Quotes from The Covenant

James A. Michener ·  1240 pages

Rating: (17.3K votes)


“This is not a promise, this is not threat, it's just the way it's gonna be!!!”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“a word once written will often accidentally find a life that no one anticipates; it lies”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“Women like her looked at their world, rolled up their sleeves, and tried to make it better. Now”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“Detritus, that's the word. The awful accumulation of wrong decisions, improper terms. You scrape away the excrescences of history...and maybe you get down to the bedrock of human society, where diamonds hide. God of my fathers, how I wish we could bring in the psychological drills and probe down to bedrock.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“Never ask such a question!” Rhodes exploded. “Anything can be done if men of good principle determine that it shall be done. Have you the courage to strike for immortal goals?” In”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant



“they believed that the bright, soaring promises of the New Testament could be used as a basis for government; and”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“a nation is totally geared to the waging of war, it had better ensure that war keeps occurring somewhere; and”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“Wrong decisions, Jakob, are never inevitable. A wise man can always turn back from a precipice.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“The sanest judgment that can be passed on the genesis of this terrible war between two groups of friends is that it was the result of imperiousness on the English side and intransigence on the Boer. Like”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“then it occurred to him that a worthy man dedicates himself not to one particular thing which attracts him, but to all tasks; and he”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant



“Most important fact of war? Keep your army in existence. Lose the battle, but keep your eye on winning the war.” But”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“What the Voortrekkers failed to realize in their moment of victory was that they had offered the covenant to God, not He to them.”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“Nevertheless, in obedience to the covenant as they understood it, they had won a signal victory, which confirmed their belief that He had accepted their offer and had personally intervened on their behalf. No”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“The Boer nation had become a theocracy, and would so remain. General”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant


“The English could bring into this tight area four hundred and forty-eight thousand soldiers, but they could not find space in their ships for the extra medicines and food needed to save emaciated women and children. They could import a hundred thousand horses for their cavalry, but not three cows for their concentration camps. Guns bigger than houses they could haul in, but no hospital equipment. It was insane; it was horrifying...”
― James A. Michener, quote from The Covenant



About the author

James A. Michener
Born place: in New York, New York, The United States
Born date February 3, 1907
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Small change, small wonders—these are the currency of my endurance and ultimately of my life. It’s a workable economy.”
― Barbara Kingsolver, quote from Small Wonder


“Not altogether a fool," said G., "but then he's a poet, which I take to be only one remove from a fool."

"True," said Dupin, after a long and thoughtful whiff from his meerschaum, "although I have been guilty of certain doggerel myself.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, quote from The Purloined Letter


“It doesn't take any effort to dream. It's a lot easier than looking at the problems in front of you and figuring out what you're going to do about them. But all you're doing is putting your problems up on a shelf for later, right? That doesn't make them go away.”
― Fuyumi Ono, quote from The Twelve Kingdoms: Skies of Dawn


“Because you’re a straight, Laura.” “Stop calling me that!” Laura said. “What makes you so different?” “Look at you,” Carlotta said. “You’re educated. You’re smart. You’re beautiful. You’re married to a goddamn architect. You have a wonderful baby and friends in high places.” Her eyes narrowed; she began to hiss. “Then look at me. I’m a cracker. Ugly. No family. Daddy used to beat me up. I never finished school—I can’t hardly read and write. I’m diselxic, or whatever they call it. You ever wonder what happens to people who can’t read and write? In your fucking beautiful Net world with all its fucking data? No, you never thought of that, did you? If I found a place for myself, it was in the teeth of people like you.”
― Bruce Sterling, quote from Islands in the Net


“I shall clasp my hands together and bow to the corners of the world.”
― Barry Hughart, quote from The Chronicles of Master Li and Number Ten Ox


Interesting books

The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare
(24.7K)
The Man Who Was Thur...
by G.K. Chesterton
Einstein: His Life and Universe
(83.4K)
Einstein: His Life a...
by Walter Isaacson
Flat-Out Love
(53.6K)
Flat-Out Love
by Jessica Park
UnEnchanted
(37.3K)
UnEnchanted
by Chanda Hahn
The Black Echo
(122K)
The Black Echo
by Michael Connelly
The Lost World
(98.4K)
The Lost World
by Michael Crichton

About BookQuoters

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.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.