Notable quotes, excerpts, and profound lines.

[astrangerhere]

But then I sigh, with a piece of Scripture
Tell them that God bids us to do evil for good;
And thus I clothe my naked villany
With odd old ends stolen out of Holy Writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.

Shakespeare, Richard III

[astrangerhere]

Its been more than a year, so bumping this thread with some new lines and a poem.

“Being an irreligious puritan and a rational mystic, I think it's irresponsible to let a belief think for you or a chemical dream for you.”

-Ursula K. Le Guin in the Afterward to The Farthest Shore

The Red Cockatoo

Sent as a present from Annam –
A red cockatoo,
Coloured like the peach-tree blossom,
Speaking with the speech of men.

And they did with it what is always done
To the learned and the eloquent:
They took a cage with stout bars
And shut it up inside.

Po Chu-I (772 -846), Translated by Arthur Waley

[nana77]

I don't know why but into https://www.organism.earth/, to me, the quotes stop after a couple of ones, https://www.organism.earth/library/ has many, and it works fine.

In Temporality (subject to the time-concept) Volition is an appearance (phenomenon), like every other appearance, an apparent element of the mechanism of living. It has no self-nature (is not as such): its only existence is its phenomenal absence.

Wei Wu Wei - All Else Is Bondage (1964)

[nana77]

It takes a good dose of humor to trasform the world's apparent chaos into a song of truth!

- Non-figurative story for Chaos (1991)
Moebius.

[j.p.s]

Negotiations for peace between the United States and Northern Afghanistan were entering the third year with hope held out that a place would shortly be agreed between the two sides at which to meet to start considering an agenda for the talks.

- Leonard Wibberly, The Mouse on Wall Street 1969, Chapter 1, third sentence.

[Loosheesh]

Little things comfort us because little things distress us.

- Blaise Pascal, Thoughts (unattributed translation)

Peu de chose nous console parce que peu de chose nous afflige.

- Blaise Pascal, Pensées

Spoiler:

A mere trifle consoles us, for a mere trifle distresses us.

- William Finlayson Trotter translation

A little matter consoles us, because a little matter afflicts us.

- Charles K Paul translation

[poohbear_nc]

The man appeared to be about as useful as a cat flap in a submarine.

Faithful Unto Death - Caroline Graham