Paul Hoffman

“We are all cynics now, I suppose, and even a mewling infant knows that to save a life is to make an eternal enemy.”

“Whatever discoveries have been made in the land of self-delusion, many undiscovered regions remain to be explored.”

“In such a beast as this..." (he means the army)"...it was the collective power that went, collapsing like a long-exhausted animal, at once falling under its own weight as much as that of its enemy. It was a collective death and not a matter of bravery or even strength, and once it was down it was finished as a battle.”

“The battle had been as hideous as you might expect between one side who were simply not afraid to die and another who regarded death as merely a door to the eternal life.”

“...and what is a good weapon but a good idea made murderous flesh?”

“Sometimes, war being the unjust and drastic creature it is, those in whom he invested hopes took an arrow in the chest, the useless, by chance, thrived to irritate him another day.”

“It is not against reason, said the Englishman, to prefer the destruction of the world to a scratch on your finger – how much easier to understand the same price for the gash in your soul.”

“Feeling sorry for yourself is a universal solvent of salvation.”

“Self-pity, while it should be accorded due respect, is the greatest of all acids to the human soul.”

“...the heart of a child can take forty-nine blows before it’s damaged for ever and what’s done can never be undone.”

“Even for the very clever it can be like breaking bones to stand back from something that’s been in front of you all your life.”

“Do you have any idea how mad you sound?’‘Indeed I do. I have in moments of doubt considered the question of my sanity.’ (...)‘And?’‘Then I consider what a piece of work is man. How defective in reason, how mean his facilities, how ugly in form and movement, in action how like a devil, in apprehension how like a cow. The beauty of the world? The paragon of animals? To me the quintessence of dust.”

“Many are called, few are chosen.”

“Full many a flower is born to blush unseen and waste its sweetness on the desert air.”

“Hypocrites,’ replied Cale, ‘I’ve come across a lot of them recently. I mean by that I understand now how many of them there are.”

“The heart of a man is a small thing but it desires great matters. It is not big enough for a dog’s dinner but the whole world is not big enough for it. Man spares nothing that lives; he kills to feed himself, he kills to clothe himself, he kills to adorn himself, he kills to attack, he kills to defend himself, he kills to instruct himself, he kills to amuse himself, he kills for the sake of killing. From the lamb he tears its guts and makes his harp resound; from the wolf his most deadly tooth to polish his pretty works of art; from the elephant his tusks to make a toy for his child.(...)And who will exterminate him who exterminates all others?”

“...the older I get, the more I believe that if love is to be judged by most of its visible effects, it looks more like hatred than friendship.”

“I have a message for your daughter,” said Cale. “I am bound to her with cables that not even God can break. One day, if there is a soft breeze on her cheek, it may be my breath; one night, if the cool wind plays with her hair, it may be my shadow passing by.” And with this terrible threat he faced forward and the procession started once more. In less than a minute they were gone. In her shady room Arbell Swan-Neck stood white and cold as alabaster.”

“...this refinement and delicacy were what Cale adored; but Cale had been beaten into shape, hammered in dreadful fires of fear and pain. How could she be with him for long? A secret part of Arbell had been searching for some time for a way to leave her lover—although she was unaware of this, it is only fair to record. And so as Cale waited for her to save him while he worked out a way of saving her, she had already chosen the bitter but reasonable path of the good, of the many over the one...”

“...Again she did not seem to hear, still looking into Cale’s eyes. Then slowly, hopelessly, she dropped her gaze. “I understand,” she said. It was that, of course, that pierced him as if she had stabbed him through the heart. To him it was the sound of lost faith and it was unendurable. He felt he’d become a kind of god in her eyes, and it was simply impossible to give up her adoration.”

“t was once famously said that it is as well that wars are so ruinously expensive, else we would never stop fighting them. However well said, it seems also to be endlessly forgotten that, while there may be just wars and unjust wars, there are never any cheap wars.”

“- Why you?- (...) I’m the best.- Modest of you.- I am the best. Modesty has nothing to say about it.”

