Magic And Sorcery Quotes & Sayings

Recent studies have shown that approximately 40% of authors are manic depressive. The rest of us just drink. — Melodie Campbell

The Golden Horn of Griffo is finely wrought," Zenodotus said, tracing his finger along the curve of Telemach's treasure. "And the magic is in its making alone. Do you understand? There is no sorcery here - none that I can detect. — Robin Sloan

A name can't begin to encompass the sum of all her parts. But that's the magic of names, isn't it? That the complex, contradictory individuals we are can be called up complete and whole in another mind through the simple sorcery of a name. — Charles De Lint

I think that the ideal space must contain elements of magic, serenity, sorcery and mystery. — Luis Barragan

The result of the scientific work we have been considering was that the outlook of educated men was completely transformed. At the beginning of the century, Sir Thomas Browne took part in trials for witchcraft; at the end, such a thing would have been impossible. In Shakespeare's time, comets were still portents; after the publication of Newton's Principia in 1687, it was known that he and Halley had calculated the orbits of certain comets, and that they were as obedient as the planets to the law of gravitation. The reign of law had established its hold on men's imaginations, making such things as magic and sorcery incredible. In 1700 the mental outlook of educated men was completely modern; in 1600, except among a very few, it was still largely medieval. — Bertrand Russell

He tilted my chin up and I swear those lips are magic. Witchcraft. Sorcery. Whatever it is in those lips, it's addictive. Unassailable. I had to have more. More of this feeling of being wanted. — Taylor Rhodes

From: The Crown of Telus
She opened her eyes, saw the crown sitting on her bedside table, and wished that it was all a dream. The crown of Trist was nothing special. It had no gemstones, no gold or silver filigree; instead it was simple, a metal circlet with four points and some inlay around a scratched and dented band.
"It's a working man's crown," she remembered her father holding the symbol of power out to her when she younger. "See the inlay? Three moons, one for each of our gods, over an oak which represents the mighty forests of the north, a shock of wheat for the Plainsmen to the south, a ship for the Gheltes to the west, and a hashap flower for the spice in the east. Nothing more. We don't need anymore."
Tears welled in her eyes. A working man's crown. Nothing fancy or bejeweled, a symbol of the power that guides the land and cares for its people.
This was going to be the first day she wore it as queen. — William Laws

The core practice of magic is: The execution of a willed intent to create change in the material world, which either defies, hastens or purifies the consequences of natural cause and effect. — Zeena Schreck

Atavistic resurgence, a primal urge towards union with the Divine by returning to the common source of all, is indicated by the backward symbolism peculiar to all Sabbath ceremonies, as also of many ideas connected with witchcraft, sorcery and magic. Whether it be the symbol of the moon presiding over nocturnal ecstasies; the words of power chanted backwards; the back-to-back dance performed in opposition to the sun's course; the devil's tail - are all instances of reversal and symbolic of Will and Desire turning within and down to subconscious regions, to the remote past, there to surprise the required atavistic energy for purposes of transformation, healing, initiation, construction or destruction. — Kenneth Grant

One bright dusk, four, five, no, my God, six summers ago, I strolled along a Greenwich avenue of mature chestnuts and mock oranges in a state of grace. Those Regency residences number amount London's Costliest properties, but should you ever inherit one, dear Reader, sell it, don't live in it. Houses like these secrete some dark sorcery that transforms their owners into fruitcakes. One such victim, an ex-chief of Rhodesian polices, had, on the evening in question, written me a check as rotund as himself to edit and print his autobiography. My state of grace was thanks in part to this check, and in part to a 1983 Chablis from the Duruzoi vineyard, a magic potion that dissolves our myriad tragedies into mere misunderstandings. — David Mitchell

The words witch and witchcraft, in everyday usage for over a thousand years, have undergone several changes of meaning; and today witchcraft, having reverted to its original connotation of magic and sorcery, does not convey the precise and limited definition it once had during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. If witchcraft had never meant anything more than the craft of "an old, weather-beaten crone..." Europe would not have suffered, for three centuries from 1450 to 1750, the shocking nightmare, the foulest crime and the deepest shame of western civilization, the blackout of everything that homo sapiens, the reasoning man, has ever upheld. This book is about that shame...degradation stifled decency, the filthiest passions masqueraded under the cover of religion, and man's intellect was subverted to condone bestialities that even Swift's Yahoos would blush.

Never were so many wrong, so long... — Rossell Hope Robbins

I don't do magic. I turn your attention back to Friday night and the big-ass sword I was carrying. My job is to run and swing. — Danielle Monsch

Once again I have told you so little, and have asked no questions, and once again I must close. But not a single answer and, even more certainly, not a single question shall be lost. There exists some kind of sorcery by which two people, without seeing each other, without talking to each other, can at least discover the greater part about each other's past, literally in a flash, without having to tell each other all and everything; but this, after all, is almost an instrument of Black Magic (without seeming to be) which, although never without reward, one would certainly never resort to with impunity. Therefore I won't say it, unless you guess it first. It is terribly short, like all magic formulas. Farewell, and let me reinforce this greeting by lingering over your hand.
Yours, Franz K. — Franz Kafka

Noontime was absolutely the perfect time for a duel in the dragon's opinion as this was also lunchtime, his favorite part of the day. As the saying went, he could kill two birds with one stone. — Sully Tarnish

Like a dried up spring, magic trickled forth with less and less strength, until one day, the people awoke and there was simply no more to be had. — Natalia Marx

