Quotes from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America

Margot Adler ·  672 pages

Rating: (6.4K votes)


“The first time I called myself a 'Witch' was the most magical moment of my life.”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“If you are a woman and dare to look within yourself, you are a Witch. You make your own rules. You are free and beautiful. You”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“Still, his question, “If there is only one model of individuation, can there be true individuality?”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“The world is holy. Nature is holy. The body is holy. Sexuality is holy. The imagination is holy. Divinity is immanent in nature; it is within you as well as without. Most spiritual paths ultimately lead people to the understanding of their own connection to the divine. While human beings are often cut off from experiencing the deep and ever-present connection between themselves and the universe, that connection can often be regained through ceremony and community. The energy you put out into the world comes back.”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“Magic is a convenient word for a whole collection of techniques, all of which involve the mind. In this case, we might conceive of these techniques as including the mobilization of confidence, will, and emotion brought about by the recognition of necessity; the use of imaginative faculties, particularly the ability to visualize, in order to begin to understand how other beings function in nature so we can use this knowledge to achieve necessary ends.”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America



“Sarah Pomeroy, in her careful study, Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves,”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“We gaze up at the same stars, the sky covers us all, the same universe encompasses us. What does it matter what practical system we adopt in our search for the truth? Not by one avenue only can we arrive at so tremendous a secret. —SYMMACHUS, 384 C.E.”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


“They might add that monotheism is a political and psychological ideology as well as a religious one, and that the old economic lesson that one-crop economies generally fare poorly also applies to the spiritual realm.”
― Margot Adler, quote from Drawing Down the Moon: Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and Other Pagans in America


About the author

Margot Adler
Born place: in Little Rock, Arkansas, The United States
Born date April 16, 1946
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Popular quotes

“Days and months are travellers of eternity. So are the years that pass by. Those who steer a boat across the sea, or drive a horse over the earth till they succumb to the weight of years, spend every minute of their lives travelling. There are a great number of ancients, too, who died on the road. I myself have been tempted for a long time by the cloud-moving wind - filled with a strong desire to wander.”
― Matsuo Bashō, quote from Backroads to Far Towns: Basho's Travel Journal


“Frederick?
Had she really spoken? Certainly she'd tried, but her voice had failed to materialize and all she heard was the sound of her nightgown ripping as Frederick pulled it over her head and threw it aside.
He was kneeling now between her ankles, pushing at her, forcing her knees apart and then her arms until she was entirely splayed on the bed beneath him.
Nothing was said. Not a word.
Ede felt his hand between her legs, forcing the way for the rest of him. Stop, she wanted to tell him. Stop. I don't understand what you're doing. But nothing - still nothing was said.
He seemed to be raging inside her, moving his hips in a circular fashion, all the weight of his upper body help above her, resting on his arms, his hands pushing down into the mattress.
Stop! But he didn't.
Don't! But he did.
Nothing. Not one word.
The only sound he made was a choking noise in his throat at the end, as tough he might be going to strangle. But when he rolled away from her onto his back, she felt the shudder of his first free breath and she heard him sigh. It was over. Tonight. It was done.
Ede could not bare the thought of seeing him, or of being seen. Still without speaking, she rose from the bed and through the dark, found her way to the bathroom. She had brought the torn nightgown wit her, but when she turned on the light and saw it, she threw it down in the corner. Ruined. Spoiled. Everything.
When at last, she returned to the bed, Fredrick was sound asleep beneath the covers - and nothing - nothing - nothing was said.”
― Timothy Findley, quote from The Piano Man's Daughter


“Old Azureus's manner of welcoming people was a silent rhapsody. Ecstatically beaming, slowly, tenderly, he would take your hand between his soft palms, hold it thus as if it were a long sought treasure or a sparrow all fluff and heart, in moist silence, peering at you the while with his beaming wrinkles rather than with his eyes, and then, very slowly, the silvery smile would start to dissolve, the tender old hands would gradually release their hold, a blank expression replace the fervent light of his pale fragile face, and he would leave you as if he had made a mistake, as if after all you were not the loved one - the loved one whom, the next moment, he would espy in another corner, and again the smile would dawn, again the hands would enfold the sparrow, again it would all dissolve.”
― Vladimir Nabokov, quote from Bend Sinister


“He stopped. “You're upset. I'll shut up and leave you”
― Iris Johansen, quote from The Killing Game


“Whaddaya mean 'old maids,' ha? The term is 'unclaimed treasure,' buddy, 'unclaimed treasure!”
― Laurie Notaro, quote from Autobiography of a Fat Bride: True Tales of a Pretend Adulthood


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