The Sunset Limited

I don't believe in God. Can you understand that? Look around you man. Cant you see? The clamor and din of those in torment has to be the sound most pleasing to his ear. And I loathe these discussions. The argument of the village atheist whose single passion is to revile endlessly that which he denies the existence of in the first place. Your fellowship is a fellowship of pain and nothing more. And if that pain were actually collective instead of simply reiterative then the sheer weight of it would drag the world from the walls of the universe and send it crashing and burning through whatever night it might yet be capable of engendering until it was not even ash. And justice? Brotherhood? Eternal life? Good god, man. Show me a religion that prepares one for death. For nothingness. There's a church I might enter. Yours prepares one only for more life. For dreams and illusions and lies. If you could banish the fear of death from men's hearts they wouldnt live a day. Who would want this nightmare if not for fear of the next? The shadow of the axe hangs over every joy. Every road ends in death. Or worse. Every friendship. Every love. Torment, betrayal, loss, suffering, pain, age, indignity, and hideous lingering illness. All with a single conclusion. For you and for every one and everything that you have chosen to care for. There's the true brotherhood. The true fellowship. And everyone is a member for life. You tell me that my brother is my salvation? My salvation? Well then damn him. Damn him in every shape and form and guise. Do I see myself in him? Yes. I do. And what I see sickens me. Do you understand me? Can you understand me?

You give up the world line by line. Stoically. And then one day you realize that your courage is farcical. It doesn't mean anything. You've become an accomplice in your own annihilation and there is nothing you can do about it. Everything you do closes a door somewhere ahead of you. And finally there is only one door left.

Probably I dont believe in a lot of things that I used to believe in but that doesnt mean I dont believe in anything.

I got what I needed instead of what I wanted and that's just about the best kind of luck you can have.

It is personal. That's what an education does. It makes the world personal.

I yearn for the darkness. I pray for death. Real death. If I thought that in death I would meet the people I've known in life I don't know what I'd do. That would be the ultimate horror. The ultimate despair. If I had to meet my mother again and start all of that all over, only this time without the prospect of death to look forward to? Well. That would be the final nightmare. Kafka on wheels.

The things that I loved were very frail. Very fragile. I didn't know that. I thought they were indestructible. They weren't.

Your god must once have stood at a dawn of infinite possibilities, and this is what he's made of it. You tell me that I want God's love? I don't. Perhaps I want forgiveness, but there's no-one to ask it of. And there's no going back, there's no setting things right, there's only the hope of nothingness.

Every road ends in death. Or worse. Every friendship. Every love. Torment, betrayal, loss, suffering, pain, age, indignity, and hideous lingering illness. All with a single conclusion. For you and for every one and every thing that you have chosen to care for. There's the true brotherhood. The true fellowship. And everyone is a member for life. You tell me that my brother is my salvation? My salvation? Well then damn him. Damn him in every shape and form and guise. Do I see myself in him? Yes. I do. And what I see sickens me. Do you understand me? Can you understand me?

Rage is really only for the good days. The truth is there's little of that left. the truth is that the forms I see have been slowly emptied out. They no longer have any content. They are shapes only. A train, a wall, a world. Or a man. A thing dangling in senseless articulation in a howling void. No meaning to its life. Its words. Why would I seek the company of such a thing? Why?

I look for the words, Professor. I look for the words because I believe that the words is the way to your heart.

Maybe you could just keep that in reserve. Maybe just take a shot at startin over. I dont mean start again. Everybody’s done that. Over means over. It means you walk away. I mean, if everthing you are and everthing you have and everthing you have done has brought you at last to the bottom of a whiskey bottle or bought you a one way ticket on the Sunset Limited then you cant give me the first reason on God’s earth for salvagin none of it. Cause they aint no reason. And I’m goin to tell you that if you can bring yourself to shut the door on all of that it will be cold and it will be lonely and they’ll be a mean wind blowin. And them is all good signs. You dont say nothin. You just turn up your collar and keep walkin.

I ain't got an original thought in my head. If it ain't got the scent of divinity to it, I ain't interested in it

The things I believed in dont exist any more. It's foolish to pretend that they do. Western Civilization finally went up in smoke in the chimneys at Dachau but I was too infatuated to see it. I see it now.

Maybe it's not logical. I don't know. I don't care. I've been asked didnt I think it odd that I should be present to witness the death of everything and I do think it's odd but that doesnt mean it's not so. Someone has to be here.

Evolution cannot avoid bringing intelligent life ultimately to an awareness of one thing above all else and that one thing is futility.

I dont think you havin a bad day, Professor. I think you havin a bad life.

I want the dead to be dead forever. I don't want to be one of them, Except of course you can't be one of them. You can't be one of the dead because that which, has no existence can have no community. No community! My heart warms just thinking about it-- blackness, aloneness ,silence, peace, and all of it only a heartbeat away.

Sometimes faith might just be a case of not havin nothin else left.

Me preguntaba de qué soy profesor. Bien, yo profeso la oscuridad. Esa noche disfrazada de día. Y ahora, le deseo lo mejor pero debo irme.

I'm glad to hear you say that, Professor. Cause I aint sure either. I just get more amazed by the minute, that's all. How come you cant see yourself, honey? You plain as glass. I can see the wheels turnin in there. The gears. And I can se the light too. Good light. True light. Cant you see it?

No, Professor, it aint nothin like that. You dont have to be virtuous. You just has to be quiet. I cant speak for the Lord but the experience I've had leads me to believe that he'll speak to anybody that'll listen. You damn sure aint got to be virtuous.

White: Well you surprise me. And you've come to what conclusions? Black: I aint. I'm still thinkin. White: Yes. Well, I'm not. Black: Things can change. White: No they cant. Black: You could be wrong. White: I dont think so. Black: But that aint somethin you have a lot of in your life. White: What isnt? Black: Being wrong. White: I admit it when I'm wrong. Black: I dont think so. White: Well, you're entitled to your opinion.

Black: So how come they cant be your brothers in despair and selfdestruction? I thought misery loved company? White: I'm sure I don't know. Black: Well let me take a shot at it. White: Be my guest. Black: What I think is that you got better reasons then them. I mean, their reasons is just that they dont like it here, but yours says what they is not to like and why not to like it. You got more intelligent reasons. More elegant reasons.

Black: If this aint the life you had in mind, what was? White: I dont know. Not this. Is your life the one you'd planned? Black: No, it aint. I got what I needed instead of what I wanted and that's just about the best kind of luck you can have.

The soul might be silent but the servant of the soul has always got a voice and it has got one for a reason.

White: We were born in such a fix as this. Suffering and human destiny are the same thing. Each is a description of the other. Black: We aint talkin about sufferin. We talkin about bein happy. White: Well you cant be happy if you're in pain. Black: Why not?