"Friends, Romans, and countrymen, lend me your ears!"
(They were all of them fond of quotations:
So they drank to his health, and they gave him three cheers,
While he served out additional rations).--- Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the Snark.
On Life// On Science and Engineering// On Robotics// On Physics// On Education// On Love// On Language// On Literature// On Politics// On Religion// On Food//
When I was a very little boy, at the beginning of the dark ages, I used to memorize all the rules and regulations in the stories that were read to me. I knew with a divine perfection of knowledge that if I were given a mysterious box and told not to open it I should not open it; I knew that whenever I discovered a corpse in a private library I ought on no account to get my fingerprints on the gun; I knew that the foreman of any ranch owned by a pretty girl (that was what we called them then --- the charming creatures are extinct now) was a man to be wary of...
--- Gene Wolfe, quoted in "Arcs and Secants," Orbit 19.
For my part I consider that it is better to be adventurous than cautious, because fortune is a woman, and if you wish to keep her under it is necessary to beat and ill-use her; and it is seen that she allows herself to be mastered by the adventurous rather than by those who go to work more coldly. She is, therefore, always, woman-like, a lover of young men, because they are less cautious, more violent, and with more audacity command her.
--- Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, chapter XXV.
I was appalled to think that never in my life would I have an opportunity to stride down a gangplank in a panama hat and a white suit and go looking for a bar with a revolving ceiling fan. How crushingly unfair life can sometimes be.
--- Bill Bryson, Notes from a Small Island.
Important safety note: if you are explosively decompressed to vacuum, open your mouth and exhale immediately. (Fortunately, screaming in terror has just this effect.)
--- Geoffrey Landis (and S.J. Van Sickle) on sci.space.tech.
"You know, when I think about myself and the life I've led, I feel self-loathing, shame, disgust; I'm a waste and a failure," he says. "But when I imagine myself as a character in a novel, well, I think I'm pretty interesting: kind of off-beat, intriguing, entertaining."
--- Joe Frank, "Fat Man Down," Somewhere Out There.
If you go in business with somebody who causes your stomach to churn, you know, I say that's a lot like marrying for money, that it's probably not a very good idea under any circumstances, but it's absolutely crazy if you're already rich. Right? And so I'm not going to do it. I mean if I can add one percent or five percent to my net worth by being around people, you know, who make me want to throw up, I'm not interested.
--- Warren Buffett, Nightline interview with Ted Koppel, March 2, 1999.
Hamlet: Denmark's a prison.
Rosencrantz: Then is the world one.
Hamlet: A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons, Denmark being one o' the worst.
Rosencrantz: We think not so, my lord.
Hamlet: Why, then, 'tis none to you; for there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so: to me it is a prison.
Rosencrantz: Why then, your ambition makes it one; 'tis too narrow for your mind.
Hamlet: O God, I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.--- William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2.
Renault: And what in heaven's name brought you to Casablanca?
Rick: My health. I came to Casablanca for the waters.
Renault: Waters? What waters? We're in the desert.
Rick: I was misinformed.--- Casablanca.
"Yes, Harry, blessed as I am with extraordinary brainpower, I understood everything you just told me," said Dumbledore, a little sharply.
--- J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.
The governments of modern nations maintain military forces whose duties include preparing for and sometimes conducting operations designed to kill people and destroy property. Explosives are widely used for military purposes, and many devices have been developed for these purposes. Money for military research has been available for many years. It is interesting to note that Aristotle, Leonardo da Vinci, LaGrange, and many others had their work supported by governments for military applications.---William C. Davis, "Introduction to Explosives," in Explosive Effects and Applications, Jonas A. Zukas and William P. Walters, ed.
That's why it's always worth having a few philosophers around the place. One minute it's all Is Truth Beauty and Is Beauty Truth, and Does A Falling Tree in the Forest Make A Sound if There's No one There to Hear It, and then just when you think they're going to start dribbling one of 'em says, Incidentally, putting a thirty-foot parabolic reflector on a high place to shoot the rays of the sun at an enemy's ships would be a very interesting demonstration of optical principles.
