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Fable Quotes

Browse 64 quotes about Fable.

Fable Quotes

“We read the pagan sacred books with profit and delight. With myth and fable we are ever charmed, and find a pleasure in the endless repetition of the beautiful, poetic, and absurd. We find, in all these records of the past, philosophies and dreams, and efforts stained with tears, of great and tender souls who tried to pierce the mystery of life and death, to answer the eternal questions of the Whence and Whither, and vainly sought to make, with bits of shattered glass, a mirror that would, in very truth, reflect the face and form of Nature's perfect self. These myths were born of hopes, and fears, and tears, and smiles, and they were touched and colored by all there is of joy and grief between the rosy dawn of birth, and death's sad night. They clothed even the stars with passion, and gave to gods the faults and frailties of the sons of men. In them, the winds and waves were music, and all the lakes, and streams, and springs,—the mountains, woods and perfumed dells were haunted by a thousand fairy forms. They thrilled the veins of Spring with tremulous desire; made tawny Summer's billowed breast the throne and home of love; filled Autumns arms with sun-kissed grapes, and gathered sheaves; and pictured Winter as a weak old king who felt, like Lear upon his withered face, Cordelia's tears. These myths, though false, are beautiful, and have for many ages and in countless ways, enriched the heart and kindled thought. But if the world were taught that all these things are true and all inspired of God, and that eternal punishment will be the lot of him who dares deny or doubt, the sweetest myth of all the Fable World would lose its beauty, and become a scorned and hateful thing to every brave and thoughtful man.”

LoveLifeTruthPastBeautifulDeathJoyPassionHopeFearNaturePleasureEffortGriefMusicDoubtDreamsMysteryTearsBirthSummerSpringPerfectionEternityBraveWinterDelightDenyWoodsPunishmentThoughtAbsurdFairyTrueAutumnPoeticGodsQuestionsMountainsScornHatefulPaganShakespeareSmilesHauntedWilliam ShakespeareLakeTenderFableThronePhilosophiesKing LearReligion MythsSacred Books
Book:Some Mistakes of Moses
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“Some women have kissed—and some are kissing—a lot of frogs, even though the very first man that they have each kissed was and is still a prince.”

HumorFunnyRomanceQuotesWomenRelationshipsFictionMarriageFantasyRelationshipHumourKingsKissingJokesHumorousRomanticDatingDivorceKissWomanQueensBreakupSatirePrincessFairy TaleAphorismQuotationsJokeHilariousFairy TalesFrogsAphorismsKingFablesBreakupsQueenPrinceDateAphoristAphoristsMarriagesFantasiesFableFrogPrincessesDivorcesPrincesKisserKiss A FrogKiss A Lot Of FrogsKissers
Author:Mokokoma Mokhonoana
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“We know that there are many animals on this continent not found in the Old World. These must have been carried from here to the ark, and then brought back afterwards. Were the peccary, armadillo, ant-eater, sloth, agouti, vampire-bat, marmoset, howling and prehensile-tailed monkey, the raccoon and muskrat carried by the angels from America to Asia? How did they get there? Did the polar bear leave his field of ice and journey toward the tropics? How did he know where the ark was? Did the kangaroo swim or jump from Australia to Asia? Did the giraffe, hippopotamus, antelope and orang-outang journey from Africa in search of the ark? Can absurdities go farther than this?”

HumorFunnyAmericaKnowledgeFantasyJourneyBibleMythIceAustraliaSwimFloodAbsurdityAngelsAfricaAsiaSlothOld WorldArkGiraffeThe BibleFableTropicsJumpHippopotamusNoah S ArkHowlingKangarooMuskratPolar BearAntelopeArmadilloOrangutanThe FloodAnteaterAgoutiFlood MythMarmosetPrehensile Tailed MonkeyRacoonVampire Bat
Book:Some Mistakes of Moses
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“It has always been a mystery to me how Adam, Eve, and the serpent were taught the same language. Where did they get it? We know now, that it requires a great number of years to form a language; that it is of exceedingly slow growth. We also know that by language, man conveys to his fellows the impressions made upon him by what he sees, hears, smells and touches. We know that the language of the savage consists of a few sounds, capable of expressing only a few ideas or states of the mind, such as love, desire, fear, hatred, aversion and contempt. Many centuries are required to produce a language capable of expressing complex ideas. It does not seem to me that ideas can be manufactured by a deity and put in the brain of man. These ideas must be the result of observation and experience.”