Magic!' cried an old man. 'Tis sorcery, and we are undone!' 'Not so,' I told him, 'Sorcery cannot harm good Christians.' 'But I am a miserable sinner,' he wailed. — Poul Anderson

To ask me to verify my life by giving you my statistics is like using science to validate sorcery. It robs the world of its magic and makes milestones out of us all. — Carlos Castaneda

Not too many years ago, the names of our perfumes bore testimony to such things. There was a popular scent called Tabu, there was Sorcery, My Sin, Vampire, Voodoo, Evening in Paris, Jungle Gardenia, Bandit, Shocking, Intimate, Love Potion, and L'Heure Bleue - The Blue Hour. Nowadays what do we find? Vanderbilt, Miss Dior, Lauren, and Armani, perfumes named after glorified tailors" - there were murmurs and gasps in the audience - "names that evoke not the poetic, the erotic, the magic, but economic status, social snobbery, and the egomania of designers. Perfumes that confuse the essence of creation with the essence of money. How much sustenance can the soul receive from a scent entitled Bill Blass? — Tom Robbins

The second the door closed after him Laire started jumping, a huge smile on her face and her body shaking in repressed excitement. "I'll go, I'll go, I'll go. You don't even like the Oracle. Let me."
Before the first words were out of Laire's mouth, Fallon started to shake her head, and as soon as the green-haired woman took a breath, Fallon used it as her opportunity to say, "No way."
"Please please please."
"Let me rephrase. No way in hell."
Laire stopped jumping, a small pout coming to her lips. How she had been able to prevent an ankle fracture while jumping on those spikes, Larissa would never know. "Why not?"
"Because if they have an orgy going on, you'll want to join. And if they don't have an orgy going on, you'll want to start one. I'll take Aislynn with me. — Danielle Monsch

AS their peculiar perfume is the chief association with spices, so sorcery is allied in every memory to gypsies. And as it has not escaped many poets that there is something more strangely sweet and mysterious in the scent of cloves than in that of flowers, so the attribute of inherited magic power adds to the romance of these picturesque wanderers. Both the spices and the Romany come from the far East - the fatherland of divination and enchantment. The latter have been traced with tolerable accuracy, If we admit their affinity with the Indian Dom and Domar, back to the p. 2 threshold of history, or well-nigh into prehistoric times, and in all ages they, or their women, have been engaged, as if by elvish instinct, in selling enchant. merits, peddling prophecies and palmistry, and dealing with the devil generally ill a small retail way. As it was of old so it is to-day - Ki shan i Romani - Adoi san' i chov'hani. Wherever gypsies go, There the witches are, we know. — Charles Godfrey Leland

Lord help her, but she was instantly drawn to his scent - a mixture of smoke and salt and mystery - as well as his strength. The pulse of his heart, the hum of blood through his veins, the aura of power and danger surrounding him. — Jo Grafford

My heart might very well beat itself from my chest," she whispered, "and 'tis difficult to breathe."
"How odd." Passion thickened his voice. "I seem to be suffering the same symptoms. Does anything else plague you?"
"A terrible weakness," she whispered shakily. "If you let me go, I am not entirely certain I shall be able to stand."
He buried his face in her neck. "Then I shall never let you go. — Jo Grafford

Sometimes, reality is the illusion, and the truth only visible where our eyes can't see.
- Lady Lalaigne — Jeanine Henning

Dragons were notoriously finicky about whom they ate, and thought it the height of bad manners to be kept waiting by their selected fare. — Sully Tarnish

The warmth in his eyes flared to heat and he captured her hand in both of his, bending over it to hold his lips against the back a long moment. He did not exactly kiss it so much as breathe her in. She feared her hand smelled of bacon, but he didn't seem to care. — Gail Dayton

Cade grabbed my hand and pressed it against his chest. You are right here forever, and no magic tricks or sorcery can pry you from my heart. — Tess Oliver

They have no gods. They work magic, and think they are gods themselves. But they are not. And when they die, they (...) become dust and bone, and their ghosts whine on the wind a little while till the wind blows them away. They do not have immortal souls. — Ursula K. Le Guin

In alarming proportions the following words have disappeared from architectural publications: beauty, inspiration, magic, sorcery, enchantment, and also serenity, mystery, silence, privacy, astonishment. All of these have found a loving home in my soul. — Luis Barragan

Ellysetta Baristani is my shei'tani." His eyes found hers. "My truemate." A murmur of voices rippled through the crowd.
"Please tell the court what a truemate is."
"A truemate is the person who holds the other half of a Fey's soul." His gaze never left hers, and Ellie felt the magic of his voice wrapping her in imperceptible weaves of longing. "It is the most sacred bond known to any Fey, more sacred than that between a king and his subjects, more sacred even than that between a mother and a child. — C.L. Wilson

He who confesses magic or sorcery shall do penance for the time of murder, and shall be treated in the same manner as he who convicts himself of this sin. — Saint Basil

The only thing more unpredictable than magic is language. — Sully Tarnish

Ellysetta Baristani." Belliard's voice caused her to stop and turn back around. "Even should you clothe yourself in rags and dirt, you would bring honor to the Fey. — C.L. Wilson

There is hardly an absurdity of the past that cannot be found flourishing somewhere in the present. Underneath all civilization, ancient or modern, moved and still moves a sea of magic, superstition and sorcery. Perhaps they will remain when the works of our reason have passed away. — Will Durant