All Quotes

"Architecturally, the town looked like the worst of all possible cheap-and-sleazy tract developments, but the psychic texture it projected was even more depressing, more like that of one of those ghastly retirement communities, one of the innumerable Leisure Worlds or Sun Manors, those childless joyless retreats where colonies of that other kind of living dead collected to await the last trumpet."

"Dr. Wilhelm Reich was condemned for unscientific claims by the Food and Drug Administration in 1956 because of his theories about sexual freedom and his discovery of an alleged "orgone" energy. He quickly became the most world-famous victim of the FDA's quest to impose One True Faith on medical practice in the United States, because the Feds not only destroyed all the equipment in Dr. Reich's experimental laboratory but burned all his books, too, in an incinerator, and then they put him in jail where he died of a heart attack. Since many disapprove of this unconstitutional way of silencing heresy, Dr. Reich has remained a center of controversy. … In addition to his bio-physical heresies, Dr. Reich vastly offended many people by his sociological theory, which holds that fascism is just an exaggerated form of the basic structure of sex-negative societies and has existed under other names in every civilization based on sexual repression. In this theory, the character and muscular armor of the average citizen — a submissive and frightened attitude anchored in body reflexes — causes the average person to want a strong authority figure above them. Tyranny, in this model, is not created by tyrants alone but by neurotic masses who want tyrants."

"Everyone has a belief system, B.S., the trick is to learn not to take anyone's B.S. too seriously, especially your own."

"The obedient always think of themselves as virtuous, rather than cowardly."

"One of the most profound and important scientific philosophers of this century … His vast intelligence and sharp wit are sufficient to shock and enlighten the most heavily imprinted domesticated primate nervous system."

"In a world where we are all giants in a pygmy's hut, fighting over the space, he was one of the few trying to knock down the walls and stretch his legs."

"Robert Anton Wilson is the unacknowledged elephant in our cultural living room: a direct and indirect influence on popular books, movies, TV shows, music, games, comics, and commentary. … Wilson is a primary source for the ironic style of conspiracism, a sensibility that treats alleged cabals not as intrigues to be exposed or lies to be debunked but as a bizarre mutant mythos to be mined for laughs, metaphors, and social insights."

"Stale is stale and borrowed is borrowed, no matter how original your models may have been."

"Autobiography. Apparently one should not name the names of those one has been to bed with, or give explicit figures on the amount of money one has earned, those being the two data most eagerly sought by readers; all the rest is legitimate to reveal."

"I enjoyed the late 1960s as much as anyone, and I regarded much of the political ferment of the time as vital to the survival of our society—the Vietnam war might have gone on for many decades more without it. But the era did have its silly side, and the search for the immediately relevant at the expense of the less immediately practical side was, to me, one of the sillier aspects of it. Throwing most of past human knowledge overboard for the sake of bringing about instant social reform did not strike me as an effective way of achieving anything but ignorance. Evidently it seemed that way to others, too: after a while the traditional sciences and historical subjects returned to the curriculum, Shakespeare and Sophocles were allowed back in also, and not a great deal was heard from the earnest, deadly young decreers of non-negotiable demands who had had such power over academic life for a time. (Although a lot of them grew up and became university professors, and they are behind the modern craze for political correctness that has spread so much terror through our academic institutions.)"

"Dinoli had to clawed himself to first rank in public relations by sheer exertion, coupled with judicious backstabbing."

"His name would fade from the front pages in a few days; he knew too much about communications media to believe that his current notoriety would last."

"When you poison a man in order to sell him the antidote, you don’t boast about it afterward to the victim!"

"Not all lawyers are annoying. Some are dead."

"Never pass by a chance to shut up."

"What value is lineage to a drowning man?"

"His speech is a burning fire."

"Man kann den Menschen nicht verwehren, Zu denken, was sie wollen."

"I am better than my reputation."

"Was man nicht aufgibt, hat man nie verloren."

"Das Leben ist Nur ein Moment, der Tod ist auch nur einer!"

"I get all my hair products at PetCo. (Jay's hair is long, curly, and quite messy)"

"You know what burns me? Matches."

"I was born nine months premature."

"Virtue is no empty echo."

"His life is a watch or a vision Between a sleep and a sleep."

"I work at Bed Bath and Beyond. I work in the Beyond section. When someone asks me where the Bath section is, I say "It's beyond me.""

