The road that is built in hope is more pleasant to the traveler than the road built in despair, even though they both lead to the same destination.
despair hope
By what men think, we create the world around us, daily new.
belief faith philosophy
Beware what you speak,' said the Merlin very softly, 'for indeed the words we speak make shadows of what is to come, and by speaking them we bring them to pass, my king.
arthurian fate merlin
Of all things we mortals are called upon to do, the most difficult is forgiveness; in order to truly do it, you will probably have to behave as if you already have forgiven for quite a while before you have actually done so.
forgiveness
Rome was mud and smoky skies; the rank smell of the Tiber and the exotically spiced cooking fires of a hundred different nationalities. Rome was white marble and gilding and heady perfumes; the blare of trumpets and the shrieking of market-women and the eternal, sub-aural hum of more people, speaking more languages than Gaius had ever imagined existed, crammed together on seven hills whose contours had long ago disappeared beneath this encrustation if humanity. Rome was the pulsing heart of the world.
beauty history italy language rome visceral-imagery
To know you are ignorant is the beginning of wisdom.
inspirational tso-life wisdom
By and large, the kind of science fiction which makes tomorrow's headlines as near as this morning's coffee has enlarged popular awareness of the modern, miraculous world of science we live in. It has helped generations of young people feel at age with a changing world.But fashions change, old loves return, and now that Sputniks clutter up the sky with new and unfamiliar moons, the readers of science fiction are willing to wait to read tomorrow's headlines. Once again, I think, there is a place, a wish, a need for the wonder and color of the world way out. The world beyond the stars. The world we won't live to see. That is why I wrote .
change science-fiction the-future
And I must believe that man has the power to know the right, to choose between good and evil and know that his choice has made a difference...
choices good-and-evil lancelet
You speak of afraid. Yet fear is something you generate in yourself, from your mind's lack of control; and you will learn to look at it and discover for yourself when you choose to be afraid. The first thing you must do is acknowledge that the fear is yours, and you can bid it come and go at will. Begin with this; whenever you feel fear that prevents choice say to yourself: 'What has made me feel fear? Why have I chosen to feel this fear preventing my choice, instead of feeling the freedom to choose?' Fear is a way of not allowing yourself to choose freely what you will do next; a way of letting your body's reflexes, not the needs of your mind, choose for you. ...[Y]ou have chosen to do nothing, so that none of the things you fear will come upon you; so your choices are not made by you but by your fear. ... I cannot promise to free you of your fear, only that a time will come when you are the master, and fear will not paralyze you.
fear fear-of-failure
Magic is a matter of focusing the disciplined will. But sometimes the will must be abandoned. The secret lies in knowing when to exercise control, and when to let go.
arthurian magic
Love is the only prayer I know.
prayer tso-love
Darling, I wish I could help you. Try to remember this: to live, you need every experience. Some will come in glory and in beauty, and some in pain and what seems like ugliness. But - they are. Life consists of opposites in balance.
balance tso-life
On one occasion I shared a bed with about seven other people, but we were all having a party overnight.
beds people
We were discussing civilization and the fact that young men among the Greeks at that time were idiots and uneducated, so the men had emotional and friendly relationships with members of their own sex.
men thetimes time
Science fiction encourages us to explore... all the futures, good and bad, that the human mind can envision.
mind science