LoveIdeasDesireLanguageFearGrowthBrainKnowledgeFantasyExpressionBibleHatredExperienceMythSensesObservationContemptSerpentAversionAdam And EveGarden Of EdenThe BibleFableImpressionsSavageDeityCenturies
Book:Some Mistakes of Moses
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“The story of the herd of seals. Hundreds of them on a beach; among them the hunter killing one after the other with a club. Together they could easily have crushed him— but they lay there, watching him come to murder, and did not move; he was only killing a neighbor— one neighbor after the other. The story of the European seals. The sunset of civilization. Tired shapeless Götterdämmerung. The empty banners of human rights. The sell-out of a continent. The onrushing deluge. The haggling for the last prices. The old dance of despair on the volcano. Peoples again slowly being driven into a slaughterhouse. The fleas would save themselves when the sheep were being sacrificed. As always.”

WisdomHuman NatureHistory Of MankindFable
Book:Arch of Triumph: A Novel of a Man Without a Country
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“‎They are angry with me, because I know what I am." Said the little eagle. "How do you know that they are angry with you?" "Because, they despise me for wanting to soar, they only want me to peck at the dirt, looking for ants, with them. But I can't do that. I don't have chicken feet, I have eagle wings." "And what is so wrong with having eagle wings and no chicken feet?" Asked the old owl. "I'm not sure, that's what I'm trying to find out." "They hate you because you know that you are an eagle and they want you to think you are a chicken so that you will peck at the ground looking for ants and worms, so that you will never know that you are an eagle and always think yourself a chicken. Let them hate you, they will always be chickens, and you will always be an eagle. You must fly. You must soar." Said the old owl.”

InspirationalWisdomFlyingChickensEaglesFablesFableSoaringWisdom In FictionOld Owl
Author:C. JoyBell C.
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“It is not then the existence or the non-existence, of the persons that I trouble myself about; it is the fable of Jesus Christ, as told in the New Testament, and the wild and visionary doctrine raised thereon, against which I contend. The story, taking it as it is told, is blasphemously obscene. It gives an account of a young woman engaged to be married, and while under this engagement, she is, to speak plain language, debauched by a ghost.”

ExistenceJesus ChristMythologyRidiculousDoctrineAbsurdityNew TestamentHoly GhostWildObsceneDebaucheryFable
Book:The age of reason
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“Chain! Chain you! What! Run you not, then, just where you please, and when?” “Not always, sir; but what of that?” “Enough for me, to spoil your fat! It ought to be a precious price which could to servile chains entice; for me, I’ll shun them while I’ve wit.” So ran Sir Wolf, and runneth yet.”

PhilosophyPoetryFreedomLibertyDogsServitudeWolvesParablesFable
Book:Le loup dans les fables - La Fontaine - 2
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“And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter. But we may hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away all this artificial scaffolding... {Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823}”

ReasonFatherUnited StatesMythFreedom Of ThoughtJupiterSupreme BeingVirginFableVirgin BirthMinervaIrreligion
Book:Letters of Thomas Jefferson
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“That many good men have believed this strange fable [Christianity], and lived very good lives under that belief (for credulity is not a crime) is what I have no doubt of. In the first place, they were educated to believe it, and they would have believed anything else in the same manner. There are also many who have been so enthusiastically enraptured by what they conceived to be the infinite love of God to man, in making a sacrifice of himself, that the vehemence of the idea has forbidden and deterred them from examining into the absurdity and profaneness of the story.”

BeliefChristianitySacrificeEducatedStoryAbsurdityIndoctrinationCredulityBrainwashingProfaneFableLove Of GodVehemenceExamineEnrapture
Book:The age of reason
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“I would by all means have men beware, lest Aesop's pretty fable of the fly that sate on the pole of a chariot at the Olympic races and said, 'What a dust do I raise,' be verified in them. For so it is that some small observation, and that disturbed sometimes by the instrument, sometimes by the eye, sometimes by the calculation, and which may be owing to some real change in the sky, raises new skies and new spheres and circles.”