--- Terry Pratchett, Small Gods.
One secret of Napoleon's success arose from his being free to make his own appointments, choosing the men who had the qualities which supplemented his and cured his own shortcomings, for every man has shortcomings. The universal genius who can manage all himself has yet to appear. Only one with the genius to recognise others of different genius and harness them to his own car can approach the "universal." It is a case of different but cooperating abilities, each part of the complicated machine fitting into its right place, and there performing its duty without jarring.---Andrew Carnegie, James Watt, Chapter 5.
The success of the environmental movement is driven by two powerful forces-- romanticism and science-- that are often in opposition. The romantics identify with natural systems; the scientists study natural systems. The romantics are moralistic, rebellious against the perceived dominant power, and combative against any who appear to stray from the true path. They hate to admit mistakes or change direction. The scientists are ethicalistic, rebellious against any perceived dominant paradigm, and combative against each other. For them, admitting mistakes is what science is.--- Stewart Brand, Technology Review, May 5, 2005.
And, he gave it for his Opinion, that whoever could make two Ears of Corn, or two blades of Grass to grow upon a Spot of Ground where only one grew before, would deserve better of Mankind, and do more essential Service to his Country than the whole Race of Politicians put together.
--- Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels, II.vii.
It looked like only a few of the bears knew how to use fire, and were carrying the others along. But isn't that how it is with everything?
--- Terry Bisson, "Bears Discover Fire."
An engineer? I had grown up among engineers, and I could remember the engineers of the twenties very well indeed: their open, shining intellects, their free and gentle humor, their agility and breadth of thought, the ease with which they shifted from one engineering field to another, and, for that matter, from technology to social concerns and art. Then, too, they personified good manners and delicacy of taste; well-bred speech that flowed evenly and was free of uncultured words; one of them might play a musical instrument, another dabble in painting; and their faces always bore a spiritual imprint.
--- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago.
Thomas Mann tells us that he wanted the hero of his novel, The Magic Mountain, to be simpleminded, innocent, and curious. So he made him an engineer. But he is curious, Mann says, "in a high sense of the word," and "the ordinary stuff of which he is made undergoes a heightening process that makes him capable of adventures in sensual, moral, intellectual spheres he would never have dreamed of..." A "heightening process" is all that is needed to transform today's engineers from the dullards that they appear to be into the demigods that they seem capable of becoming.
--- Samuel C. Florman, The Existential Pleasures of Engineering.
As with the tone-deaf, they don't know what they miss. They give a pitying chuckle at the news of scientists who have never read a major work of English literature. They dismiss them as ignorant specialists. Yet their own ignorance and their own specialization is just as startling. A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity at the illiteracy of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is about the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's?
I now believe that if I had asked an even simpler question -- such as, What do you mean by mass, or acceleration, which is the scientific equivalent of saying, Can you read? -- not more than one in ten of the highly educated would have felt that I was speaking the same language. So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had.
--- C. P. Snow, The Two Cultures.
And that you will find is the case with "scientists" as a class all the world over. What there is great about them is an annoyance to their fellow scientists and a mystery to the general public, and what is not is evident. There is no doubt about what is not great, no race of men have such obvious littlenesses. [...] And withal the reef of science that these little "scientists" built and are yet building is so wonderful, so portentous, so full of mysterious half-shapen promises for the mighty future of man! They do not seem to realise the things they are doing. No doubt long ago even Mr. Bensington, when he chose this calling, when he consecrated his life to the alkaloids and their kindred compounds had some inkling of the vision -- more than an inkling. Without some great inspiration, for such glories and positions only as a "scientist" may expect, what young man would have given his life to this work, as young men do? No, they must have seen the glory, they must have had the vision, but so near that it has blinded them, mercifully, so that for the rest of their lives they can hold the light of knowledge in comfort -- that we may see.
