Sublime
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I really feel almost ashamed of having known that he was not quite in his wits, taking account of the utmost I have done with mine.
Charles Dickens • David Copperfield
One highly successful trilogy—representing Inglewood recognizing Inglewood, Inglewood prostrating himself before Inglewood, and Inglewood severely beating Inglewood with an umbrella— Innocent Smith wanted to have enlarged and put up in the hall, like a sort of fresco, with the inscription,— "Self-reverence, self-knowledge, self-control— These three
... See moreG. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton • Manalive
“Get this straight, Geoffrey, I’m thinking of Yvonne, not you.” “Get it a little straighter still. You’re thinking of yourself.
Malcolm Lowry • Under the Volcano: A Novel (P.S.)
It was left, then, to cast Sharpton, and for Sharpton to cast himself, as the Outrageous Nigger, the familiar role—assigned sixty years ago to Father Divine and thirty years later to Adam Clayton Powell—of the essentially manageable fraud whose first concern is his own well-being.
Joan Didion • After Henry: Essays
You know the way they can take a dog, a house pet, like a police dog that’s been fed and pampered all its life, and train it to be a vicious watchdog?” “I’ve heard of it,” said Killian. “I’ve seen it done,” said Quigley. “I saw it done when I was on the force.” “Well, then you know the principle,” said Sherman. “They don’t alter that dog’s
... See moreTom Wolfe • The Bonfire of the Vanities: A Novel
The “I Have a Dream” speech21 was not a sermon; it was a political address. But its author did not feel that he had to relegate his religious faith to the private and subjective sphere. He knew that certain truth claims were central to his Christianity, and he did not hesitate to argue for them in the full glare of publicity. Though King met with
... See moreRobert Barron • Arguing Religion
Imaginary beings, in a real landscape. No wonder he had forgotten the carrot and the stick, and wandered off into the realm of new being and radical difference and all that crap. Trying to be John Boone. Yes, it was true! He was trying to do what John had done. But John had been good at it; Frank had seen him work his magic time after time in the
... See moreKim Stanley Robinson • Red Mars (Mars Trilogy Book 1)

He fully shared the opinion of those extreme minds which attribute to human law I know not what power of making, or, if the reader will have it so, of authenticating, demons, and who place a Styx at the base of society. He was stoical, serious, austere; a melancholy dreamer, humble and haughty, like fanatics. His glance was like a gimlet, cold and
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