farah k

“But when the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the state, will be of no service. They will become flatterers instead of legislators; the instruments, not the guides, of the people. If any of them should happen to propose a scheme of liberty, soberly limited, and defined with proper qualifications, he will be immediately outbid by his competitors, who will produce something more splendidly popular. Suspicions will be raised of his fidelity to his cause. Moderation will be stigmatized as the virtue of cowards; and compromise as the prudence of traitors; until, in hopes of preserving the credit which may enable him to temper, and moderate, on some occasions, the popular leader is obliged to become active in propagating doctrines, and establishing powers, that will afterwards defeat any sober purpose at which he ultimately might have aimed.”
― Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France

“My life... my life has got to be like this. It's got to keep going up.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

“Too many writers write for the wrong reasons.
They want to get famous or they want to get rich or they want to get laid by the girls with bluebells in their hair...
When everything works best, it's not because you chose writing, but because writing chose you. It's when you're mad with it. When it's stuffed in your ears, nostrils, under your finger nails.
It's when there's no hope but that.”
― Charles Bukowski

“There is nothing more magic and beautiful than lines forming across paper. It's all there is. It's all there ever was.”
― Charles Bukowski, On Writing