#death

Both liberty and equality are among the primary goals pursued by human beings throughout many centuries; but total liberty for wolves is death to the lambs, total liberty of the powerful, the gifted, is not compatible with the rights to a decent existence of the weak and the less gifted. ↗

— Isaiah Berlin

#liberty #paradox #power #rights #weakness

The clear awareness of having been born into a losing struggle need not lead one into despair. I do not especially like the idea that one day I shall be tapped on the shoulder and informed, not that the party is over but that it is most assuredly going on—only henceforth in my absence. (It's the second of those thoughts: the edition of the newspaper that will come out on the day after I have gone, that is the more distressing.) Much more horrible, though, would be the announcement that the party was continuing forever, and that I was forbidden to leave. Whether it was a hellishly bad party or a party that was perfectly heavenly in every respect, the moment that it became eternal and compulsory would be the precise moment that it began to pall. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#atheism #death #despair #eternal-life #heaven

If my mom told one more story about how cute I looked in the bathtub when I was three years old I was going to burrow into the snow and freeze myself to death. ↗

— Rick Riordan

#sally-jackson #death

Flowers that grow where old ones have withered serve to remind us that death will one day come to us all. ↗

— Arthur Golden

#death

In order to eat, you have to be hungry. In order to learn, you have to be ignorant. Ignorance is a condition of learning. Pain is a condition of health. Passion is a condition of thought. Death is a condition of life. ↗

— Robert Anton Wilson

#hagbard-celine #death

The old man smiled. 'I shall not die of a cold, my son. I shall die of having lived. ↗

— Willa Cather

#death

I moved to assist, but never got the chance. there was some pretty violent banging for a minute, and then a tearing sound. Finally the stall door flew open, and Ray's shirtless body emerged and started bitch-slapping everything in sight. His aim was off, probably due to the difficulty of having his eyes on the other side of the room, but he made up for it with sheer determination. ↗

— Karen Chance

#headless-body #ray #death

We were masters of nature, masters of the world. We had forgotten everything--death, fatigue, our natural needs. Stronger than cold or hunger, stronger than the shots and the desire to die, condemned and wandering, mere numbers, we were the only men on earth. ↗

— Elie Wiesel

#holocaust #night #wiesel #death

There are a million things in this world that can end you, that can in one second obliterate the life you work so hard to keep alive. Our lives are structured around not dying. Eating, sleeping, looking both ways before you cross the street. It's all, all of it, to keep us safe from the thing that we know is going to get us anyway. It doesn't even make sense, if you think about it. It's the world's biggest joke. Our entire lives are set up around not dying, knowing all the while that it's the one thing we can't avoid. ↗

— Rebecca Serle

#romeo-and-juliet #death

The price for using dark magic is death, so that goes a long way toward deterring users. ↗

— Devon Monk

#death