And perhaps it accounts for Redwood's touch of preoccupation, that -- there can be no doubt of it now -- he among his fellows was different; he was different inasmuch as something of the vision still lingered in his eyes.
--- H.G. Wells, The Food of the Gods, 1904.
I would rather discover a single fact, even a small one, than debate the great issues at length without discovering anything at all.
--- Galileo Galilei.
Amicus Plato amicus Aristoteles magis amica veritas. [Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my best friend is truth.]
--- Isaac Newton, undergraduate notebook, 1664.
I'm an engineer and I intend to take credit for what we can. I think the steam engine probably did more to free slaves than any human being. More than Abraham Lincoln did or U.S. Grant.
--- Gene Wolfe, quoted in an interview with James B. Jordan, 1992.
I suppose it is possible that the stereotype of the wicked scientist dissuades some youngsters from entering the profession, but the world today is so topsy-turvy that perhaps as many are attracted as are repelled by the prospect of a career of malefaction.
--- Sir Peter Medawar, Advice to a Young Scientist.
WHEN I heard the learn'd astronomer; When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me; When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them; When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room, How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick; Till rising and gliding out, I wander'd off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.
--- Walt Whitman, When I heard the Learn'd Astronomer.
When you saw him you felt drawn towards him by one of those moral attractions which scientists fortunately cannot yet analyze. They would find in it some phenomenon of galvanism or the activity of some fluid or other and they would express our feelings in a formula of proportions of oxygen and electricity.
--- Honore de Balzac, The Purse.
But although the doctrine itself has remained unquestioned by orthodox economists up to a late date, its signal failure for purposes of scientific prediction has greatly impaired, in the course of time, the prestige of its practitioners. For professional economists, after Malthus, were apparently unmoved by the lack of correspondence between the results of their theory and the facts of observation;---a discrepancy which the ordinary man has not failed to observe, with the result of his growing unwillingness to accord to economists that measure of respect which he gives to other groups of scientists whose theoretical results are confirmed by observation when they are applied to the facts.
--- John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, 1935.
Is it not fair to ask the technologist, not only to provide artefacts which work, but also to provide beauty, even in the common street, and above all, to provide fun? Otherwise technology will die of boredom. Let us have lots of ornament. Let there be figure-heads on ships, gilded rosettes on the spandrels of bridges, statues on buildings, crinolines on women, and, everywhere, lots and lots of flags.
--- J.E. Gordon, Structures, or Why Things Don't Fall Down, 1978, p. 373.
These things are pure science fiction! And yet they are all true.
--- M.O. Rabin, in a Harvard class on probabilistic algorithms, 1991.
'Am I already in the shadow of the Coming Race? and will the creatures who are to transcend and finally supersede us be steely organisms, giving out the effluvia of the laboratory, and performing with infallible exactness more than everything that we have performed with a slovenly approximativeness and self-defeating inaccuracy?'
--- George Eliot, The Impressions of Theophrastus Such, 1879.
You end up with a tremendous respect for a human being if you're a roboticist.
--- Joseph Engelberger, quoted in Robotics Age, 1985.
The Encyclopaedia Galactica defines a robot as a mechanical apparatus designed to do the work of a man. The Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation defines a robot as "Your plastic pal who's fun to be with."
--- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (radio script).
Total memory requirements are modest except for the sizable digital map requirements (50 to 100K bytes).-- W.E. Longenbaker, "Terrain-Aided Navigation of an Unpowered Tactical Missile Using Autopilot-Grade Sensors," J. Guidance, Vol. 7, No. 2, March-April 1984.
The other reason the TOE [Theory of Everything] phrase upset me is that it alienated many of our physics colleagues, some of whom had serious doubts about the subject [of string theory] anyway.
Quite understandably, it gave them the impression that people who work in this field are a very arrogant bunch. Actually, we are all very charming and delightful.
--- John Schwarz.