"O tender yearning, sweet hoping! The golden time of first love! The eye sees the open heaven, The heart is intoxicated with bliss; O that the beautiful time of young love Could remain green forever."

"Appearance should never attain reality, And if nature conquers, then must art retire."

"John Howe (cleric) (1630–1705), English Puritan theologian"

"John Howe (artist) (born 1957), Canadian illustrator"

"No man can certainly know, or ought to conclude, concerning himself or others, as long as they live, that the season of grace is quite over with them. As we can conceive no rule God hath set to Himself to proceed by, in ordinary cases of this nature; so nor is there any He hath set unto us to judge by, in this case. It were to no purpose, and could be of no use to men to know so much; therefore it were unreasonable to expect God should have settled and declared any rule, by which they might come to the knowledge of it."

"Tho none ought to conclude that their day or season of grace is quite expired, yet they ought to deeply apprehend the danger, lest it should expire before their necessary work be done and their peace made. For tho it can be of no use for them to know the former, and therefore they have no means appointed them by which to know it, 'tis of great use to apprehend the latter; and they have sufficient ground for the apprehension."

"Illustrating Tolkien means treading warily, dipping one's brush in shadow and rinsing them in light. Battle and balance, down the impossible path between the clear and the obscure."

"History is like a jigsaw puzzle, except every piece is from a different puzzle, and you try to make them all fit. Although you many never have a finished picture, the time you spend, I think you end up understanding at least the pieces."

"Drawing is giving yourself up to an exercise with no immediate application. It is a form of communion with your subject, be it in front of you or in your head. Expertise and skill go hand in hand with your desire to express feelings, to tell stories, to create and share worlds. It's personal."

"It is wise not to confuse information and inspiration. The former is the result of studious application, the latter is what happens when you don't think about it. Each has a role to play, but must not look to play the role of the other. Inspiration may be the bright tower in the clouds; information is the solid rock where the foundations are."

"Like any admirer of Celtic myth, I was eager to have a go at depicting Cernunnos, the antlered god. I often sit with one of my many books on the subject and look in awe at the reproduction of the Gunderstrup Cauldron, on which he appears."

"From Alan, I learned to take a more instinctive and intuitive approach to pencil work. I used to let my mind get far too far ahead of my pencil, which can be productive, but removes the serendipitous switch of direction when the pencil and hand discover an idea the mind’s eye had missed. Drawing at the right speed is a sort of graphic contrapposto providing what I’d be tempted to call an “intuitional resilience” unobtainable with more energetic methods. I very much enjoyed working with him, a situation of symbiosis between enthusiasm and despair, the former because his work is just so good, the latter because his work is just so good. He is hard to keep up with, but then I believe he says the same of me. He is a dear friend and a wonderful artist."

"I dislike giving advice, and am always very careful to find out what the person needs to hear (not necessarily wants to hear; the two usually have little in common) before venturing into that territory. I’m sure I have received much good advice, but can only recall the bad."

"If your work reflects not only your technical skills, but also who you are and more importantly what you have to say, then it will do the talking in your stead. I agree that networking and meeting people is very important, but a foot in the door doesn’t always stop it closing."

"His magic has a purpose, to make us think and wonder about distant places and people in times gone by."

"I feel an army in my fist."

"To save all we must risk all."

"The joke loses everything when the joker laughs himself."

"Did you think the lion was sleeping because he didn't roar?"

"The lemonade is weak, like your soul."

"Votes should be weighed, not counted. Sooner or later, the state will be wrecked In which majority rules, and ignorance decides."

"There are three lessons I would write, — Three words — as with a burning pen, In tracings of eternal light Upon the hearts of men. Have Hope. Though clouds environ now, And gladness hides her face in scorn, Put thou the shadow from thy brow, — No night but hath its morn. Have Faith. Where'er thy bark is driven, — The calm's disport, the tempest's mirth, — Know this: God rules the hosts of heaven, The habitants of earth. Have Love. Not love alone for one, But men, as man, thy brothers call; And scatter, like the circling sun, Thy charities on all. Thus grave these lessons on thy soul, — Hope, Faith, and Love, — and thou shalt find Strength when life's surges rudest roll, Light when thou else wert blind."

"Die Weltgeschichte ist das Weltgericht."