Quotes & Sayings About Luminaries

It must not be supposed that the heavens or the luminaries are endowed with life(3). For they are inanimate and insensible(4). So that when the divine Scripture saith, Let the heavens rejoice and the earth be glad(5), it is the angels in heaven and the men on earth that are invited to rejoice. — John Damascene

'The Luminaries' is such a different book to 'The Rehearsal.' There are only a couple of things that link the two books: there's a certain preoccupation with looking at relationships from the outside, being shut out of human intimacy; and then there's patterning. — Eleanor Catton

You want Mr. Staines to love you very much, don't you, Miss Wetherell?'
Anna seemed offended by his implication. 'He does love me.'
'That wasn't my question.'
She squinted at him. 'Everyone wants to be loved.'
'That's very true,' Devlin said, sadly. 'We all want to be loved - and need to be loved, I think. Without love, we cannot be ourselves. — Eleanor Catton

Throughout his long career, Washington earned the adulation not merely of ordinary people but of the other luminaries whom we now hail as 'founding fathers.' — Edmund Morgan

You're of a mind with Mr. Staines.'
'Am I?'
'Yes,' Anna said. 'That is precisely the sort of thing that he would say.'
'Your Mr. Staines is quite the philosopher, Miss Wetherell.'
'Why, Reverend,' Anna said, smiling suddenly, 'I believe you've just paid yourself a compliment. — Eleanor Catton

Let's just enjoy it for ourselves. Dawn is such a private hour, don't you think? Such a solitary hour. One always hears that said of midnight, but I think of midnight as remarkably companionable - everyone together, sleeping in the dark.'
'I am afraid I am interrupting your solitude,' Anna said.
'No, no,' the boy said. 'Oh, no. Solitude is best enjoyed in company.' He grinned at her, quickly, and Anna smiled back. 'Especially the company of one other soul,' he added, turning back to the sea. 'It's dreadful to feel alone and really be alone. But I love to enjoy the feeling when I'm not. — Eleanor Catton

I grew up with Scientology - my parents at one point were clerical. It's a pragmatic philosophy, not merely a belief system. Yeah, it's had media exposure because certain luminaries do Scientology, but millions of people do it who are not celebrities. It's not a threat or some cult. — Giovanni Ribisi

How would I overlook the name Moody? Why, that's like overlooking Hanover, or - or Plantagenet.'
The woman laughed. 'I would hardly compare Adrian Moody to a royal line! — Eleanor Catton

Unlike the sun, intellectual luminaries shine brightest after they set. — Charles Caleb Colton

He and Anna lay facing each other, Staines lying on his left hip, and Anna, on her right, both of them with their knees drawn up to their chests, Staines with one hand tucked beneath his bandaged shoulder, Anna with one hand tucked beneath her cheek. She must have turned toward him, some time in the night: her left arm was flung outward, her fingers reaching, her palm turned down ...
Devlin came closer ... He looked down at Anna and Emery, their mirrored bodies, facing in. They were breathing in tandem.
So they are lovers, he thought, looking down at them. So they are lovers, after all. He knew it from the way that they were sleeping. — Eleanor Catton

Even with a Democratic president behind the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a far larger percentage of Republicans than Democrats voted for it. Eminent Democratic luminaries voted against it, including Senators Ernest Hollings, Richard Russell, Sam Ervin, Albert Gore Sr., J. William Fulbright (Bill Clinton's mentor) and of course, Robert Byrd. Overall, 82 percent of Senate Republicans supported the Civil Rights Act of 1964, compared to only 66 percent of Democrats. In the House, 80 percent of Republicans voted for it, while only 63 percent of Democrats did.
Crediting Democrats for finally coming on board with Republicans civil rights policies by supporting the 1964 act would be nearly as absurd as giving the Democrats all the glory for Regan's 1981 tax cuts - which passed with the support of 99 percent of Republicans but only 29 percent of Democrats. — Ann Coulter

My second novel, 'The Luminaries,' is set in the New Zealand gold rushes of the 1860s, though it's not really a historical novel in the conventional sense. So far, I've been describing it as 'an astrological murder mystery.' — Eleanor Catton

