“If a man has to ask for your trust, it's a sure sign that you should not give it. Trust should be earned inherently, without any verbal demands. Trust is knowing a man's character, knowing truth, and relying on that character and truth even when the odds seem against you.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“I listened long to your story,
Listened but could not hear.
When you chose to walk that path so overgrown,
I remained alone with my fear.
Cold silence covers the distance,
Stretches from shore to shore.
I follow in my mind your far-off journeying,
But I will walk that path no more.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“That isn't trust; that's foolishness! If a man has asked for your trust, it's a sure sign you should not give it. Trust should be earned inherently, without any verbal demands. Trust is knowing a man's character, knowing truth, and relying on that character and truth even when the odds seem against you. That is trust, my dear, not this leap in the dark..." (King Fidel)”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“See! See, she's gone and put her foot in her mouth again! Right in, heel and all.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“I chose to long ago, long before we met. When my father sent me to win you, I loved you already.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“Hope is such a beautiful dream that dies such a hideous death.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“If there is one thing in which I hold complete confidence, it is the conviction of my own desirability.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“Does that look like flowing gold?”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“Have you ever dreamed of one thing for so long, wanted nothing more than to have that dream fulfilled, only to find out that maybe it wasn't what you actually wanted all along?"
He juggled four stones lightly. "I believe that's called growing up.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“And now all this rot about invisible injuries and interrupting Prince Gervais as he and I don't see what business it is of I can do what I like and I think you're simply and that's that!"
Una paused there, wondering if what she'd just said had made a lick of sense. Judging from Prince Aethelbald's face, it hadn't.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“But my head is splitting in two!"
"It's doing a remarkably neat job since I can't see so much as a seam.”
― Anne Elisabeth Stengl, quote from Heartless
“Our study of psychoneurotic disturbances points to a more comprehensive explanation, which includes that of Westermarck. When a wife loses her husband, or a daughter her mother, it not infrequently happens that the survivor is afflicted with tormenting scruples, called ‘obsessive reproaches’ which raises the question whether she herself has not been guilty through carelessness or neglect, of the death of the beloved person. No recalling of the care with which she nursed the invalid, or direct refutation of the asserted guilt can put an end to the torture, which is the pathological expression of mourning and which in time slowly subsides. Psychoanalytic investigation of such cases has made us acquainted with the secret mainsprings of this affliction. We have ascertained that these obsessive reproaches are in a certain sense justified and therefore are immune to refutation or objections. Not that the mourner has really been guilty of the death or that she has really been careless, as the obsessive reproach asserts; but still there was something in her, a wish of which she herself was unaware, which was not displeased with the fact that death came, and which would have brought it about sooner had it been strong enough. The reproach now reacts against this unconscious wish after the death of the beloved person. Such hostility, hidden in the unconscious behind tender love, exists in almost all cases of intensive emotional allegiance to a particular person, indeed it represents the classic case, the prototype of the ambivalence of human emotions. There is always more or less of this ambivalence in everybody’s disposition; normally it is not strong enough to give rise to the obsessive reproaches we have described. But where there is abundant predisposition for it, it manifests itself in the relation to those we love most, precisely where you would least expect it. The disposition to compulsion neurosis which we have so often taken for comparison with taboo problems, is distinguished by a particularly high degree of this original ambivalence of emotions.”
― Sigmund Freud, quote from Totem and Taboo
“They are less than the mud. You do not get angry at the mud for clinging to your shoe. You wipe it off and never look at it again.”
― Kiersten White, quote from And I Darken
“he wondered if he was doing the right thing sticking with Brenda. But when she started walking, he followed.”
― James Dashner, quote from The Maze Runner Series
“WHY THE SEA IS SALT Once upon a time, long, long ago, there were two brothers, the one rich and the other poor. When Christmas Eve came, the poor one had not a bite in the house, either of meat or bread; so he went to his brother, and begged him, in God's name, to give him something for Christmas Day. It was by no means the first time that the brother had been forced to give something to him, and he was not better pleased at being asked now than he generally was. "If you will do what I ask you, you shall have a whole ham," said he. The poor one immediately thanked him, and promised this. "Well, here is the ham, and now you must go straight to Dead Man's Hall," said the rich brother, throwing the ham to him. "Well, I will do what I have promised," said the other, and he took the ham and set off. He went on and on for the livelong day, and at nightfall he came to a place where there was a bright light. "I have no doubt this is the place," thought the man with the ham. An old man with a long white beard was standing in the outhouse, chopping Yule logs. "Good-evening," said the man with the ham. "Good-evening to you. Where are you going at this late hour?" said the man. "I am going to Dead Man's Hall, if only I am on the right track," answered the poor man. "Oh! yes, you are right enough, for it is here," said the old man. "When you get inside they will all want to buy your ham, for they don't get much meat to eat there; but you must not sell it unless you can get the hand-mill which stands behind the door for it. When you come out again I will teach you how to stop the hand-mill, which is useful for almost everything." So the man with the ham thanked the other for his good advice, and rapped at the door. When he got in, everything happened just as the old man had said it would: all the people, great and small, came round him like ants on an ant-hill, and each tried to outbid the other for the ham. "By rights my old woman and I ought to have it for our Christmas dinner, but, since you have set your hearts upon it, I must just give it up to you," said the man. "But, if I sell it, I will have the hand-mill which is standing there behind the door." At first they would not hear of this, and haggled and bargained with the man, but he stuck to what he had said, and the people were forced to give him the hand-mill. When the man came out again into the yard, he asked the old wood-cutter how he was to stop the hand-mill, and when he had learned that, he thanked him and set off home with all the speed he could, but did not get there until after the clock had struck twelve on Christmas Eve.”
― Andrew Lang, quote from The Blue Fairy Book
“It was the absences that had made her think, not the presences.”
― Nick Hornby, quote from Juliet, Naked
BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
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