Downing Quotes (page 53)
If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.
Samuel Adams
Brenna’s lorry wasn’t parked in the street. The dog was nowhere to be seen. Apparently even Betty had deserted him in his hour of need. The only choice left was a quick and cowardly retreat. “What was I thinking?” he stopped short and clapped a hand to his forehead. “I’m supposed to be helping Aidan . . . at the house. Slipped my mind.”
As quickly as he could manage, he untangled his arm, gently nudging her hand away, as he might a puppy who was inclined to nip. Down, girl. “Things are always...
Nora Roberts
Of course all life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of the work-the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come, from outside-the ones you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your friends about, don't show their effect all at once.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
I felt very low. I had been unmasked only that morning by Jay Cee herself, and I felt now that all the uncomfortable suspicions I had about myself were coming true. After nineteen years of running after good marks and prizes and grants of one sort and another, I was letting up, slowing down, dropping clean out of race.
Sylvia Plath
Now, Muriel Spark is said to have felt that she was taking dictation from God every morning-- sitting there, one supposes, plugged into a Dictaphone, typing away, humming. But this is a very hostile and aggressive position. One might hope for bad things to rain down on a person like this.
Anne Lamott
I will never forget that the passing down of memories is the strongest link in the gossamer bridge that binds up as people. I plan to devote my live to doing just that. And if you've taught me anything, it's that what we hold in our hearts is truly the fierest component of our humanity.
David Baldacci
Y.T. is maxing at a Mom's Truck Stop on 405, waiting for her ride. Not that she would ever be caught dead at a Mom's Truck Stop. If, like, a semi ran her over with all eighteen of its wheels in front of a Mom's Truck Stop, she would drag herself down the shoulder of the highway using her eyelid muscles until she reached a Snooze 'n' Cruise full of horny derelicts rather than go into a Mom's Truck Stop.
Neal Stephenson
Why do I have a sense of impending disaster?
(He reflects) Sonders is after my niece and has discovered the secret address where I am sending her to the safe keeping of my sister-in-law Miss Blumenblatt, who has never laid eyes on him, or, for that matter, on Marie either since she was a baby—while I have to leave my business in the charge of my assistant and an apprentice, and follow my new servant, whom I haven't had time to introduce to anyone, to town to join the parade and take my fiance...
Tom Stoppard