Quotes by British Authors - Page 156

Once upon a time there was a young prince who believed in all things but three. He did not believe in princesses, he did not believe in islands, he did not believe in God. His father, the king, told him that such things did not exist. As there were no princesses or islands in his father's domains, and no sign of God, the young prince believed his father.But then, one day, the prince ran away from his palace. He came to the next land. There, to his astonishment, from every coast he saw islands, and on these islands, strange and troubling creatures whom he dared not name. As he was searching for a boat, a man in full evening dress approached him along the shore.Are those real islands?' asked the young prince.Of course they are real islands,' said the man in evening dress.And those strange and troubling creatures?'They are all genuine and authentic princesses.'Then God must exist!' cried the prince.I am God,' replied the man in full evening dress, with a bow.The young prince returned home as quickly as he could.So you are back,' said the father, the king.I have seen islands, I have seen princesses, I have seen God,' said the prince reproachfully. The king was unmoved.Neither real islands, nor real princesses, I have seen God,' said the prince reproachfully.The king was unmoved.Neither real islands, nor real princesses, nor a real God exist.'I saw them!'Tell me how God was dressed.'God was in full evening dress.'Were the sleeves of his coat rolled back?'The prince remembered that they had been. The king smiled.That is the uniform of a magician. You have been deceived.'At this, the prince returned to the next land, and went to the same shore, where once again he came upon the man in full evening dress.My father the king has told me who you are,' said the young prince indignantly. 'You deceived me last time, but not again. Now I know that those are not real islands and real princesses, because you are a magician.'The man on the shore smiled.It is you who are deceived, my boy. In your father's kingdom there are many islands and many princesses. But you are under your father's spell, so you cannot see them.'The prince pensively returned home. When he saw his father, he looked him in the eyes.Father, is it true that you are not a real king, but only a magician?'The king smiled, and rolled back his sleeves.Yes, my son, I am only a magician.'Then the man on the shore was God.'The man on the shore was another magician.'I must know the real truth, the truth beyond magic.'There is no truth beyond magic,' said the king.The prince was full of sadness.He said, 'I will kill myself.'The king by magic caused death to appear. Death stood in the door and beckoned to the prince. The prince shuddered. He remembered the beautiful but unreal islands and the unreal but beautiful princesses.Very well,' he said. 'I can bear it.'You see, my son,' said the king, 'you too now begin to be a magician.
John Fowles
There is only one thing to be done," went on the old lady, "be simple and quiet. Whenever your soul begins to be disturbed and anxious, put yourself in His Hands, and refuse to decide for yourself. It is easy, so easy.
Robert Hugh Benson
When an artist friend of mine explained she was working her way up the creative ladder, I asked if she would kindly paint the front of my house on the way up.
Benny Bellamacina
Social media allows us to subjugate feelings and problems we don't want to confront, like emotional eating or substance abuse, thus perpetuating our problems and delaying our happiness.
Sam Owen
In fact, over the last twenty years, authors have offered up over nine thousand different systems, languages, principles, and paradigms to help explain the mysteries of management and leadership.
Marcus Buckingham
But, oh, when gloomy doubts prevail,I fear to call thee mine;The springs of comfort seem to fail,And all my hopes decline.Yet, gracious God, where shall I flee?Thou art my only trust;And still my soul would cleave to thee,Though prostrate in the dust.
Anne Steele
You know that when ex-military personnel start assassinating their own government's agents that something funky is going on.
Steven Magee
People show you who they are, not by what they say, but by what they do.
Jane Green
There is no matter what children should learn first, any more than what leg you should put into your breeches first. Sir, you may stand disputing which is best to put in first, but in the meantime your backside is bare. Sire, while you stand considering which of two things you should teach your child first, another boy has learn't 'em both.
Samuel Johnson
Escape? There is one unwatched way: your eyes. O Beauty! Keep me good that secret gate.
Wilfred Owen
Without tact you can learn nothing.
Benjamin Disraeli
The anthropologists got it wrong when they named our species Homo sapiens ('wise man'). In any case it's an arrogant and bigheaded thing to say, wisdom being one of our least evident features. In reality, we are Pan narrans, the storytelling chimpanzee.