The idea of applying the inverse square law to deduce Kepler's laws predates Newton. It had occurred at least to Wren and Halley, as implied by a 1684 letter from the latter to Newton, and to Hooke, who put forth the law in a letter to Newton of January 6, 1680. (Anyone can aspire to write interesting letters, and many succeed in doing so; but to receive such letters all the time is a much more ambitious goal, which not many contemplate and only an exceptional few achieve.)
--- Lucio Russo, The Forgotten Revolution, p. 376.
Many people are aware of the Weak and Strong Anthropic Principles. The Weak One says, basically, that it was jolly amazing of the universe to be constructed in such a way that humans could evolve to a point where they could make a living in, for example, universities, while the Strong One says that, on the contrary, the whole point of the universe was that humans should not only work in universities but also write for huge sums books with words like 'Cosmic' and 'Chaos' in the titles.
--- Terry Pratchett, Hogfather, 1996.
It has been remarked in a jocular vein that if H stands for the Hamiltonian, K must stand for the Kamiltonian!
--- Herbert Goldstein, Classical Mechanics, second edition, p. 380. (Possibly the worst jocular remark ever made?)
Ludwig Boltzmann, who spent much of his life studying statistical mechanics, died in 1906, by his own hand. Paul Ehrenfest, carrying on the work, died similarly in 1933. Now it is our turn to study statistical mechanics.
--- David L. Goodstein, States of Matter.
The music of the heavens being eternal, Leonardo understood that friction is absent from the state of grace. Thus confined to this mortal world, friction is a consequence of original sin.
--- Brian Armstrong-Helouvry, Control of Machines with Friction.
Big whirls have little whirls which feed on their velocity;
Little whirls have smaller whirls and so on to viscosity.--- L. F. Richardson
I thought, "I'd better find out what this is about, because it's a prediction for a worldwide calamity in approximately 2007." And, as I read up more on it, I began to think, "What can I do? I'm a physicist-- I don't really do anything that helps anybody." Then I realized-- I can write a book.
--- David Goodstein, quoted in Caltech News, Volume 38, Number 2, 2004.
It was like something was deformed about him--but when you looked at him closely each part of him was normal and as it ought to be. Therefore if this difference was not in the body it was probably in the mind. He was like a man who had served a term in prison or had been to Harvard College or had lived for a long time with foreigners in South America. He was like a person who had been somewhere that other people are not likely to go or had done something that others are not apt to do.--- Carson McCullers, The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter.
While learning something new, many students will think, "Damn, this is hard for me. I wonder if I am stupid." Because stupidity is such an unthinkably terrible thing in our culture, the students will then spend hours constructing arguments that explain why they are intelligent yet are having difficulties. The moment you start down this path, you have lost your focus.
I used to have a boss named Rock. Rock had earned a degree in astrophysics from Cal Tech [sic] and had never had a job where he used his knowledge of the heavens. Once I asked him if he regretted getting his degree. "My absurd degree in astrophysics has proved to be very valuable," he said, "Some things in this world are just hard. When I am struggling with something, I sometimes think 'Damn, this is hard. I wonder if I am stupid,' and then I remember that I have a degree in astrophysics from Cal Tech; I must not be stupid."
--- Aaron Hillegass, Cocoa Programming for Mac OS X.
I regard a knowledge of every detail of the original Robinson Crusoe as well-nigh a necessity in education. Girls may occasionally be excused, but never boys.
--- Edward Everett Hale, Preface to The Brick Moon and Other Stories, 1899.
"The method employed I would gladly explain,
While I have it so clear in my head,
If I had but the time and you had but the brain--
But much yet remains to be said."--- Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the Snark.
Possibly Gilman ought not to have studied so hard. Non-Euclidean calculus and quantum physics are enough to stretch any brain; and when one mixes them with folklore, and tries to trace a strange background of multi-dimensional reality behind the ghoulish hints of the Gothic tales and the wild whispers of the chimney-corner, one can hardly expect to be wholly free from mental tension.
--- H.P. Lovecraft, The Dreams in the Witch-House.