But could he endure it, that other men knew her in a way that he, Staines, did not? He did not know. — Eleanor Catton

Pritchard was lonely, and like most lonely souls, he saw happy couples everywhere. — Eleanor Catton

What I wanted to create with 'The Luminaries' is a book that had structural patterns built in that didn't matter, but if you cared about them, you could look into the book and see them. — Eleanor Catton

In researching 'The Luminaries,' I did read quite a lot of 20th-century crime. My favourites out of that were James M. Cain, Dassiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler and Graham Greene and Patricia Highsmith. — Eleanor Catton

It was a noteworthy lesson, even for someone who'd been fed a daily diet of italicized lessons: that people in high places, luminaries with advanced degrees in Classics and in possession of excellent manners, can disappoint you as profoundly as anyone else. — Elinor Lipman

Cowell Devlin sighed. Yes, he understood Anna Wetherell at long last, but it was not a happy understanding. Devlin had known many women of poor prospects and limited means, whose only transport out of the miserable cage of their unhappy circumstance was the flight of the fantastic. Such fantasies were invariably magical - angelic patronage, invitations into paradise - and Anna's story, touching though it was, showed the same strain of the impossible. Why, it was painfully clear! The most eligible bachelor of Anna's acquaintance possessed a love so deep and pure that all respective differences between them were rendered immaterial? He was not dead - he was only missing? He was sending her 'messages' that proved the depth of his love - and these were messages that only she could hear? It was a fantasy, Devlin thought. It was a fantasy of the girl's own devising. The boy could only be dead. — Eleanor Catton

It is our duty not to not only hold fast, but to hold forth the Word of life; not only to hold fast for our own benefit, but to hold it forth for the benefit of others, to hold it forth as the candlestick holds forth the candle, which makes it appear to advantage all around, or as the luminaries of the heavens, which shed their influences far and wide. — Matthew Henry

If one of the luminaries should condescend, then the homely lover, plain of face, knows damn well to choose some modest number, and then begin counting down the days of love. Beauty seeks after beauty, like goes with like; forever this was the way of things, world without end. — Kai Ashante Wilson

Among ourselves (Westerners), the people who are regarded as moral luminaries are those who forgo ordinary pleasures themselves and find compensation in interfering with the pleasures of others. — Bertrand Russell

It's not vague,' Anna said. 'I'm certain of it. Just as when you're certain you did have a dream ... you knew you dreamed ... but you can't remember any of the details. — Eleanor Catton

Coachella is a magnet for music-biz luminaries such as Tara Reid, Paris Hilton, and Cameron Diaz. — Adam Schlesinger

Tonight shall be the very beginning.'
'Was it?'
'It shall be. For me.'
'My beginning was the albatrosses.'
'That is a good beginning; I am glad it is yours. Tonight shall be mine.'
'Ought we to have different ones?'
'Different beginnings? I think we must.'
'Will there be more of them?'
'A great many more. Are your eyes closed?'
'Yes. Are yours?'
'Yes. Though it's so dark it hardly makes a difference.'
'I feel - more than myself.'
'I feel - as though a new chamber of my heart has opened.'
'Listen.'
'What is it?'
'The rain. — Eleanor Catton

Historic figures have homes to visit for posterity; the Lord of history left no home. Luminaries leave libraries and write their memoirs; He left one book, penned by ordinary people. Deliverers speak of winning through might and conquest; He spoke of a place in the heart. — Ravi Zacharias

Are you fixing to stay in this country, then, Walter? After you've dug yourself a patch, and made yourself a pile?'
'I expect my luck will decide that question for me.'
'Would you call it lucky to stay, or lucky to go?'
'I'd call it lucky to choose,' said Moody - surprising himself, for that was not the answer he would have given, three months prior. — Eleanor Catton

What an unrequited love it is, this thirst! But is it love, when it is unrequited? — Eleanor Catton

