Man Would Be King Quotes & Sayings

And so to my fool's bed. What was that? No, no, not a girl crying in the garden. No one, cold, hungry, and banished, was shivering there, longing and not daring to come in. It was the chains swinging at the well. It would be folly to get up and go out and call again: Psyche, Psyche, my only love. I am a great queen. I have killed a man. I am drunk like a man. All warriors drink deep after the battle. Bardia's lips on my hand were like the touch of lightning. All great princes have mistresses and lovers. There's the crying again. No, it's only the buckets at the well. "Shut the window, Poobi. To your bed, child. Do you love me, Poobi? Kiss me good night. Good night." The king's dead. He'll never pull my hair again. A straight thrust and then a cut in the leg. That would have killed him. I am the Queen; I'll kill Orual too. — C.S. Lewis

Again Satan was defeated, and again he resorted to deception, in the hope of converting his defeat into a victory. To stir up rebellion in the fallen race, he now represented God as unjust in having permitted man to transgress his law. "Why," said the artful tempter, "when God knew what would be the result, did he permit man to be placed on trial, to sin, and bring in misery and death?" And the children of Adam, forgetful of the long-suffering mercy that had granted man another trial, regardless of the amazing, the awful sacrifice which his rebellion had cost the King of heaven, gave ear to the tempter, and murmured against the only Being who could save them from the destructive power of Satan. — Ellen G. White

a small few actually able to do those things of which men whisper - these few could call demons and the dead, could kill with a curse or heal with strange potions. One of these men had been a creature the gunslinger believed to be a demon himself, a creature that pretended to be a man and called itself Flagg. He had seen him only briefly, and that had been near the end, as chaos and the final crash approached his land. Hot on his heels had come two young men who looked desperate and yet grim, men named Dennis and Thomas. These three had crossed only a tiny part of what had been a confused and confusing time in the gunslinger's life, but he would never forget seeing Flagg change a man who had irritated him into a howling dog. He remembered that well enough. — Stephen King

A woman may achieve greatness, or at any rate great renown, by merely being a wonderful wife and mother, like the mother of the Gracchi; whereas the men who have achieved great renown by being devoted husbands and fathers might be counted on the fingers of one hand. Charles I was an unfortunate king, but an admirable family man. Still, you would scarcely class him as one of the world's great fathers, and his children were not an unqualified success. Dear me! Being a great father is either a very difficult or a very sadly unrewarded profession. Wherever you find a great man, you will find a great mother or a great wife standing behind him - or so they used to say. It would be interesting to know how many great women have had great fathers and husbands behind them. — Dorothy L. Sayers

If man had the wisdom of age in youth and the vitality of youth in age, then he would be an eternally wise young man. (Feb 2003) — James King

MacKenzie surveyed the nearly finished quilt. "What's the name of this pattern, Mrs. King?" he asked.
"Princess Feather," Jesse answered.
Taking LisBeth's hand in his own, MacKenzie asked, "Would it be presumptuous of me to ask if you had planned to add this quilt to LisBeth's hope chest?"
Jesse looked up at the couple and grinned. "I could be persuaded to do that. But only if I was assured that her future husband was a man worthy of sharing such a gift. — Stephanie Grace Whitson

Donald Trump is appealing to, that whole expression, everybody who asked me, why is Trump able to win in those 16 people? There's a whole expression. In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. I'm not very good at prognosticating but I would not be surprised if he's the nominee. — Joe Biden

had gone to heaven. Enoch was "translated" and Elijah was "taken up." One could "ascend" a ladder (Jesus had told Nathanael that he would see angels ascending and descending on the Son of Man, and Jacob beheld a ladder in his midnight dream at Bethel) or one could "ascend" to Jerusalem, moving to a higher elevation from sea level. The term could be used figuratively to refer to the elevation of a king to his royal office. But no one ever had "ascended to heaven" in the sense in which Jesus was speaking. The ascension of Jesus was the supreme political event of world history. He ascended — R.C. Sproul

