Em

“The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds other life—another hunter, an angel or a demon, a delicate infant or a tottering old man, a fairy or a demigod—there’s only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them. In this forest, hell is other people. An eternal threat that any life that exposes its own existence will be swiftly wiped out. This is the picture of cosmic civilization. It’s the explanation for the Fermi Paradox.”
― Liu Cixin, The Dark Forest

“You confuse not speaking with not listening.”
― Gregory Maguire, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

“Words are finite organs of the infinite mind.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature

“He read while he walked. He read while he ate. The other librarians suspected he somehow read while he slept, or perhaps didn't sleep at all.”
― Laini Taylor, Strange the Dreamer