The answer to every question [on a graduate student's oral candidacy exam] is either zero, one, or infinity.
--- Joel Burdick, personal communication.
Quantus tremor est futurus,
Quando judex est venturus,
Cuncta stricte discussurus!
Quid sum miser tunc dicturus?
Quem patronum rogaturus
Cum vix justus sit securus?
--- Excerpt from the Requiem Mass. (Used by me as an epigram during my engineering Ph.D. qualifying exams. Sometimes I kill myself.)
The wondrous power of flattery in passados at woman is a perception so universal as to be remarked upon by many people almost as automatically as they repeat a proverb, or say that they are Christians and the like, without thinking much of the enormous corollaries which spring from the proposition. Still less is it acted upon for the good of the complemental being alluded to. With the majority such an opinion is shelved with all those trite aphorisms which require some catastrophe to bring their tremendous meanings thoroughly home. When expressed with some amount of reflectiveness it seems coordinate with a belief that this flattery must be reasonable to be effective. It is to the credit of men that few attempt to settle the question by experiment, and it is for their happiness, perhaps, that accident has never settled it for them. Nevertheless, that a male dissembler who by deluging her with untenable fictions charms the female wisely, may acquire powers reaching to the extremity of perdition, is a truth taught to many by unsought and wringing occurrences. And some profess to have attained to the same knowledge by experiment as aforesaid, and jauntily continue their indulgence in such experiments with terrible effect.--- Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd.
For what did Cauchy know, or Christoffel,
Or Fourier, or any Boole or Euler,
With their compasses, their pens and rulers,
Of thy supernal sinusoidal spell?
--- Stanislaw Lem, The Cyberiad.
"Come and live on my boat with me and we will sail the Spanish Main together and I will tell you all about myself and frequently make love to you," he said at once. Out loud, however, all he could say was, "Uh... thanks for wiping my beard last night... uh..."
"Don't mention it," she said.
--- Avram Davidson, Sleep Well of Nights.
Many people claim to love inanimate objects. They say they love clothing from a particular store or a type of sandwich served at a specific restaurant or that restored Victorian over on Elm Street, the one with the porch swing. I've always thought that a statement like that was slightly dishonest, and that the more objects a person claimed to love, the less you could believe anything they said, whether it had to do with your new haircut or the latest release by R.E.M.
--- Christian Wardlaw, Edmund's Automobile Road Tests (from a review of the Mazda Miata)
When Winston Churchill wanted to rally the nation in 1940, it was to Anglo-Saxon that he turned: "We shall fight on the beaches; we shall fight on the landing grounds; we shall fight in the fields and the streets; we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." All of these stirring words came from Old English as spoken in the year 1000, with the exception of the last one, surrender, a French import which came with the Normans in 1066.
--- Robert Lacey and Danny Danziger, The Year 1000, p.30.
Ye knowe ek that in forme of speche is chaunge
Withinne a thousand yere, and wordes tho
That hadden pris, now wonder nyce and straunge
Us thinketh hem, and yit they spake hem so.
--- Geoffrey Chaucer, Troilus and Criseyde, Book 2, 22-25.
Verbing weirds language.
--- Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes.
The No-Initial-But-or-And shibboleth [...] asserts that no paragraph -- in an extreme variety, no sentence even -- may start with either of those conjunctions. Phooey. And did those feet, in ancient time trample all over England's green and pleasant language?
--- The Economist, December 21, 1996, p. 120.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen. [Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.]
--- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 1922.
Magic realism is fantasy written by people who speak Spanish.
--- Gene Wolfe, quoted in an interview with Brendan Baber, 1994.
