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Quote by John Cowper Powys

“There are times in life, little lady," he said, "when we can only listen to the ticking of the clock of fate and wait for what is destined to happen. This is one of those times.”

Quote by John Cowper Powys

Book:The Brazen Head
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The Brazen Head

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Author

John Cowper Powys
John Cowper Powys

John Cowper Powys was an English novelist known for his profound psychological insights and exploration of human nature. His works are characterized by complex plots and rich symbolism, covering a wide range of themes from history to philosophy. more

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“The unconscious is very serious today - even a little bit sad - because we repress serious things into it: sex, death, libido, desire. But if it were irony and offhandedness which were repressed, what form would the new unconscious take then? It would become ironic; we would have ironic, breezy drives and fantasies, which would surface in our dreams and our slips, in our neuroses and madness. But isn't it already that way, in a sense? Television will perhaps only have been invented in order, by a delectable detour, to give back its force to the silence of the image. We certainly have to accept an authority, but one more stupid than ourselves. That is the great law of the political world. This is wonderfully apparent in the USSR (Zinoviev tells of the pharaonic stupidity of the Soviet leaders, equalled only by the pharaonic servitude of the Soviets themselves), but you can see it in France just as clearly. Why prefer Marchais, Le Pen, Chirac and other such hollow figures to more sophisticated people? Why have they not long ago sunk beneath their own idiocy? The fact is that these figures are the surest remedy against the anxiety we all feel at the reign and the primacy of intelligence. They reassure us about our own stupidity, and this is their vital function as it was that of the shaman. And how can you ward off stupidity, if not by a greater stupidity? I notice that on windows which have been left untouched, which have not, in other words, seen the faintest shadow of a duster for ten years, there is not more than a fraction of a millimetre of dirt and dust. No more, in the end, than the wind and rain scratch from the surface of a rock in the same period. There is a dreamlike slowness to both erosion and sedimentation.”

FateTelevisionAuthorityIronyUnconsciousDecadence
Book:Cool memories
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“Cast aside all caution from sleeping creatures, for they know not the meaning of destiny - to them destiny is out of their hands, so they shiver in imagination all their life - they make their own prison of misery and insecurity and die in it every day - but you my friend, you who is a human, you who is alive and not dead, you who is awake with not practicality but responsibility - not with insecurity but with love - are not bound by destiny, for destiny is fantasy invented by the weak - those who are strong and determined make their own reality out of their blood and sweat.”

DestinyFateBrainy QuotesHumanismHumanitarianService Of HumanityHumanitarianismBraveheartServing People
Book:Servitude is Sanctitude
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“She suggested that...I should examine what I had been trying to shoot at and punch and kill for so long- whether or not I had, perhaps, denied some more gentle part of my nature, and if so, what had it cost me. "And don't get a tattoo for your forehead," she said, smiling. "It's entirely unnecessary." As proof, she held her hands in front of her. Wiggled her fingers and smiled. Our being human made us tragic and comic both, she has said; the gods both laughed and wept.”

SufferingPsychologyFateHuman NatureSelf AwarenessMythology Philosophy
Book:I Know This Much Is True
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