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Mystery Quotes

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Mystery Quotes

“I had long since given up trying to extract from a woman as it were the square root of her unknown quantity, the mystery of which a mere introduction was generally enough to dispel.”

Trying Long Enough Given Women Mystery Roots Mere Squares Quantity Introduction Given Up Square Roots

Book:In Search of Lost Time, Volume IV: Sodom and Gomorrah (A Modern Library E-Book)

Source: In Search of Lost Time, Volume IV: Sodom and Gomorrah (A Modern Library E-Book)

“Major Greene this evening fell into some conversation with me about the Divinity and satisfaction of Jesus Christ. All the argument he advanced was, "that a mere creature or finite being could not make satisfaction to infinite justice for any crimes," and that "these things are very mysterious." Thus mystery is made a convenient cover for absurdity.”

Source: Diary and Autobiography of John Adams: Diary, 1755-1770

“Love interest nearly always weakens a mystery because it introduces a type of suspense that is antagonistic to the detective's struggle to solve the problem. It stacks the cards, and in nine cases out of ten, it eliminates at least two useful suspects. The only effective love interest is that which creates a personal hazard for the detective - but which, at the same time, you instinctively feel to be a mere episode. A really good detective never gets married.”

Feels Two Problem Interest Cases Struggle Mystery Type Ten Married Mere Solve Nine Cards Suspense Suspects Introducing Episodes Detectives Hazards

Book:Raymond Chandler Speaking

Source: Raymond Chandler Speaking

“Poets say science takes away from the beauty of stars-mere globs of gas atoms. Nothing is "mere". I too see the stars on a desert night, and feel them. But do I see less or more? ...What is the pattern, or the meaning, or the why? It does not do harm to the mystery to know a little more about it. For far more marvelous is the truth than any artists of the past imagined it.”

Knows Feels Littles Doe Past Artist Night Stars Mystery Poet Mere Patterns Harm Desert Gas Atoms Marvelous

Author:Richard P. Feynman

“What deep and worthy love is so, whether of woman or child, or art or music. Our caresses, our tender words, our still rapture under the influence of autumn sunsets, or pillared vistas, or calm majestic statues, or Beethoven symphonies all bring with them the consciousness that they are mere waves and ripples in an unfathomable ocean of love and beauty; our emotion in its keenest moment passes from expression into silence, our love at its highest flood rushes beyond its object and loses itself in the sense of divine mystery.”

Source: George Eliot Collection: Middlemarch, Adam Bede, Silas Marner, The Lifted Veil, and The Mill on the Floss

“Attention is riveted on what is tangible, useful, instantly available; the stimulus for deeper thought and reflection may be lacking. Yet human beings have a vital need for time and inner quiet to ponder and examine life and its mysteries... Understanding and wisdom are the fruit of a contemplative eye upon the world, and do not come from a mere accumulation of facts, no matter how interesting.”

“Something can be symbolic without being a mere stand-in or vessel, which just brings us away from the true mystery and dread, into some boring version of what we already know. So what you say is true, in that the bear is a kind of parallel to the speaker, or imagined as such, but also very different. So if it's a symbol it is - ahem - a polysemous one.”

Ifs Knows Kind Different Mystery Bears Mere Boring Versions Symbols Speakers Dread Parallels Vessel Symbolic

Author:Matthew Zapruder

“Don't become a mere recorder of facts, but try to penetrate the mystery of their origin.”

Trying Facts Psychology Mystery Mere Penetrate Recorders

Author:Ivan Pavlov

“Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night. In their gray visions they obtain glimpses of eternity, and thrill, in waking, to find that they have been upon the verge of the great secret. In snatches, they learn something of the wisdom which is of good, and more of the mere knowledge which is of evil.”

Mind Has Beens Dream Night Evil Secret Vision Mystery Words Of Wisdom Eternity Mere Gray Waking Thrill Glimpse Verge Cognizant

Book:Complete Tales & Poems

Source: Complete Tales & Poems

“I reminded myself: when a book lies unopened it might contain anything in the world, anything imaginable. It therefore, in that pregnant moment before opening, contains everything. Every possibility, both perfect and putrid. Surely such mysteries are the most enticing things You grant us in this mortal mere -- the fruit in the garden, too, was like this. Unknown, and therefore infinite. Eve and her mate swallowed eternity, every possible thing, and made the world between them.”

World Made Book Moments Might Lying Perfect Mystery Possibility Garden Eternity Infinite Mere Fruit Opening Mortals Grants Mates Pregnant Enticing

Author:Catherynne M. Valente

“My child, you have a flawed grasp of the nature of myth-making. I am a poet and storyteller, a creator of ballads and sagas. Pray do not confuse the exercise of the imagination with mere mendacity. I am a master of the mysteries of words, their meanings and music and mellifluous magic.”

Children Imagination Magic Mystery Poet Masters Praying Exercise Mere Creator Myth My Children Storyteller Flawed Ballads Saga Mendacity

Book:Fly By Night

Source: Fly By Night