“... If the dead can come back to this earth and move unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you; in the garish day and in the darkest night—amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours—always, always; and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or if the cool air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.”

“Force is as pitiless to the man who possesses it as it is to its victims—the second it crushes, the first it intoxicates.”

“Until two days ago what had driven him was the will to survive: deep, animal, full of rage—but always part of him had not cared at all whether he lived or died. Now he did care, and very deeply, and so for the first time in a long time he was afraid. To love life is, of course, a wonderful thing, but not on this day of all days.”

“...his soul (was) ringing like a well-struck bell. But it was a bell that rang with more than joy and adoration — there was the sound there too of anger and resentment. She would not look at him because she did not want to be in his presence. She hated him and he (how could he not?) hated her in return.”

“(Arbell)The ungrateful gorgeous bitch.”

“Get on your feet or die.”

“Better a live dog than a dead lion.”

“The wicked have weakness other than their willingness to kill and maim. Even the bleakest, cruelest soul can have its tender spots. Even the harshest desert has its pools, its shady trees and gentle streams.”

“Lidské srdce je malé, touží ale po velkých věcech. Nestačí ani zasytit psa, ale celý svět pro něj není dost velký.”

“Bůh není nějaký kriminálník, který podvádí v kartách. Chce, abychom se jeho zákony řídili svobodně, z vlastní vůle. Ani Bůh nedokáže nakreslit kulatý čtverec. Bůh je osamělý - chce, aby si lidé poslušnost sami zvolili, a ne aby k ní byli přinuceni strachem.”

“Nemá smysl zlobit se na někoho za to, že je sám sebou a stará se o vlastní zájmy.”

“Nikdy nepřerušuj nepřítele, když se dopouští omylu.”

“To be sociable is a risky thing—even fatal—because it means being in contact with people, most of whom are dull, perverse and ignorant and are really with you only because they cannot bear their own company. Most people bore themselves and greet you not as a true friend but as a distraction—like a dancing dog or some half-wit actorwith a fund of amusing stories.”

“You're the right colour for the Angel of Death, Mister Cale. But a little short.' 'I could cut your head off and stand on it. Then I'd be taller.”

“Think of how strange the colours and sights of the world would be for a blind man abruptly made to see or a man deaf from birth hearing the playing of a hundred flutes”

“How can I know for sure if it's my son speaking and not you?""You never can, my lord. Just as no man can ever be sure that he alone is a thinking and feeling creature and everyone else a machine that only pretends to feel and think.”

“Where have you come from boy?'He looked at her again.'From hell, to take you away in the night and eat you.”

“What are those humps on her chest?”

“Cuanto más viejo me hago más propenso a creer que si el amor ha de juzgarse por sus efectos visibles, se parece más al odio que a la amistad.”

“Estoy unido a ella por lazos que ni siquiera Dios puede romper. Un día, si una suave brisa le acaricia la mejilla, puede que sea mi aliento; y si una noche el fresco aire juega con su pelo, será mi espíritu el que pasa a su lado.”

“La fuerza es tan despiadada con quien la posee como con quien la sufre: a este lo aplasta, al primero lo envenena.”

“Cuando uno les demuestra a los demás que están equivocados, los demás lo odian a uno por ello.”

“Ser sociable es muy arriesgado, incluso fatal, porque supone estar en contacto con personas, la mayor parte de las cuales son aburridas, perversas o ignorantes, y sólo lo buscan a uno porque no soportan su propia compañía. La mayor parte se aburren a sí mismos y reciben a los demás no como a verdaderos amigos, sino como una distracción...”

“La soledad es algo maravilloso (...), por dos motivos: primero porque le permite a un hombre estar consigo mismo; y segundo porque se libra de estar con los demás.”

“... los hombres importantes tienen responsabilidades importantes, y la de no mantener su palabra es una de ellas.”

“Como muchos hombres inteligentes, cree que los demás son idiotas.”

“...la solución a todo problema es siempre otro problema.”

“Listen. The Sanctuary of the Redeemers on Shotover Scarp is named after a damned lie for there is no redemption that goes on there and less sanctuary”