We have feudal governments in a commercial age. It would be but an easy extension of our commercial system, to pay a private emperor a fee for services, as we pay an architect, an engineer, or a lawyer. If any man has talent for righting wrong, for administering difficult affairs, for counselling poor farmers how to turn their estates to good husbandry, for combining a hundred private enterprises to a general benefit, let him in the county- town, or in Court-street, put up his sign-board, Mr. Smith, Governor, Mr. Johnson, Working king. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

The thing that was forfeited in the garden was regained. God gave him [Adam] dominion over the works of His hand. God made him His understudy, His king to rule over everything that had life. Man was master, man lived in the realm of god. He lived on terms of equality with God. God was a faith God. All God had to do was to believe that the sun was, and the sun was. All God had to do was to believe that the planets would be, and they were. Man belonged to God's class of being - a faith man, And he lived in the creative realm of God — John G. Lake

In all probability, the man who found the horoscope would also catch Nut and Nutcracker. They had to believe all the more strongly in the astrologer's new forecast since none of his predictions had ever come true. Sooner or later, his prognoses had to be right, given that the king, who could never be wrong, had made him his Grand Augur. — E.T.A. Hoffmann

A man sentenced to death obtained a reprieve by assuring the king he would teach his majesty's horse to fly within the year - on the condition that if he didn't succeed, he would be put to death at the end of the year. "Within a year," the man explained later, "the king may die, or I may die, or the horse may die. Furthermore, in a year, who knows? Maybe the horse will learn to fly." My philosophy is like that man's. I take the long-range view. — Bernard Baruch

He should have said something, why hadn't he? Costis wondered. In fact, the king had. He had complained at every step all the way across the palace, and they'd ignored it. If he'd been stoic and denied the pain, the entire palace would have been in a panic already, Eddisian soldiers on the move. He'd meant to deceive them, and he'd succeeded. It made Costis wonder for the first time just how much the stoic man really wants to hide when he unsuccessfully pretends not to be in pain. — Megan Whalen Turner

The negro king desired to be portrayed as white. But do not laugh at the poor African; for every man is but another negro king, and would like to appear in a color different from that with which Fate has bedaubed him. — Heinrich Heine

The belief that a person has a share in an unknown life to which his or her love may win us admission is, of all the prerequisites of love, the one which it values most highly and which makes it set little store by all the rest. Even those women who claim to judge a man by his looks alone, see in those looks the emanation of a special way of life. That is why they fall in love with soldiers or with firemen; the uniform makes them less particular about the face; they feel they are embracing beneath the gleaming breastplate a heart different from the rest, more gallant, more adventurous, more tender; and so it is that a young king or a crown prince may make the most gratifying conquests in the countries that he visits, and yet lack entirely that regular and classic profile which would be indispensable, I dare say, for a stockbroker. — Marcel Proust

It would seem that in Paine's view the code of government should be that of the legendary King Pausole, who prescribed but two laws for his subjects, the first being, Hurt no man , and the second, Then do as you please. — Albert J. Nock

I want you to listen to me you seem to be under the misconception that there is something wrong with you, that there is nothing special about you. There is nobody else in the whole world that I would rather be with. I could look at you for hours an never get sick of it. I could spend ever second of everday in your presence and I would die a happy man. You belong with me. — Tiffany King

Of course, God is not necessarily anthropomorphic," she said. "Or what we would call, in our colossal egotism and sentimentality, 'a decent person.' But there is probably God. Satan, however, was man's invention, a name for the force that seeks to overthrow the civilized order of things. The first man who made laws - be he Moses or some ancient Egyptian king Osiris - that lawmaker created the devil. The devil meant the one who tempts you to break the laws. And we are truly Satanic in that we follow no law for man's protection. So why not truly disrupt? Why not make a blaze of evil to consume all the civilizations of the earth? — Anne Rice

