#than

Psyche did not think the feeling running through her could exist, it was too powerful, too profound and pierced her soul in a way that was a beautiful agony. ↗

— Jasmine Dubroff

#greek-mythology #jasmine-dubroff #more-than-life #beauty

Look at us. We build giant highways and murderously fast cars for killing each other and committing suicide. Instead of bomb shelters we construct gigantic frail glass buildings all over Manhattan at Ground Zero, a thousand feet high, open to the sky, life a woman undressing before an intruder and provoking him to rape her. We ring Russia's borders with missile-launching pads, and then scream that she's threatening us. In all history there's never been a more lurid mass example of the sadist-masochist expression of the thanatos instinct than the present conduct of the United States. The Nazis by comparison were Eagle Scouts. ↗

— Herman Wouk

#death #ground-zero #manhattan #modernity #sadism

In uncertainty I am certain that underneath their topmost layers of frailty men want to be good and want to be loved. Indeed, most of their vices are attempted shortcuts to love. When a man comes to die, no matter what his talents and influence and genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and his dying a cold horror. It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world. ↗

— John Steinbeck

#death

You don’t see yourself at all, do you? It seems to me that you’re good at everything you try,” said Ethan sincerely. “I had a dream I could breathe underwater,” I said flippantly, “Maybe I’ll go swim with the mermaids.” Ethan turned to look at me with shock in his eyes. “Just kidding,” I said, alarmed at his reaction ↗

— Derrolyn Anderson

#between-the-land-and-sea #derrolyn-anderson #ethan #joke #marina

...as a mark of gratitude for his previous patronage, and a slight super-added morsel after breakfast, put likewise into his hand a whale! The great fish, reversing his experience with the prophet of Nineveh, immediately began his progress down the same red pathway of fate whiter so varied a caravan had preceded him. ↗

— Nathaniel Hawthorne

#the-house-of-the-seven-gables #experience

Whatever happens in your life, no matter how troubling things might seem, do not enter the neighborhood of despair. Even when all doors remain closed, God will open up a new path only for you. Be thankful! ↗

— Elif Shafak

#thankfulness #troubles #life

Gratitude goes beyond the 'mine' and 'thine' and claims the truth that all of life is a pure gift. In the past I always thought of gratitude as a spontaneous response to the awareness of gifts received, but now I realize that gratitude can also be lived as a discipline. The discipline of gratitude is the explicit effort to acknowledge that all I am and have is given to me as a gift of love, a gift to be celebrated with joy. ↗

— Henri J.M. Nouwen

#grace #gratitude #spiritual-discipline #thankfulness #life

A Dickens character to me is a theatrical projection of a character. Not that it isn't real. It's real, but in that removed sense. But Sherlock Holmes is simply there. I would be astonished if I went to 221 1/2 B Baker Street and didn't find him." [An Invitation to Learning, January 1942] ↗

— Rex Stout

#dickens #larger-than-life #novels #presence #realism

I know the odds are all against me and I know you might not feel this way too but I know I would rather die trying to know if I could mean something to you ↗

— David Levithan

#love-songs-for-elizabeth #the-realm-of-possibility #love

I'm thankful because I'm still alive. I'm thankful because I lived the mantra, Only The Strong Survive. I'm thankful because I have Chris Ann. And that has made all the difference. And it always will. It always gets better. I told you so... ↗

— Jamie Schoffman

#jamie-schoffman #not-all-out-of-love #strong #thankful #love