In April 1962, McGeorge Bundy - the former Harvard dean and now national security adviser to President Kennedy - had Oppenheimer invited to a White House dinner honoring forty-nine Nobel laureates. At this gala affair, Oppie rubbed elbows with such other luminaries as the poet Robert Frost, the astronaut John Glenn and the writer Norman Cousins. Everyone laughed when Kennedy quipped, "I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone." Afterwards, — Kai Bird

There was dust everywhere: dust on the cracked and rheumy window; dust over the drugget that made shift as Mr. Guyle's carpet; dust on the framed portraits of my lords Eldon, Coke and other luminaries that hung on the wall; and dust, it may be presumed, in the ventricles of Mr. Guyle's ancient legal heart. — D.J. Taylor

A part of what makes myths live is their multiplicity, the way different voices retell them in every generation. Homer survives because his poetry was outstanding, yes, but also because he's been passed down by so many by luminaries like Vergil and Ovid, Shakespeare, James Joyce and Margaret Atwood, but also by countless others. I wanted to do my part for these tremendous stories. — Madeline Miller

The literary world is made up of little confederacies, each looking upon its own members as the lights of the universe; and considering all others as mere transient meteors, doomed to soon fall and be forgotten, while its own luminaries are to shine steadily into immortality. — Washington Irving

The three most important powers are Heaven, Earth and Man. The three luminaries are the Sun, the Moon and the Stars. Opportunities given by Heaven are not equal to the advantages afforded by Earth, while the advantages of Earth do not match the blessings that come from harmony among men — Lisa See

We have no regulation of drones in the United States in their commercial use. You can see drones some day hovering over the homes of Hollywood luminaries, violating privacy. This question has to be addressed. And we need rules of operation on the border, by police, by commercial use, and also by military and intelligence use. — Dianne Feinstein

It is impossible for the mind which is not totally destitute of piety, to behold the sublime, the awful, the amazing works of creation and providence; the heavens with their luminaries, the mountains, the ocean, the storm, the earthquake, and the volcano; the circuit of the seasons and the revolutions of empires; without marking in them all the mighty hand of God, and feeling strong emotions of reverence toward the Author of these stupendous works. — Timothy Dwight V

From the very beginning, I had an ambition for 'The Luminaries': a direction - but not a real idea. — Eleanor Catton

Has he made an avowal of his love?'
'No,' Anna said. 'He doesn't need to. I know it, just the same. — Eleanor Catton

And the hermit's spirit detaches itself, ever so gently, and begins its lonely passage upward, to find its final resting place among the stars. — Eleanor Catton

Is it the smoke?' the boy said, shivering slightly. 'I've never touched the stuff, myself, but how it claws at one ... like a thorn in every one of your fingers, and a string around your heart ... and one fees it always. Nagging. Nagging. — Eleanor Catton

When I was writing 'The Luminaries,' I read a lot of crime novels because I wanted to figure out which ones made me go, 'Ah! I didn't know that was coming!' — Eleanor Catton

The alternative connection to what is ultimate is, of course, revelation. In this view, it is not the human being reaching up to seize the meaning of life, or gazing into itself for that meaning, but God reaching down to explain life's meaning. In this understanding, there can be no speaking of God, no speaking of meaning, before his speaking to us is heard. This way was treated rudely by the Enlightenment luminaries because it both limited human freedom in shaping the meaning of reality and resorted to what was miraculous in the way revelation has been given. And it has not been treated any more kindly by the postmoderns for whom its grand, overarching Story is anathema and who do not believe that they can escape their own subjectivity. But this is the Christian confession. — John Piper

It is perfectly serendipitous,' said the boy, descending the steps to the street. 'Fancy that - us meeting a second time! Of course I have wished for it, very much - but they were vain wishes; the kind one makes in twilight states, you know, idly. I remember just what you said, as we rounded the heads of the harbor - in the dawn light. "I should like to see him in a storm," you said. I have thought of it many times, since; it was the most delightfully original of speeches.'
Anna blushed at this: not only had she never heard herself described as an original before, she had certainly never supposed that her utterances qualified as 'speeches. — Eleanor Catton