lack of words you did not elaborate on this subject as did Tullius [Cicero], whose words will follow. For in the Hortensius, the book he wrote ...
A person functioning exclusively in the Cartesian mode may be free from manifest symptoms but cannot be considered mentally healthy. Such individuals typically lead ego-centred, competitive, goal-oriented lives. Overpreoccupied with their past and th...
I am aware that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or to speak, or write, with moderation. No! no! T...
For this new-married man approaching here, Whose salt imagination yet hath wrong'd Your well defended honour, you must pardon For Mariana's sake: but as he adjudged your brother,-- Being criminal, in double violation Of sacred chastity and of promise...
Chester nods all the way through this, but does not rudely interrupt Randy as a younger nerd would. Your younger nerd takes offense quickly when someone near him begins to utter declarative sentences, because he reads into it an ssertion that he, the...
The stakes in this game are not low. Our enterprise is no less than the introduction of an alternative language, and with the language an altered perspective, for a group of phenomena that tradition tended to refer to with such words as 'spirituality...
This quarrel over the messianic status of Jesus within first-century Judaism had profound effects on Christianity and prompted it towards a fateful turning point that switched the emphasis from following the way of Jesus to believing things about Jes...