“You heard him say it? 'Pain's the only evil I know about.' You heard that?" The monk nodded solemnly. "And that society is the only thing that determines whether an act is wrong or not? That too?" "Yes." "Dearest God,… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
“As Brother Francis readily admitted, his mastery of pre-Deluge English was far from masterful yet. The way nouns could sometimes modify other nouns in that tongue had always been one of his weak points. In Latin, as in most simple dialects of the region, a construction like servus puer meant about the same thing as puer servus, and even in… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share
“Yes, yes, but the freedom to speculate is essential-" "No one has tried to deprive you of that. Nor is anyone offended. But to… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
“And yet he felt forebodings. Some nameless threat lurked just around the corner of the world for the sun to rise again. The feeling had been gnawing at him, as annoying as a swarm of hungry insects that buzzed about one's face in the desert sun. There was the sense of the imminent, the remorseless, the mindless; it coiled like… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share
“Earth - it was a place where you could stop being afraid, a place where fear of suffocation was not, where fear of blowout… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
“When the world was in darkness and wretchedness, it could believe in perfection and yearn for it. But when the world became bright with… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
“Simpletons! Yes, yes! I'm a simpleton! Are you a simpleton? We'll build a town and we'll name it Simple Town, because by then all… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
“Are you an atheist?" "Oh no, I honor all the gods." "And how many belong to that all ?" "Countless. And one ." "How meaningless!" "'Oliness, let me hear you count to one." "One." "Point at that one ." Brownpony stirred restlessly. Finally he tapped his index finger against his temple. Wooshin laughed quietly. "Wrong. You had to think about… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share
“Tell me, how would you feel if everyone screamed and ran when they saw you coming, or hunted you down like a criminal? How long would you sanity last?"..."...Tell me something else, if all the world was blind save one man, wouldn't the world be inclined to call that man's sight a hallucination? And the man with eyes might even… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share
“When the world was in darkness and wretchedness, it could believe in perfection and yearn for it. But when the world became bright with reason and riches, it began to sense the narrowness of the needle's eye, and that rankled for a world no longer willing to believe or yearn. Well, they were going to destroy it again, were they… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share
“It never was any better, it never will be any better. It will only be richer or poorer, sadder but not wiser, until the… — Walter M. Miller Jr Copy Share Image