RaceDustFableOlympicAesopChariotAesop S Fables
Book:The Collected Works of Sir Francis Bacon (Unexpurgated Edition)
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“If there is one fable, which would seem entitled to escape the analysis, which we have undertaken of religious poems and sacred legends, by the laws of physical and astronomical science, it is doubtless that of Christ, or the legend, which under that name is really dedicated to the worship of the Sun. The hatred, which the sectarians of that religion,—jealous to make their form of worship dominant over all others,—have shown against those, who worshipped Nature, the Sun, the Moon and the Stars, against the Roman Deities, whose temples and altars they have upset,—would suscitate the idea, that their worship did not form a part of that otherwise universal religion.”

ScienceAstronomyLegendsDeitiesRomanFableChrist MythSavantChrist Myth TheorySun Worship
Author:Charles François Dupuis
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“As Augustus basked in self-praise, he became aware of a movement beyond his reflection, beyond the glass. At first he saw the flicking tail of the yellow goatfish, then a blue and gold tang, then a school of pearl wrasses. As he refocused his eyes into the tank he realized that all of the creatures of the aquarium were just across the glass, all of them staring at him. What on Earth is going on here, their expressions seemed to say. Augustus shook his head, suddenly uncomfortable. “Youse all there in the fish tank,” he growled, pointing, “youse can go stuff yerself for all I care! I’m done here.”

ScienceClimate ChangePublic PolicyFishMisinformationAllegoryFableAquarium
Book:FISH TANK: A Fable for Our Times
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“Surprisingly few tussles occurred over the falling food. ... Only Push the puffer and Hammy the parrotfish regularly stole more than their fair share. But they argued that as they were bigger than the others, they deserved more. “Plus,” Push said, “and I don’t mean to be indelicate here, but some of you eat our ordure. Thus if we get more, you get more.” “Let’s face it,” added Hammy, wanting to add to Push’s words, “that is the way the world works.”

ScienceClimate ChangePublic PolicyFishMisinformationAllegoryFableAquarium
Book:FISH TANK: A Fable for Our Times
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“What Roop says is correct. That thermometer hasn’t worked in years.” Sanger paused, looking around for Hansom before continuing. Not seeing the goatfish, he proceeded confidently, “Actually, I daresay my own studies have found the instrument to be so imprecise that it is my professional opinion that the temperature is just as likely to be going down as to be going up!”

ScienceClimate ChangePublic PolicyFishMisinformationAllegoryFableAquarium
Book:FISH TANK: A Fable for Our Times
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“Over the stern, I could see the clouds rolling over the sea towards us. Hungry. I closed my eyes and drew the humid air into my chest. I'd spent my childhood in the face of storms just like her, many of them angrier than this one. It was the reason only the most daring traders sailed the Narrows. And even though I could feel her power in every bone, every muscle, there was something deep inside of me that opened its eyes from sleep when I felt it. It was terrifying, but familiar. As beautiful as it was deadly.”

StormFableAdrienne Young
Book:Fable
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“I'd never been to the Unnamed Sea, but my mother was born there. Her leathered skin and callused hands made her look as if she'd grown up on a ship, but she'd come to the Narrows on her own when she was no more than my age, finding a place on Saint's crew as a dredger and leaving her past in the Unnamed Sea behind. She would wrap her arms around me as we sat up on the mast with our feet dangling, and she would tell me about Bastian, the port city she called home, and the huge ships that sailed those deep water. Once, I asked her if she'd ever go back. If she'd take me there one day. But she only said she'd been born for a different life, and so had I.”

MotherSeaFableAdrienne Young
Book:Fable
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“She's saying something. My mother's words found me, there in the black. I pinched my eyes closed, her face coming into perfect view One long, dark red braid over her shoulder. Pale gray eyes the color of morning fog and the sea-dragon necklace around her neck as she looked up into the clouds above us. Isolde loved the storms. That night, the bell rang out and my father came for me, pulling me from my hammock bleary-eyed and confused. and when he put me in the rowboat, I screamed for my mother until my throat was raw. The Lark was already half-sunk, disappearing in the water behind us. My mother called it touching the soul of the storm. When she came upon us like that, she was taking us into her hart and letting us see her. She was saying something. And only then would we know what lay within her. Only then would we know who she was.”

StormFableAdrienne YoungSea Adventure
Book:Fable
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