The screaming, struggling civilian was a dark man with a face white as flour from fear. His eyes were pulsating in hectic desperation, flapping like bat's wings, as the many tall policemen seized him by the arms and legs and lifted him up. His books were spilled on the ground. "Help!" he shrieked shrilly in a voice strangling in its own emotion, as the policemen carried him to the open doors in the rear of the ambulance and threw him inside. "Police! Help! Police!" The doors were shut and bolted, and the ambulance raced away. There was a humorous irony in the ludicrous panic of the man screaming for help to the police while policemen were all around him. Yossarian smiled wryly at the futile and ridiculous cry for aid, then saw with a start that the words were ambiguous, realized with alarm that they were not, perhaps, intended as a call for police but as a heroic warning from the grave by a doomed friend to everyone who was not a policeman with a club and a gun and a mob of other policemen with clubs and guns to back him up. "Help! Police!" the man had cried, and he could have been shouting of danger.--- Joseph Heller, Catch-22, 1955.
I don't believe in the divine right of the womb. I see no reason why somebody that happens to win the ovarian lottery and come out of the right womb is entitled to fan themselves for the next 50 years or command the resources of society. If we're going to pick an Olympic team in the year 2000, I don't think we ought to take the eldest son or the eldest daughter of who won all the prizes in 1976 and put them on the team. I really believe in a meritocracy in athletics and I believe in a meritocracy in terms of who has the, who handles the resources of society. And we're a better society because that's the case. [...] I take the view, it's kind of interesting, you have people talk about the debilitating effect of food stamps on welfare recipients, the cycle of dependency and all of that sort of thing, but if you come out of the right womb, you're on welfare the day you're born. I mean instead of calling it a welfare officer you have a trust officer. Instead of calling it food stamps you have dividends and interest. But it's the same picture. And I really think that, I really think that everybody ought to start at fairly close to the same place.
--- Warren Buffett, Nightline interview with Ted Koppel, March 2, 1999.
The division of Europe into a number of independent states, connected, however, with each other by the general resemblance of religion, language, and manners, is productive of the most beneficial consequences to the liberty of mankind. A modern tyrant, who should find no resistance either in his own breast or in his people, would soon experience a gentle restraint from the example of his equals, the dread of present censure, the advice of his allies, and the apprehension of his enemies. The object of his displeasure, escaping from the narrow limits of his dominions, would easily obtain, in a happier climate, a secure refuge, a new fortune adequate to his merit, the freedom of complaint, and perhaps the means of revenge. But the empire of the Romans filled the world, and when that empire fell into the hands of a single person, the world became a safe and dreary prison for his enemies. The slave of Imperial despotism, whether he was condemned to drag his gilded chain in Rome and the senate, or to wear out a life of exile on the barren rock of Seriphus or the frozen banks of the Danube, expected his fate in silent despair. To resist was fatal, and it was impossible to fly. On every side he was encompassed with a vast extent of sea and land, which he could never hope to traverse without being discovered, seized, and restored to his irritated master. Beyond the frontiers his anxious view could discover nothing except the ocean, inhospitable deserts, hostile tribes of barbarians of fierce manners and unknown language, or dependent kings who would gladly purchase the emperor's protection by the sacrifice of an obnoxious fugitive.
--- Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
[I]t cannot be deny'd but that the naturall state of men, before they entr'd into Society, was a meer War, and that not simply, but a War of all men, against all men [... I]t were to be accounted a Miracle, if any, even the most strong should close up his life with many years, and old age. They of America are Examples hereof, even in this present Age: Other Nations have been in former Ages, which now indeed are become Civill, and Flourishing, but were then few, fierce, short-lived, poor, nasty, and destroy'd of all that Pleasure, and Beauty of life, which Peace and Society are wont to bring with them. Whosoever therefore holds, that it had been best to have continued in that state in which all things were lawfull for all men, he contradicts himself; for every man, by naturall necessity desires that which is good for him: nor is there any that esteemes a war of all against all, which necessarily adheres to such a State, to be good for him. And so it happens that through feare of each other we think it fit to rid our selves of this condition, and to get some fellowes; that if there needs must be war, it may not yet be against all men, nor without some helps.
--- Thomas Hobbes, De Cive.
