Death was like an unpleasant neighbor. You didn’t talk about him for fear he might hear you and decide to pay a visit. Except for stories, of course. Tales of poisoned kings and duels and old wars were fine. They dressed death in foreign
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“I wanted to see you again, touch you, know who you were, see if I would find you identical with the ideal image of you which had remained with me and perhaps shatter my dream with the aid of reality.
-Claude Frollo ”
― The Hunchback of Notre Dame
-Claude Frollo ”
― The Hunchback of Notre Dame
“Nothing makes a man so adventurous as an empty pocket.”
― The Hunchback of Notre Dame
― The Hunchback of Notre Dame
“Nor am I greatly moved by jocular inquiries such as, 'Where will you put all the mosquitoes?' -- a question to be answered on its own level by pointing out that, if the worst came to worst, a heaven for mosquitoes and a hell for men could very conveniently be combined.”
― The Problem of Pain
― The Problem of Pain
“What do you think?" shouted Razumihin, louder than ever, "you think I am attacking them for talking nonsense? Not a bit! I like them to talk nonsense. That's man's one privilege over all creation. Through error you come to the truth! I am a man because I err! You never reach any truth without making fourteen mistakes and very likely a hundred and fourteen. And a fine thing, too, in its way; but we can't even make mistakes on our own account! Talk nonsense, but talk your own nonsense, and I'll kiss you for it. To go wrong in one's own way is better than to go right in someone else's. In the first case you are a man, in the second you're no better than a bird. Truth won't escape you, but life can be cramped. There have been examples. And what are we doing now? In science, development, thought, invention, ideals, aims, liberalism, judgment, experience and everything, everything, everything, we are still in the preparatory class at school. We prefer to live on other people's ideas, it's what we are used to! Am I right, am I right?" cried Razumihin, pressing and shaking the two ladies' hands.”
― Crime and Punishment
― Crime and Punishment
“Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts,...Your affectionate uncle, Screwtape.”
― The Screwtape Letters
― The Screwtape Letters
Classics and the Western Canon
— 4956 members
— last activity 5 hours, 26 min ago
This is a group to read and discuss those books generally referred to as “the classics” or “the Western canon.” Books which have shaped Western though ...more
Reading the Church Fathers
— 330 members
— last activity Jan 02, 2025 09:30PM
There is an immense library of Christian philosophy, theology, history, apologetics, biblical commentary, and devotion written in the first seven cent ...more
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