Post a random quote from a book you're reading

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"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way–in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

“How much better is silence; the coffee cup, the table. How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. Let me sit here for ever with bare things, this coffee cup, this knife, this fork, things in themselves, myself being myself.”
― Virginia Woolf, The Waves

“There is still, I think, not enough recognition by teachers of the fact that the desire to think--which is fundamentally a moral problem--must be induced before the power is developed. Most people, whether men or women, wish above all else to be comfortable, and thought is a pre-eminently uncomfortable process.”

~ Vera Brittain, Testament of Youth

“Men are like the earth and we are the moon; we turn always one side to them, and they think there is no other, because they don't see it—but there is.”

~ Olive Schreiner, The Story of an African Farm

“When the first baby laughed for the first time, its laugh broke into a thousand pieces, and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies.” - Peter Pan

"Devant cette nuit chargée de signes et d’étoiles, je m’ouvrais pour la première fois à la tendre indifférence du monde. De l’éprouver si pareil à moi, si fraternel enfin, j’ai senti que j’avais été heureux, et que je l’étais encore. Pour que tout soit consommé, pour que je me sente moins seul, il me restait à souhaiter qu’il y ait beaucoup de spectateurs le jour de mon exécution et qu’ils m’accueillent avec des cris de haine."

- Albert Camus, L’Étranger

^




"Aimer ou avoir aimé, cela suffit. Ne demandez rien ensuite. On n'a pas d'autre perle à trouver dans les plis ténébreux de la vie. Aimer est un accomplissement."


Les Misérables, Victor Hugo

Cold in the earth—and the deep snow piled above thee,
Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave!
Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee,
Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave?

Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover
Over the mountains, on that northern shore,
Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves cover
Thy noble heart forever, ever more?

Cold in the earth—and fifteen wild Decembers,
From those brown hills, have melted into spring:
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!

No later light has lightened up my heaven,
No second morn has ever shone for me;
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.

But, when the days of golden dreams had perished,
And even Despair was powerless to destroy,
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.

Then did I check the tears of useless passion—
Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine;
Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten
Down to that tomb already more than mine.

And, even yet, I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I seek the empty world again?




"Remembrance" - Emily Jane Brontë (1845)

On this anniversary of her death, in 1848 at age 30.

"If you must keep wearing those dirty leggings," she said, "then the next thing to go on will be this." She handed him padded, sleeveless vest. Her face was intent as she helped him tie the knots, and he could see her strange, dark eyes up close.
"Why are you doing this?" he asked as she cinched the last laces.
"Your idea about the archives was a good one," she said, watching her own nimble fingers, not his face. She bent for the two armoured sleeves and began attaching them to the vest. "It could be that you might produce one or even two more useful ideas before the Sacrifices kill us, helping me live long enough to kill even more of my enemies. So I have decided to keep you alive if I can - at least for a while."
"I'm honored," he said, sourly as he could.
She raised one of her thin white eyebrows. "So. That is good, then."

("Into the Narrowdark," by Tad Williams)

I'm a type
unfit
to talk to people—
I wake up
knowing it

- Takuboku: Poems to Eat

“Il regrettait toutes les années perdues au cours desquelles il n’avait pas fait assez attention aux arbres ni aux fleurs.” - Pour que tu ne te perdes pas dans le quartier par Patrick Modiano

Idk if webnovels count but i have so many from Heaven Official's Blessing

" The one standing in infinite glory is you; the one fallen from grace is also you. What matters is 'you' and not the state of you."

Triggering content: DV

When I was very young and the urge to be someplace else was in me, I was assured by mature people that maturity would cure this itch. When years described me as mature, the remedy prescribed was middle age. In middle age I was assured that greater age would calm my fever and now that I am fifty-eight perhaps senility will do the job. Nothing has worked.

John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley.

From my book The Death of a Christian Economist https://www.amazon.com/Death-Christian- ... 116&sr=8-1

From my book Heaven's Queens