Quotes from Books

[quasimodo1]

To karo: "My Law" is a fabulous piece and it's similarity to the Alfred Noyes poem jumps right out. The attribution is unknown to me, unless "a Maori" or "Maori" is a pen name (the proper name is identical to a tribe somewhere in the New Zealand part of the world.) Don't suppose you know any more about the writer? Looking here for more information... http://www.path-ways.com/forums/arch....php/f-6.html: [Tieme Ranapiri... (enhance the mind)]

[quasimodo1]

Letter 352: To E.M. Forster, April 16, 1928 ...from Karachi, Pakistan..... " Dear E.M.F., Forgive the pencil. I am inkless this afternoon. Don't cut me off from anything you may write in future, because you've sent me one supremely good thing.* I've liked everything you've written: some of it very much, some of it less: but I liked it all. I've tried to write, myself, and know that a man doesn't ever succeed in mating sound and sense and expectation. We land, always, other than we meant to land. That's presumably the fun as well as the vexation of writing. Your less-good work is very helpful to me, as an amateur of writing: for our minds are parallel enough for me to see your intention behind the expression, (or to flatter myself that I do partly and in some senses see it...oh shades of Henry James in this style of letter!) and just because it may not completely come off, so I may be able to see the works inside it more clearly. " {*footnote, an unpublished story}

[Idril]

From The Charterhouse of Parma by Stendhal:

"On May 15, 1796, a whole people became aware that all it had hitherto respected was supremely ridiculous, and, occasionally hateful to boot."

[Circuvico]

From Finnegans Wake
"O tell me all about Anna Livia! I want to hear all about Anna Livia. Well, you know Anna Livia? Yes, of course, we all know Anna Livia. Tell me all. Tell me now."

[karo]

Quasimodo, unfortunately I know nothing about the author of 'My Law', but I believe it was inspired by a New Zealand Maori.

[karo]

Quoting from letter from Lizzie to Charles:

If I came to see you like you want, just coming because you feel in the mood to see me, to sort of try my company again, I would fall straight back into the old madness....you didn't love me enough, and now - I don't believe in miracles....Charles, I've been in hell and I've come out of it and I don't want to go there again..... My love for you is quiet at last. I don't want it to become a roaring furnace.

[ngtotd_dtrt]

From Don Quixote (Ormsby translation)... just finished it, very enjoyable.
Some of may fav quotes, mostly Sancho's proverbs. (Sorry for the quantity...collected them as I read.)


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"To be grateful for benefits received is the part of persons of good birth,
and one of the sins most offensive to God is ingratitude;
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And still more surprised were they when they perceived that what they heard
sung were the verses not of rustic shepherds, but of the polished wits of
the city; and so it proved, for the verses they heard were these:

What makes my quest of happiness seem vain? Disdain.
What bids me to abandon hope of ease? Jealousies.
What holds my heart in anguish of suspense? Absence.
If that be so, then for my grief Where shall I turn to seek relief,
When hope on every side lies slain By Absence, Jealousies, Disdain?

What the prime cause of all my woe doth prove? Love.
What at my glory ever looks askance? Chance.
Whence is permission to afflict me given? Heaven.
If that be so, I but await The stroke of a resistless fate,
Since, working for my woe, these three, Love, Chance and Heaven, in league I see.

What must I do to find a remedy? Die.
What is the lure for love when coy and strange? Change.
What, if all fail, will cure the heart of sadness? Madness.
If that be so, it is but folly To seek a cure for melancholy:
Ask where it lies; the answer saith In Change, in Madness, or in Death.
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for virtue is more persecuted by the wicked than loved by the good.
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for the possessor of wealth is not made happy by possessing it, but by spending it, and not by spending as he pleases, but by knowing how to spend it well. The poor gentleman has no way of showing that he is a gentleman but by virtue, by being affable, well-bred, courteous, gentle-mannered, and kindly, not haughty, arrogant, or censorious, but above all by being charitable;
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"Teresa says," replied Sancho, "that I should make sure with your
worship, and 'let papers speak and beards be still,' for 'he who binds
does not wrangle,' since one 'take' is better than two 'I'll give
thee's;' and I say a woman's advice is no great thing, and he who won't take it is a fool."
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for learning without virtue is a pearl on a dunghill.
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"God will guide it better," said Sancho, "for God who gives the wound gives the salve;
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No, faith; and between a woman's 'yes' and 'no' I wouldn't venture to put the point of a pin, for there would not be room for it;
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As a grandmother of mine used to say, there are only two families in the world, the Haves and the Haven'ts; and she stuck to the Haves; and to this day, Senor Don Quixote, people would sooner feel the pulse of 'Have,' than of 'Know;' an *** covered with gold looks better than a
horse with a pack-saddle.
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"He preaches well who lives well," said Sancho, "and I know no more theology than that."

