Camelia > Camelia's Quotes

“It is not by way of language that I shall transmit what is within me; for it is inexpressible in words. I can but signify this insofar as you may understand it through other channels than the spoken word; by love's miracle or because, born of the same God, we are akin. Else I have to drag it out, laboriously--that sunken world within me. And thus, as my clumsiness avails, I display this or that aspect alone--as in the case of my mountain, of which I may say merely that it is high. But it is far more than that, and behind those weak words I have in mind the far-flung glory of the night when one stands on the heights, alone and shivering, amongst the stars.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Citadelle

“N'espere rien de l'homme s'il travaille pour sa propre vie et non pour son eternite.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Citadelle

“...through reading, the modern man succeeds in obtaining an "escape from time" comparable to the "emegence from time" effected by myths. (...) Reading projects him out if his personal duration and incorporates him into other rythms, makes him live in another "history".”
― Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion

“Oh, if only it were possible to find understanding,” Joseph exclaimed. “If only there were a dogma to believe in. Everything is contradictory, everything tangential; there are no certainties anywhere. Everything can be interpreted one way and then again interpreted in the opposite sense. The whole of world history can be explained as development and progress and can also be seen as nothing but decadence and meaninglessness. Isn’t there any truth? Is there no real and valid doctrine?”

The master had never heard him speak so fervently. He walked on in silence for a little, then said: “There is truth, my boy. But the doctrine you desire, absolute, perfect dogma that alone provides wisdom, does not exist. Nor should you long for a perfect doctrine, my friend. Rather, you should long for the perfection of yourself. The deity is within you, not in ideas and books. Truth is lived, not taught. Be prepared for conflicts, Joseph Knecht - I can see that they already have begun.”
― Hermann Hesse, The Glass Bead Game

“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Proper teaching is recognized with ease. You can know it without fail because it awakens within you that sensation which tells you this is something you have always known.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“There should be a science of discontent. People need hard times to develop psychic muscles. -- Muad'Dib”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“The mind commands the body and it obeys. The mind orders itself and meets resistance.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“It is so shocking to find out how many people do not believe that they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“The mystery of life isn't a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Absolute power does not corrupt absolutely, absolute power attracts the corruptible.”
― Frank Herbert

“There is no escape—we pay for the violence of our ancestors.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Education is no substitute for intelligence.”
― Frank Herbert

“Hope clouds observation.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“It is impossible to live in the past, difficult to live in the present and a waste to live in the future.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“The people who can destroy a thing, they control it.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Fear is the mind-killer.”
― Frank Herbert , Dune

“Survival is the ability to swim in strange water.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Try looking into that place where you dare not look! You'll find me there, staring out at you!”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Arrakis teaches the attitude of the knife - chopping off what's incomplete and saying: 'Now, it's complete because it's ended here.'

- from "Collected Sayings of Maud'Dib'' by the Princess Irulan”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises—no matter the mood! Mood's a thing for cattle or making love or playing the baliset. It's not for fighting.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“If wishes were fishes, we'd all cast nets.”
― Frank Herbert, The Dune Storybook

“A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. ”
― Frank Herbert

“It's easier to be terrified by an enemy you admire.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“I am like a person whose hands were kept numb, without sensation from the first moment of awareness - until one day the ability to feel is forced into them. And I say "Look! I have no hands!" But the people all around me say: "What are hands?”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Humans are almost always lonely.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune

“To endure oneself may be the hardest task in the universe.”
― Frank Herbert

“I see us giving love to each other in a time of quiet between storms. It's what we were meant to do.”
― Frank Herbert, Dune