The completeness of the Ricardian victory is something of a curiosity and a mystery. It must have been due to a complex of suitabilities in the doctrine to the environment into which it was projected. That it reached conclusions quite different from what the ordinary uninstructed person would expect, added, I suppose, to its intellectual prestige. That its teaching, translated into practice, was austere and often unpalatable, lent it virtue. That it was adapted to carry a vast and consistent logical superstructure, gave it beauty. That it could explain much social injustice and apparent cruelty as an inevitable incident in the scheme of progress, and the attempt to change such things as likely on the whole to do more harm than good, commended it to authority. That it afforded a measure of justification to the free activities of the individual capitalist, attracted to it the support of the dominant social force behind authority.
--- John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, 1935.
Major Major's father was a sober God-fearing man whose idea of a good joke was to lie about his age. He was a long-limbed farmer, a God-fearing, freedom-loving, law-abiding rugged individualist who held that federal aid to anyone but farmers was creeping socialism. He advocated thrift and hard work and disapproved of loose women who turned him down. His specialty was alfalfa, and he made a good thing out of not growing any. The government paid him well for every bushel of alfalfa he did not grow. The more alfalfa he did not grow, the more money the government gave him, and he spent every penny he didn't earn on new land to increase the amount of alfalfa he did not produce. Major Major's father worked without rest at not growing alfalfa. On long winter evenings he remained indoors and did not mend harness, and he sprang out of bed at the crack of noon every day just to make certain that the chores would not be done. He invested in land wisely and soon was not growing more alfalfa than any other man in the county. Neighbors sought him out for advice on all subjects, for he had made much money and was therefore wise. "As ye sow, so shall ye reap," he counseled one and all, and everyone said, "Amen."
Major Major's father was an outspoken champion of economy in government, provided it did not interfere with the sacred duty of government to pay farmers as much as they could get for all the alfalfa they produced that no one else wanted or for not producing any alfalfa at all. He was a proud and independent man who was opposed to unemployment insurance and never hesitated to whine, whimper, wheedle, and extort for as much as he could get from whomever he could. He was a devout man whose pulpit was everywhere.
"The Lord gave us good farmers two strong hands so that we could take as much as we could grab with both of them," he preached with ardor on the courthouse steps or in front of the A & P as he waited for the bad-tempered gum-chewing young cashier he was after to step outside and give him a nasty look. "If the Lord didn't want us to take as much as we could get," he preached, "He wouldn't have given us two good hands to take it with." And the others murmured, "Amen."
--- Joseph Heller, Catch-22, 1955.
She believed that God liked people in sailboats much better than He liked people in motorboats. She could not bear to look at a worm. When she saw a worm, she screamed.She was a fool, and so am I, and so is anyone who thinks he sees what God is Doing, [writes Bokonon].
--- Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle, 1963.
A wise man's heart is at his right hand; but a fool's heart at his left.
--- Ecclesiastes 10:2
Insofar as I may be heard by anything, which may or may not care what I say, I ask, if it matters, that you be forgiven for anything you may have done or failed to do which requires forgiveness. Conversely, if not forgiveness but something else may be required to insure any possible benefit for which you may be eligible after the destruction of your body, I ask that this, whatever it may be, be granted or withheld, as the case may be, in such a manner as to insure your receiving said benefit. I ask this in my capacity as your elected intermediary between yourself and that which may not be yourself, but which may have an interest in the matter of your receiving as much as it is possible for you to receive of this thing, and which may in some way be influenced by this ceremony. Amen.--- "The Agnostic's Prayer," Roger Zelazny, Creatures of Light and Darkness, 1969.
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth? Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
--- Ecclesiastes 3:20-22.
It may seem somewhat remarkable, that Bernard of Clairvaux, who records so many miracles of his friend St. Malachi, never takes any notice of his own, which, in their turn, however, are carefully related by his companions and disciples. In the long series of ecclesiastical history, does there exist a single instance of a saint asserting that he himself possessed the gift of miracles?
---Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chapter XV.