"Nor needst thou," said Don Quixote, "but I cannot conceive or make out how it is that, the fear of God being the beginning of wisdom, thou, who art more afraid of a lizard than of him, knowest so much."
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that love has no greater enemy than hunger and constant want; for love is all gaiety, enjoyment, and happiness, especially when the lover is in the possession of the object of his love, and poverty and want are the declared enemies of all these;
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"Remember, O prudent Basilio," added Don Quixote, "it was the opinion of a certain sage, I know not whom, that there was not more than one good woman in the whole world; and his advice was that each one should think and believe that this one good woman was his own wife, and in this way he would live happy.
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a good woman does not win a good name merely by being good, but by letting it be seen that she is so, and open looseness and freedom do much more damage to a woman's honour than secret depravity.
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“…at the worst the hypocrite who pretends to be good does less harm than the open sinner."
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…My lady the duchess kisses thy hands a thousand times; do thou make a return with two thousand, for as my master says, nothing costs less or is cheaper than civility.
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"Secondly, thou must keep in view what thou art, striving to know
thyself, the most difficult thing to know that the mind can imagine…
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…pride thyself rather upon being one of lowly virtue than a lofty sinner.

"Remember, Sancho, if thou make virtue thy aim, and take a pride in doing
virtuous actions, thou wilt have no cause to envy those who have princely
and lordly ones, for blood is an inheritance, but virtue an acquisition,
and virtue has in itself alone a worth that blood does not possess.
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it is not well for those that administer governments to be long without their wives

[but choose wisely, for] all that may be gained by a wise governor may be lost and wasted by a boorish stupid wife.
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"Abuse not by word him whom thou hast to punish in deed, for the pain of punishment is enough for the unfortunate without the addition of thine objurgations.
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diligence is the mother of good fortune, and indolence, its opposite, never yet attained the object of an honest ambition.
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never engage in a dispute about families, at least in the way of comparing them one with another; for necessarily one of those compared will be better than the other, and thou wilt be hated by the one thou hast disparaged, and get nothing in any shape from the one thou hast exalted.
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'they'll come for wool and go back shorn;'
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'whether the pitcher hits the stove, or the stove the pitcher, it's a bad business for the pitcher;'
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'the fool knows more in his own house than the wise man in another's.'"
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and if there's any reason to think that because of my being a governor the devil will get hold of me, I'd rather go Sancho to heaven than governor to hell."
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for I place a barrier between my inclinations and my virtue, and I do not wish to break this rule through the generosity your highness is disposed to display towards me;
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…show thyself grateful to them, for ingratitude is the daughter of pride, and one of the greatest sins we know of; and he who is grateful to those who have been good to him shows that he will be so to God also who has bestowed and still bestows so many blessings upon him.
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keep a safe conscience and let them say what they like; for trying to stop slanderers' tongues is like trying to put gates to the open plain.
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"for what thou hast to give to the mouse, give to the cat, and it will save thee all trouble."
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For the sense of being under an obligation to return benefits and favours received is a restraint that checks the independence of the spirit. Happy he, to whom heaven has given a piece of bread for which he is not bound to give thanks to any but heaven itself!"
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'For giving and keeping there's need of brains.'
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for pledges don't trouble a good payer."
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for jests that give pain are no jests, and no sport is worth anything if it hurts another.
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Her companion then came up and said, "I should like to know, Head,
whether my husband loves me or not;" the answer given to her was, "Think
how he uses thee, and thou mayest guess;" and the married lady went off
saying, "That answer did not need a question; for of course the treatment
one receives shows the disposition of him from whom it is received."
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'a good hope is better than a bad holding’
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They did not embrace each other [publicly], for where there is deep love there will never be overmuch boldness.
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for, as sensible people hold, 'the fault of the *** must not be laid on the pack-saddle;'
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'better a clear escape than good men's prayers.'
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"it is the part of brave hearts to be patient in adversity just as much as to be glad in prosperity”
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"No, no, senor," replied Sancho; "it shall never be said of me, 'The money paid, the arms broken;'
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[Idril]

From The Rat by Günter Grass:

And I saw the She-rat on top of the garbage mountain, proclaiming that man is no more. This, she cried out, is your heritage.

