John

“They are made to believe they cannot behave without their imaginary friend watching over them. Some of them set out to demonstrate this too. They feel they have no purpose without this magic father in the sky, and their leaders make it so they are too weak willed to have any purpose other than being steered like a herd of tranquilized cattle. Looking to an imaginary paradise, which will never come, they pledge their real lives to slavery, keeping themselves captive.”
― Damien Ba'al, The Satanic Narratives: A Modern Satanic Bible

“is drilled into us that having too much fun is wrong. Quite the contrary, it is the entire point of being alive. As life serves no particular purpose other than to perpetuate itself, we must all find our own meaning. The”
― Damien Ba'al, The Satanic Narratives: A Modern Satanic Bible

“The high and humble crowded into the sept together to pray.”
― George R.R. Martin, A Clash of Kings

“It's tempting to trivialize the power of metaphors. To each of the earlier examples, the natural response is to say, "Well, of course the right metaphor is more useful. The other metaphor was wrong!" Though that's a natural reaction, it's simplistic. The history of science isn't a series of switches from the "wrong" metaphor to the "right" one. It's a series of changes from "worse" metaphors to "better" ones, from less inclusive to more inclusive, from suggestive in one area to suggestive in another.”
― Steve McConnell, Code Complete