“Knowledge is a burden--once taken up, it can never be discarded.”
“To friends! Life belongs to those who love, and where love reigns is man truly king!”
“Unbelievers enjoy the security of their unbelief; there is great confidence in ignorance.”
“It is the poor man who clenches so tightly to the gold he is given - for fear of losing it. The man of wealth spends his gold freely to accomplish his will in the world. It is the same with life.'
Suddenly ashamed of my conspicuous poverty, I lowered my eyes. But Scatha placed a hand beneath my chin and raised my head. 'Cling too tightly to your life and you will lose it, my Reluctant Warrior. You must become the master of your life, not its slave.”
“That was on the pillar stone on Ynys Bainail," I said, indicating the carving. "What does it mean?"
"It is Mor Cylch, the maze of life," Tegid told me. "It is trodden with just enough light to see the next step or two ahead, but not more. At each turn the soul must decide whether to journey on or whether to go back the way it came."
"What if the soul does not journey on? What if it chooses to go back the way it came?"
"Stagnation and death," replied Tegid with mild vehemence. He seemed irritated that anyone would consider retreating.
"And if the soul travels on?"
"It draws nearer its destination," the bard answered. "The ultimate destination of all souls is the Heart of the Heart.”
“The Otherworld does not supply the meaning of life. Rather, the Otherworld describes being alive. Life, in all its glory - warts and all, so to speak. The Otherworld provides meaning by example, by exhibition, by illustration if you will. ... Through the Otherworld we learn what it is be be alive, to be human: good and evil, heartbreak and ecstasy, victory and defeat, everything. ... where does one first learn loyalty? Or honor? Or any higher value, for that matter? ... Where does one learn to value the beauty of a forest and to revere it?'
In nature?'
Not at all. This can easily be proven by the fact that so many among us do not revere the forests at all - do not even see them, in fact. You know the people I am talking about. You have seen them and their works in the world. They are the ones who rape the land, who cut down forests and despoil oceans, who oppress the poor and tyrannize the helpless, who live their lives as if nothing lay beyond the horizon of their own limited earth-bound visions. But I digress. The question before us is this: where does one first learn to see a forest as a thing of beauty, to honor it, to hold it dear for its own sake, to recognize its true value as a forest, and not just see it as a source of timber to be exploited, or a barrier to be hacked down in order to make room for a motorway? ... the mere presence of the Otherworld kindles in us the spark of higher consciousness, or imagination. It is the stories and tale and visions of the Otherworld - that magical, enchanted land just beyond the walls of the manifest world - which awaken and expand in human beings the very notion of beauty, of reverence, of love and nobility, and all the higher virtues.”
“Apart from pleasure, beauty also kindles imagination, hope and encouragement. If beauty ceased to exist, we would, in a very real sense, cease to exist--for we would be no longer who we are.”
“As I understand it, the Celts venerated all sorts of plexus-type things: the seashore, dawn, dusk, the edge of the forest - anything that was neither here nor there, so to speak.”
“Kingship wrought of Infinite worship,
Quick-forged by the Swift Sure Hand;
Bold in Righteousness,
Valiant in Justice,
A sword of honor to defend the clans of Albion!”
“I tell you the truth, a man may not make himself king; only the blessing of him who holds the kingship can elevate a man to that high place. For sovereignty is a sacred trust that may not be bartered or sold; still less may it be stolen or taken by force.”
“Unbelievers enjoy the security of their unbelief; there is great confidence in ignorance. But”
“J. R. R. Tolkien, undisputedly a most fluent speaker of this language, was criticized in his day for indulging his juvenile whim of writing fantasy, which was then considered—as it still is in many quarters— an inferior form of literature and disdained as mere “escapism.” “Of course it is escapist,” he cried. “That is its glory! When a soldier is a prisoner of war it is his duty to escape—and take as many with him as he can.” He went on to explain, “The moneylenders, the knownothings, the authoritarians have us all in prison; if we value the freedom of the mind and soul, if we’re partisans of liberty, then it’s our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as possible.”
“To friends! Life belongs to those we love, and where love reigns is man truly king!”
“Digitalur är symptomatiska för vår motsägelsefulla tidsålder. De ger oss exakt tid på nanosekunden, men ingen kontext: en oändlig följd av "Du är här"-pilar, men ingen karta.”
“Once upon a time' These are the most magical words our world has ever known and the gateway to the greatest stories ever told. They're an immediate calling to anyone who hears them-a calling into a world where everyone is welcome and anything can happen. Mice can become men, maids can become princesses, and they can teach valuable lessons in the process.”
“The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting on the stool had been put into use even before Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was born. Mr. Summers spoke frequently to the villagers about making a new box, but no one liked to upset even as much tradition as was represented by the black box. There was a story that the present box had been made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it, the one that had been constructed when the first people settled down to make a village here. Every year, after the lottery, Mr. Summers began talking again about a new box, but every year the subject was allowed to fade off without anything's being done. The black box grew shabbier each year: by now it was no longer completely black but splintered badly along one side to show the original wood color, and in some places faded or stained.
Mr. Martin and his oldest son, Baxter, held the black box securely on the stool until Mr. Summers had stirred the papers thoroughly with his hand. Because so much of the ritual had been forgotten or discarded, Mr. Summers had been successful in having slips of paper substituted for the chips of wood that had been used for generations. Chips of wood, Mr. Summers had argued, had been all very well when the village was tiny, but now that the population was more than three hundred and likely to keep on growing, it was necessary to use something that would fit more easily into he black box. The night before the lottery, Mr. Summers and Mr. Graves made up the slips of paper and put them in the box, and it was then taken to the safe of Mr. Summers' coal company and locked up until Mr. Summers was ready to take it to the square next morning. The rest of the year, the box was put way, sometimes one place, sometimes another; it had spent one year in Mr. Graves's barn and another year underfoot in the post office. and sometimes it was set on a shelf in the Martin grocery and left there.”
“He gestured toward her twisted leg. "Like you. Some don't walk good. Some be broken in other ways. Not all. But lots. Do you think it maken them quiet and nice, to be broken?”
“أريد إقناع نفسي بأنك طيب وأنك تتلقى هناك تقدير الجميع،إنما ليس كافيا أن تكون طيبا.الخطيئة ليست طيبة.وللقضاء عليها يجب أن تكون قاسيا وصارما
أريد أن أصدق أنهم جميعا مازالوا مؤمنين،إنما لست أنت من يحفظ لهم إيمانهم ،إنهم يحتفظون به بسبب الخرافة والخوف
السيد القسيس كونتلا”
“For a moment -- not even a moment, a split second -- I imagine him saying, 'The truth is, I'm desperately attracted to you.' And then I imagine myself spitting in his face. and then I imagine licking it off his cheek and kissing him. (Because I'm disturbed. Ask Anyone.)”
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