This inflexible perseverance, which appeared so odious or so ridiculous to the ancient world, assumes a more awful character, since Providence has deigned to reveal to us the mysterious history of the chosen people. But the devout and even scrupulous attachment to the Mosaic religion, so conspicuous among the Jews who lived under the second temple, becomes still more surprising, if it is compared with the stubborn incredulity of their forefathers. When the law was given in thunder from Mount Sinai, when the tides of the ocean and the course of the planets were suspended for the convenience of the Israelites, and when temporal rewards and punishments were the immediate consequences of their piety or disobedience, they perpetually relapsed into rebellion against the visible majesty of their Divine King, placed the idols of the nations in the sanctuary of Jehovah, and imitated every fantastic ceremony that was practised in the tents of the Arabs, or in the cities of Phoenicia. As the protection of Heaven was deservedly withdrawn from the ungrateful race, their faith acquired a proportionable degree of vigor and purity. The contemporaries of Moses and Joshua had beheld with careless indifference the most amazing miracles. Under the pressure of every calamity, the belief of those miracles has preserved the Jews of a later period from the universal contagion of idolatry; and in contradiction to every known principle of the human mind, that singular people seems to have yielded a stronger and more ready assent to the traditions of their remote ancestors, than to the evidence of their own senses.
--- Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chapter XV.
Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
But will they come when you do call for them?--- William Shakespeare, Henry IV Part 1, Act 3, Scene 1.
And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.
--- Genesis 11:5-8.
And he made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one brim to the other:
it was round all about, and his heightwas five cubits: and a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about.--- 1 Kings 7:23.
And when he was alone, they that were about him with the twelve asked of him the parable. And he said unto them, "Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables. That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing, they may hear and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them."
--- Mark 4:10-12. (Possibly this quote should be in the "Education" section.)
From coupler-flange to spindle-guide I see Thy Hand, O God --
Predestination in the stride o' yon connectin'-rod.--- Rudyard Kipling, ``M'Andrew's Hymn,'' The Seven Seas.
The pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America, I point the finger in their face and say, "You helped this [the September 11 terrorist attacks] happen."
--- Jerry Falwell, The 700 Club, September 13, 2001.
I sincerely regret that comments I made during a theological discussion on a Christian television program were taken out of their context and reported... I was sharing my burden for revival in America on a Christian TV program, intending to speak to a Christian audience from a theological perspective about the need for national repentance.
--- Jerry Falwell, "Why I Said What I Said," September 17, 2001. (So you see, Falwell's remarks were intended for consumption only by a Christian audience and were taken out of context. When he pointed his finger in the face of pagans, abortionists, feminists, gays, lesbians, and the ACLU, and said, "You helped this happen," he didn't think they were actually in the room.)
What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?
--- Lin Yutang.
Not long ago, we came up with an interesting set of facts: A billion hours ago, human life appeared on Earth. A billion minutes ago, Christianity emerged. A billion seconds ago, the Beatles changed music forever. A billion Coca-Colas ago was yesterday morning.
--- Roberto C. Goizueta, Coca-Cola Company 1997 annual report.
Oysters are supposed to be the first course. Or terrapin. Then the soup, then the fish, then the mushrooms or asparagus, then the roast, then the frozen punch, then the game, then the salad, then the creamed dessert, then the frozen dessert, then the cheese, then the fruit, and then hungry guests can get into the candy and nuts.
--- Judith Martin (Miss Manners), August 21, 1996.
"Its excellent flesh is very highly esteemed, and in Malaya it is reserved for the tables of princes. For this reason a relentless hunt goes on for this excellent animal that, like the manatee, its close relative, is becoming more and more rare.""If that is the case," said Conseil, in a serious vein, "this dugong may well be the last of its race, and perhaps it would be better to spare it, in the interest of science."
"Perhaps," answered the Canadian, "it will be better to hunt it, in the interest of the kitchen."
"Go ahead, Master Land," said the Captain.
--- Jules Verne, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.