Terry Pratchett
NAMING THE EARTH(a poem of light for national poetry day)And the world will be born againin circles of steaming breathand beams of lightas each one of us directsour inner eyeupon its name.Hear the cry of wings,the sigh of leaves and grass,smell the new sweet mist risingas the pathway is cleared at last.Stones stand ready -they have knownsince ages and ages agothat they were not alone.Water carries the planet's energyinto skies and down to earth and bones.The cold parts steadily as we come together,bodies and hearts warm,hands tingling.We are silentbut our eyes are singing.We look, we feel, we know,we trust each other's souls,we have no need to speak.Not now, but later,when the time is right,the name will ringwithin the iron coreof each other's listening -and the very earth's being.Every creature, every plant,will hear it calling,tolling like a bell -a sound we've always feltbut never dared to hopeto hear reverberating -true at last, at every levelof existence.The poets come togetherto open the intimate centre.Believein life and air -breathe the light itself,for these are the energiesand rhythms that we needto see, to touch, to reach,to identify, to say, the NAME.Colours on your skinfuse and dissolve -leave the river cleanfor pure space and timeto enter and flow in.We all become one fluid streamof stillness and motion,of flaring thoughtpulses discoveringweird pools and twists withinwhere darkness hidesfrom the flames in our eyesbut will not snare us.We probe deeper still,journeying towards a unitywhich will be more rawand yet also more formedthan anything writtenor spoken before.Our fragile bodiesfall away -and the trees, and the roots of trees,guide us -lead us awayfrom the faces we rememberseeing each day in the mirror -into an oceanof dreamsseething with warmth,love,where the beginningis real,ripe, evolving.And the world is born againin circles of steaming breathand beams of light.An ache - a signal -a trembling moment -and the time is rightto say the name.We sing as one wholevoice of the universal -all the words, the namesof every tiny thirsting thing,and they ring out togetheras one sound,one energy, one sense,one vibration, one breath.And the world listens,beats, shines, glows -IS -Exists!
Jay Woodman
Thine are these orbs of light and shade;Thou madest Life in man and brute;Thou madest Death; and lo, thy footIs on the skull which thou hast made.
Alfred Tennyson
...but he is a man, hence cannot see how tiresome it is to have explained at length what one has already fully understood.
Diane Setterfield
…having once seen him put forth his strength in battle, methinks I could know him again among a thousand warriors. He rushes into the fray as if he were summoned to a banquet. There is more than mere strength--there seems as if the whole soul and spirit of the champion were given to every blow which he deals upon his enemies. God assoilzie him of the sin of bloodshed! It is fearful, yet magnificent, to behold how the arm and heart of one man can triumph over hundreds.
Walter Scott
What is history? Any thoughts, Webster?''History is the lies of the victors,' I replied, a little too quickly.'Yes, I was rather afraid you'd say that. Well, as long as you remember that it is also the self-delusions of the defeated. ...'Finn?''"History is that certainty produced at the point where the imperfections of memory meet the inadequacies of documentation." (quoting Patrick Lagrange)
Julian Barnes
Alone all day, Juniper would remember the animals and places he loved, and hold them in his own heart before the great Heart that made them. He was learning to find quietness inside himself. He was learning to pray.
Margaret McAllister
I don't know, Benes. I'm not sure I've ever really understood women for that kind of commitment.' He flipped his beer mat up int the air with his index finger and caught it in his hand.
F.C. Malby
Nothing in our culture, not even home computers, is more overrated than the epidermal felicity of two featherless bipeds in desperate congress.
Quentin Crisp
She told me it was unlucky to share a reading with others, but the main point, the one I don't mind mentioning because it seems relevant to the story, is that she said I had a kind of evil spirit following me. 'Obviously,' she added, 'that sucks. But if we get you some amber—
Olivia Sudjic
What if it rained or you felt a bit glandy? It just wasn't practical. Better by far to simply try and be good and courageous and bold and to make a difference. Not change the world exactly, but the bit around you.
David Nicholls
I suppose that one reason I have always detested religion is its sly tendency to insinuate the idea that the universe is designed with 'you' in mind or, even worse, that there is a divine plan into which one fits whether one knows it or not. This kind of modesty is too arrogant for me.
Christopher Hitchens
A work of art is somehow organic, and to slash a painting or smash a statue is not just an offence against property: it is an offence against life.
Anthony Burgess
To an eagle or to an owl or to a rabbit, man must seem a masterful and yet a forlorn animal; he has but two friends. In his almost universal unpopularity he points out, with pride, that these two are the dog and the horse. He believes, with an innocence peculiar to himself, that they are equally proud of this alleged confraternity. He says, 'Look at my two noble friends -- they are dumb, but they are loyal.' I have for years suspected that they are only tolerant.
Beryl Markham
It's always nice being wanted. Even if it's by the wrong person.
Tabitha Suzuma
But books, when you want to buy them, are costly and, when you need to sell them, valueless.
Gerald Kersh
I don't think it matters who you love, just as long as you love. Who cares whether it's a man or a woman? Why does that have anything more to do with the person inside than the color of someone's skin? Personally, I'm pretty fucking disappointed that I seem to be one hundred percent heterosexual.
Jane Green
Virtue is the fount whence honor springs.
Christopher Marlowe
The truth, he thought, has never been of any real value to any human being - it is a symbol for mathematicians and philosophers to pursue. In human relations kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths.
Graham Greene
Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger.
J.R.R. Tolkien
There is no such thing as inevitable war. If war comes it will be from failure of human wisdom.
Bonar Law
To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again: and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself -- that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word 'doublethink' involved the use of doublethink.
George Orwell
never put all the good people in one plane, ship, train .....
Jay Woodman
Always let your talent and tenacity do the talking. Never your tantrums or sense of self righteousness or entitlement. For it is your talent and tenacity that will carve out, shape and seal your possibilities and destiny.