[Riesa]

Then one arose in the host of Olwe, which was ever the hindmost on the road; Lenwe he was called. He forsook the westward march, and led away a numerous people, southwards down the great river, and they passed out of the knowledge of their kin until long years were past. Those were the Nandor; and they became a people apart, unlike their kin, save that they loved water, and dwelt most beside falls and running streams. Greater knowledge they had of living things, tree and herb, bird and beast, than all other Elves. In after years Denethor, son of Lenwe, turned again west at last, and led a part of that people over the mountains into Beleriand ere the rising of the Moon.

J.R.R Tolkien The Silmarillion

The Rat's lookin' pretty good right 'bout now.

[Idril]

J.R.R Tolkien The Silmarillion

The Rat's lookin' pretty good right 'bout now.

Okay, right there, Olwe really isn't that important in the grand scheme of things, nor are the Nandor all that important so feel free to wipe all that from your memory. That's the kind of stuff you can just skim over.

[quasimodo1]

Letter 205: To Lionel Curtis, dated March 19, 1923. .........."There again, perhaps there's a solution to be found in multiple personality. It's my reason which condemns the book (The Seven Pillars of Wisdom) and the revolt, and the new nationalities: because the only rational conclusion to human argument is pessimism such as Hardy's, a pessimism which is very much like the wintry heath, of bog and withered plants and stripped trees, about us. Our camp on its swelling in this desolation feels pustular, and we (all brown-bodied, with yellow spots down our front belly-line), must seem like the swarming germs of its fermentation. That's feeling, exterior-bred feeling, with reason harmonising it into a picture: but there's a deeper sense which remembers other landscapes, and the changes which summer will bring to this one: and to that sense nothing can be changeless: whereas the rational preference or advantage of pessimism is its finality, the eternity in which it ends: and if there isn't an eternity there cannot be a pessimism pure."

[quasimodo1]

Letter 234: December 19, 1923. To Subscribers to 'Seven Pillars' postmarked at Clouds Hill, Moreton ...............[On May 31st, 1923, Bernard Shaw wrote a private memorandum to Mr. Baldwin, then Prime Minister, expressing his great concern at Lawrence's poverty. 'Clearly this is a bad case of Belisarius begging obols in an ungrateful country...the fact remains that he is serving as a private soldier for his daily bread: and however much his extraordinary character may be accountable for this, it strikes all who know about it as a scandal that should be put an end to by some means. They feel that the private soldier business is a shocking tomfoolery and are amazed to find that Lawrence is not in a position of a pensioned commanding officer in dignified private circumstances.' Bernard Shaw sent the letter to Hogarth, who corrected some of his statements, before sending it to the Prime Minister. Shaw did not rest content with a refusal but continued to press Mr. Baldwin, and afterwardes Mr. MacDonald, on the subject of a pension for Lawrence, but without success. From several of Lawrence's letters it would appear that he would have accepted a pension, had one been offered him, but I cannot think he would have been pleased that the sentence 'the private soldier business is a shocking tomfoolery' should be read by Mr. Baldwin]

[NickAdams]

"The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new."

"The human eyelid is not teartight (happily for the human eye)."

"He was split, one part of him never left this mental chamber that pic-
tured itself as a sphere full of light fading into dark, because there was
no way out. But motion in this world depended on rest in the world out-
side. A man is in bed, wanting to sleep. A rat is behind the wall at is head,
wanting to move. The man hears the rat fidget and cannot sleep, the rat
hears the man fidget and dares not move. They are both unhappy, one
fidgeting and the other waiting, or both happy, the rat moving and the
man sleeping."

[Woland]

Canto 1 from Purgatorio

"Who are you that up the blind river have fled
the eternal prison?

Who has guided you, or what has been your
lantern, coming forth from the deep night that
makes the valley of Hell forever black?

Can the laws of the abyss be broken, then? or
has some new counsel been adopted in Heaven,
that although damned, you come to my cliffs?"

[NickAdams]

A humorous description:

"Age. Unimportant
Head. Small and round.
Eyes. Green.
Complexion. White.
Hair. Yellow.
Features. Mobile.
Neck. 13 3/4".
Upper arm. 11".
Forearm.9 1/2".
Wrist 6".
Bust. 34".
Waist. 27".
Hips, etc. 35".
Thigh. 21 3/4".
Knee. 13 3/4".
Calf. 13".
Ankle. 8 1/4".
Instep. Unimportant.
Height. 5'4".
Weight. 123 lbs.

She stormed away from the callbox, accompanied delightedly by her hips, etc."