It was as if God had decreed this characterless engagement…

““It was as if God had decreed this characterless engagement of brainless forces as his answer to the human presumption.””

E.L. Doctorow

About This Quote

This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation.

The passage suggests that fate or divine will imposes a mindless, characterless conflict as a response to human arrogance.

In simple terms: Divine retribution for human hubris

Key Takeaway

Human pride invites impersonal forces

Themes

hubris fate divine will conflict characterlessness

Mood

solemn reflective cynical

Type

philosophical literary theological

When to use this quote

philosophical reflection
literary analysis
theological debate

Key Concepts

presumption brainless forces God's decree

Practical Applications

critical essay
thematic study

Questions to Reflect On

What does this imply about human agency?
How does the text frame divine justice?

★ ★ ★ ★ ★ No ratings yet

Civil war

More by E.L. Doctorow

“I cite too the ordinary fears of mortality the inspection of a fast-growing mole on the side of the nose blood in the stool…

E.L. Doctorow

“And what if neutrinos in their uncountable multitudinous dark-matteredness gravitationally directing the universe . . . are the souls of the dead?”

E.L. Doctorow

“Treason the only crime defined in the Constitution. Tyranny as under the Stuart and Tudor kings characterized by the elimination of political dissent under…

E.L. Doctorow

“I remember holding her in my arms and absolving God of meaninglessness.”

E.L. Doctorow

“Somehow he had catapulted himself beyond the world's value system. But this very fact lay upon him an awesome responsibility to maintain the illusions…

E.L. Doctorow

“Emily supposed the modern world was fortunate in the progress of science. But she could not help but feel at this moment the impropriety…

E.L. Doctorow

“Father looked at her and she was beautiful in the way she had been as a girl. He did not realize the pleasure he…

E.L. Doctorow

“Happiness consists of living in the dailiness of life and not knowing how happy you are. True happiness comes of not knowing you're happy.”

E.L. Doctorow

“Grandmamma had been the last connection to our past. I had understood her as some referent moral authority to whom we paid no heed,…

E.L. Doctorow

“I asked this question: How can I think about my brain when it’s my brain doing the thinking? So is this brain pretending to…

E.L. Doctorow

“She's some kind of Socialist-anarchist-anarcho-syndicalist-Communist. Unless you're one of them you can't tell exactly what any of them are.”

E.L. Doctorow

“I didn’t actually have to write a thing because the act of reading was my writing. I thought of myself as a writer for…

E.L. Doctorow

“You're nothing more than a clever prostitute. You accepted the conditions in which you found yourself and you triumphed.”

E.L. Doctorow

“Writing teachers invariably tell students, write about what you know. That's, of course, what you have to do, but on the other hand, how…

E.L. Doctorow

“And now I will tell of the revels that went on for three nights and two days in the brothel on West Seventy-sixth Street…

E.L. Doctorow

Explore all 64 E.L. Doctorow quotes

More Brainless quotes

I think zombies have always been an easy metaphor for hard times. Because they're this big, faceless, brainless group of evil things that will…

Seth Grahame-Smith

It is not difficult to destroy Islam. Islam is the pumped up ego of a megalomaniac psychopath. Muhammad was a narcissist madman. Just as…

Ali Sina

Sportswriters are a rude and brainless subculture of fascist drunks, a gang of vicious monkeys jerking off in a zoo cage... more disgusting by…

Hunter S. Thompson

My mantra: Brainless exercise is a lost opportunity for improvement.

Michael Merzenich

“Some brainless comedy where actors with perfect white teeth spoke their lines then froze in place to let the laugh track unwind.”

James Sallis

“When you are gunning to be like other people, you are foolishly repeating their mistakes, and the worst of it all is that you…

Michael Bassey Johnson

I'm basically a writer of ideas, and the English aren't interested in ideas. The English, I'm afraid, are totally brainless.

Colin Wilson

Culinary science? You elected culinary science? That's the most brainless class ever. -Rose to Christian

Richelle Mead

“I've said it before and I say it again: "A man's got to do what a brainless idiot's got to do.”

Henry Rollins

I think that the theory of evolution is the most unscientific, faith-based, fundamentally brainless idea that ever had the misfortune to come out of…

Ray Comfort

Lord knows, I love a brainless pop song.

Jake Shears

“Echo." Too late. Brainless swept into the foyer.”

Katie McGarry

Girls in scripts are often pretty but brainless, or geeky and no one likes them, so it's great to find richer roles. Chalk and…

Jessica Brown Findlay

For a brief, weird minute I felt like Dorothy in Oz, walking down the street with Terric the doubtful, Shame the brainless, and heartless…

Devon Monk

Brainless writers gossip nonsense to others heads as dense as they is.

George Harrison

Browse all 47 Brainless quotes

It was as if God had decreed this characterless engagement…

About This Quote

Related quotes

More by E.L. Doctorow

More Brainless quotes