This Life Quotes (page 91)
He had learned well the law of club and fang, and he never forewent an advantage or drew back from a foe he had started on the way to Death. He had lessoned from Spitz, and from the chief fighting dogs of the police and mail, and knew there was no middle course. He must master or be mastered; while to show mercy was a weakness. mercy did not exist in the primordial life. It was misunderstood for fear, and such misunderstandings made for death. Kill or be killed, eat or be eaten, was the law;...
Jack London
As we grow older we become more conscious of the complexity, incoherence, and unreasonableness of human beings; this indeed is the only excuse that offers for the middle-aged or elderly writer, whose thoughts should more properly be turned to graver matters, occupying himself with the trivial concerns of imaginary people. For if the proper study of mankind is man it is evidently more sensible to occupy yourself with the coherent, substantial, and significant creatures of fiction than with the...
W. Somerset Maugham
Market moralities and mentalities-- fueled by economic imperatives to make a profit at nearly any cost-- yield unprecedented levels of loneliness, isolation, and sadness. And our public life lies in shambles, shot through with icy cynicism and paralyzing pessimism. To put it bluntly, beneath the record-breaking stock markets on Wall Street and bipartisan budget-balancing deals in the White House lurk ominous clouds of despair across this nation.
Cornel West
At the bottom of her heart, however, she was waiting for something to happen. Like shipwrecked sailors, she turned despairing eyes upon the solitude of her life, seeking afar off some white sail in the mists of the horizon. She did not know what this chance would be, what wind would bring it her, towards what shore it would drive her, if it would be a shallop or a three-decker, laden with anguish or full of bliss to the portholes. But each morning, as she awoke, she hoped it would come that...
Gustave Flaubert
the scientist's religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is utterly insignificant reflection. This feeling is the guiding principle of his life and work, in so far as he succeeds in keeping himself from the shackles of selfish desire. It is beyond question closely akin to that which has possessed the religious geniuses...
Albert Einstein
… my century..is unique in the history of men for two reasons. It is the first century since life began when a decisive part of the most articulate section of mankind has not merely ceased to believe in God, but has deliberately rejected God. And it is the century in which this religious rejection has taken a specifically political form….
Whittaker Chambers
I gestured at my litre of fizzy red wine. “Want a drop of this?” I asked him.
No thanks. I try not to drink at lunchtime.”
So do I. But I never quite make it.”
I feel like shit all day if I drink at lunchtime.”
Me too. But I feel like shit all lunchtime if I don’t.”
Yes, well it all comes down to choices, doesn’t it?” he said. “It’s the same in the evenings. Do you want to feel good at night or do you want to feel good in the morning? It’s the same with life. Do you want to feel good young or...
Martin Amis
The light of artistic creation is also blinding.
The artist can’t see the suffering he causes
to those around him. And the’ll never
understand the purity of his goal, how the heat
of his invention won’t melt the ice in his heart.
He must be ruthless!
No religion, no purpose except this:
Make something perfect before you die.
Life is short, art is for all time
Ian Mcewan
Liz: What's it like in hell?
Ketut: Same like heaven. Universe is a circle, Liss. To up, to down -- all same, at end.
Liz: Then how can you tell the difference between heaven and hell?
Ketut: Because of how you go. Heaven, you go up, through seven happy places. Hell you go down, through seven sad places. This is why it better for you to go up, Liss.
Liz: You mean, you might as well spend your life going upward, through the happy places, since heaven and hell -- same destinations -- are the...
Elizabeth Gilbert