Rasheed Ogunlaru
My father used to say, 'If you want to know the artist, look at the art'. He was usually talking about Stanley Matthews or Don Bradman when he said it.
David Peace
The words 'believe' and 'repent' are now largely replaced by other terms such as "Give your life to Christ', 'Open your heart to Christ', 'Do it now', 'Surrender completely', 'Decide for Christ', etc., and in similar language those who profess conversion are sometimes represented as having 'given in'.
Iain H. Murray
I found her lying naked on the lawn at midnight, can I keep her?
R.J. Anderson
Open your eyes, Ambrosio, and be prudent. Hell is your lot; You are doomed to eternal perdition; Nought lies beyond your grave but a gulph of devouring flames.
Matthew Lewis
Random thoughts have the potential to create a chaotic reality.
Steven Redhead
Our heads will happen cold when this is found.
Tony Harrison
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger more complex and more violent. It takes a touch of genius-and a lot of courage-to move in the opposite direction.
E. E. Schumacher
But what is Hope? Nothing but the paint on the face of Existence; the least touch of truth rubs it off, and then we see what a hollow-cheeked harlot we have got hold of.
George Gordon Byron
Though the face before me was that of a young woman of certainly not more than thirty years, in perfect health and the first flush of ripened beauty, yet it bore stamped upon it a seal of unutterable experience, and of deep acquaintance with grief and passion. Not even the slow smile that crept about the dimples of her mouth could hide the shadow of sin and sorrow. It shone even in the light of those glorious eyes, it was present in the air of majesty, and it seemed to say: 'Behold me, lovely as no woman was or is, undying and half-divine; memory haunts me from age to age, and passion leads me by the hand--evil have I done, and with sorrow have I made acquaintance from age to age, and from age to age evil shall I do, and sorrow shall I know till my redemption comes.
H. Rider Haggard
Mother made sure her little kids were subjected to a strict routine. We were given a timetable which covered our every waking moment, copies of which were posted by our bedside, in the sitting room and in the kitchen. Story hour meant that mother would read us novels and short stories by Guy de Maupassant, Oscar Wilde and Edmondo de Amicis. Soon we graduated to Tolstoy, Gogol and Turgenev. She read them to us in Chinese and I never realised until much later that the writers wrote them in different European languages. Comics were absolutely forbidden and so were Enid Blyton adventures and pop music. . .Lee Cyn and I soon went to a primary school nearby. . .After mother’s rigorous timetable, school became fun and easy-going.
Ang Swee Chai
what is new in his theories is not true, and what is true in his theories is not new.
Hans Jürgen Eysenck
Well, I will wear the bees, like Damon and Pythagoras – ho, a mere sixty thousand bees in the cabin don't signify, much.
Patrick O'Brian
Honour, in her modern self-confidence, had grown up never having to face actual raw, passionate, drop-down-dead-hostility. She didn't really understand what was going to happen,
Ruth Ahmed
Tea is one of the main stays of civilization in this country.
George Orwell
I believed, from the solitary and thoughtful way in which my mother murmured her song, that she was alone. And I went softly into the room. She was sitting by the fire, suckling an infant, whose tiny hand she held against her neck. Her eyes were looking down upon its face, and she sat singing to it. I was so far right, that she had no other companion. I spoke to her, and she started, and cried out. But seeing me, she called me her dear Davy, her own boy! and coming half across the room to meet me, kneeled down upon the ground and kissed me, and laid my head down on her bosom near the little creature that was nestling there, and put its hand up to my lips. I wish I had died. I wish I had died then, with that feeling in my Heart! I should have been more fit for Heaven than I ever have been since.
Charles Dickens
And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing either into a heavenly creature or a hellish creature: either into a creature that is harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with its fellow-creatures, and with God.
C.S. Lewis
The reaper does not listen to the harvest.
Terry Pratchett
Family jokes though rightly cursed by strangers are the bond that keeps most families alive.
Stella Benson
Perhaps, in a few people, I have seen what can be described as a struggle with death, and it can be distressing to behold. But for the vast majority of people death is gentle, tender.
Jennifer Worth
How was it possible to be with someone and yet feel so utterly alone? How was it possible to be with someone as wonderful, warm and kind as Andrew and yet still wonder if love would ever find you?
Chris Manby
Do not sell your soul for a bucketful of pleasures and temptations. It’s God’s priceless gift to you.
Christian Hunt
Between 60 and 80 percent of strippers come from a background of sexual abuse.
Caitlin Moran
Wedged as we are between two eternities of idleness, there is no excuse for being idle now.
Anthony Burgess
Does a caterpillar sit on the same leaf when it's a butterfly? No! It goes for a little fly and sees something of the world. Does the tadpole stay in the same pond once it's a frog? No! It stretches its legs, goes for a jump, explores other waters. Did Cinderella go back cleaning hearths once she married the prince? ... Transformation means moving forward. If a butterfly stays on the same leaf and a frog stays in the same pond, then they may as well have stayed a caterpillar or a tadpole. There was no point in metamorphosing.
Holly Smale
We can't just restrict ourselves to what we know, because we are talking about the unknown.
Belsebuub