Favorite book quotes/excerpts

Here's mine -



“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.”

― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space



feel free to add yours.

I think you ended the thread before it even started.

That's an awesome quote and would be my pick as well. Carl is one of my hero's and was a really great person.

I guess I'll have to share one of my other favorites.

"It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. Because they were holding on to something... There's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it's worth fighting for"

- Samwise Gamgee

“Show me a man or a woman alone and I'll show you a saint. Give me two and they'll fall in love. Give me three and they'll invent the charming thing we call 'society'. Give me four and they'll build a pyramid. Give me five and they'll make one an outcast. Give me six and they'll reinvent prejudice. Give me seven and in seven years they'll reinvent warfare. Man may have been made in the image of God, but human society was made in the image of His opposite number, and is always trying to get back home.”

“She couldn't be on his wavelength all the time. That's all. When you could recognize that and deal with it, you were on your way to an adult relationship.”

“Love doesn't grow very well in a place where there is only fear”

“Men who find themselves late (In life) are never sure. They are all the things the civics books tell us the good citizen should be: partisans but never zealots, respectors of the facts which attend each situation but never benders of those facts, uncomfortable in positions of leadership but rarely unable to turn down a responsibility once it has been offered . . . or thrust upon them. They make the best leaders in a democracy because they are unlikely to fall in love with power.”

Steven King........The Stand



"Don't call my lyrics poetry. It's an insult to real poets."

Bernie Taupin

So live your life so the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their views, and demand that they respect yours.

Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and of service to your people.

Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide. Always give a word or sign of salute when meeting or passing a stranger if in a lonely place. Show respect to all people, but grovel to none.
When you arise in the morning, give thanks for the light, for your life and strength.

Give thanks for your food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies in yourself. Touch not the poisonous firewater that makes wise ones turn to fools and robs them of their visions.

When your time comes to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way.
Sing your death song, and die like a hero going home.

~Tecumseh

From the poem "Crow's Theology" by Ted Hughes :

Crow realized there were two Gods -

One of them much bigger than the other
Loving his enemies
And having all the weapons.

'This book belongs to...'

There's a whimsy in this line that's hard to go past...over the years I've spent many hours wondering whether it was the start of a detective novella, that somehow had said enough.

Å99

Originally posted by 3NL1GHT3N3D1
I think you ended the thread before it even started.

That's an awesome quote and would be my pick as well. Carl is one of my hero's and was a really great person.

I guess I'll have to share one of my other favorites.

"It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. Because they were holding on to something... There's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it's worth fighting for"

- Samwise Gamgee

That one is my favourite as well. It describes very well our world.
I'll also add this one:

"Even the smallest person can change the course of the future"

- Galadriel

reply to post by Lady_Tuatha


Great thread. There are so many to choose from. I'm so glad a Tecumseh quote was put in this thread.

“An unbelieved truth can hurt a man much more than a lie. It takes great courage to back truth unacceptable to our times. There's a punishment for it, and it's usually crucifixion.”

John Steinbeck - East of Eden

“I am at the moment writing a lengthy indictment against our century. When my brain begins to reel from my literary labors, I make an occasional cheese dip.”

John Kennedy Toole- Confederacy of Dunces

CJ

"Consider: Natural selection stopped for man when he acheived control over his enviroment, and furthermore began to save the lives of all his weakilngs, and preserve their bad genes. Once natural selection has been halted, the the only remaining pressure upon the race to evolve is mutation. Artificial radio-activity, and indeed even fallout itself, maybe God's way of resuming the evolution of Man...perhaps towards some ultimate organism we cannot forsee,perhaps even towards some unitay mind which we all will share with God, as Teilhardt de Chardin emvisioned-"

from After Such Knowledge by James Blish.

a good book i though.

(and good idea for a thread lady)

“Maybe there aren't any such things as good friends or bad friends - maybe there are just friends, people who stand by you when you're hurt and who help you feel not so lonely. Maybe they're always worth being scared for, and hoping for, and living for. Maybe worth dying for too, if that's what has to be. No good friends. No bad friends. Only people you want, need to be with; people who build their houses in your heart.”

- It by Stephen King

I like it because its ugly.

OLD BULL LEE, ON the Road