If he had the earth for his pasture and the sea for his pond, he would be a pauper still. He only is rich who owns the day. There is no king, rich man, fairy or demon who possesses such power as that.
Mentioned in
Sixty Days and Counting, by Kim Stanley Robinson — Ralph Waldo Emerson

What does that mean?" Matthias asked. "Goedmedbridge?"
"Good maiden bridge."
"Why is it called that?"
Nina leaned against the doorway and said, "Well, the story is that when a woman found out her husband had fallen in love with a girl from West Stave and planned to leave her, she came to the bridge and, rather than live without him, hurled herself into the canal."
"Over a man with so little honor?"
"You'd never be tempted? All the fruits and flesh of West Stave before you?"
"Would you throw yourself off a bridge for a man who was?"
"I wouldn't throw myself off a bridge for the king of Ravka. — Leigh Bardugo

The heart of man's problem is the problem of man's heart. Scripture says that the heart of man is wicked and God requires a broken and contrite heart. King David though a man with a bad past, who journeyed to repentance, was called 'a man after God's own heart.' On the road to Emmaus two fellows unwittingly entered fellowship with God himself. When they realised it was Jesus they exclaimed 'Did not our hearts burn within us as we talked with him along the way.' It was these and others of the upper room who went on to turn the world upside down. The early followers of Jesus were the start of a revolution of the heart.

O that we would live with vision that revolution of the heart. In the words of the hymn - Be Thou My Vision: 'Christ of my own heart, whatever befall.
Still be my vision, O ruler of all'. — David Holdsworth

Were I not a king, I would be a university man. — King James I

If I were not a king, I would be a university man; and if it were so that I must be a prisoner, if I might have my wish, I would desire to have no other prison than that library [the Bodleian]. — King James I

I would rather be a poor man in a garret with plenty of books than a king who did not love reading. — Thomas Babington Macaulay

Do not enter the ministry if you can help it ...
If any student in this room could be content to be
a newspaper editor, or a grocer, or a farmer, or a
doctor, or a lawyer, or a senator, or a king, in the
name of heaven and earth let him go his way; he is
not the man in whom dwells the Spirit of God in
its fullness, for a man so full of God would utterly
weary of any pursuit but that for which his inmost
soul pants. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Say not a word in death's favor; I would rather be a paid servant in a poor man's house and be above ground than king of kings among the dead. -Achilles — Homer

A dying man asked a dying man for eternal life; a man without possessions asked a poor man for a Kingdom; a thief at the door of death asked to die like a thief and steal Paradise. One would have thought a saint would have been the first soul purchased over the counter of Calvary by the red coins of Redemption, but in the Divine plan it was a thief who was the escort of the King of kings into Paradise. If Our Lord had come merely as a teacher, the thief would never have asked for forgiveness. But since the thief's request touched the reason of His coming to earth, namely, to save souls, the thief heard the immediate answer:
'I promise thee, this day thou shalt be
With Me in Paradise'
(Luke 23:43)
It was the thief's last prayer, perhaps even his first. He knocked once, sought once, asked once, dared everything, and found everything. When even the disciples were doubting and only one was present at the Cross, the thief owned and acknowledged Him as Saviour. — Fulton J. Sheen

means that of all God's creatures a cat is at all times himself. When in the presence of a king, mere mortal man must bow and lady, curtsy. A dog, well trained, will grovel and beg. Horses wait patiently in the rain upon his pleasure. But a cat cares but for himself. He will walk into any room and stare you in the eye, be you king or clown and he will hold his own opinion of you. He will turn his back on you if you displease him, stand, sit, or walk away as is his will. And a king will tolerate this from a cat, but from no one else, since to protest would be the veriest waste of time." "How — D.L. Carter

Your name?" George asked him directly. He had probably seen the man a dozen times before yet did not know anything about him. King Davit would have no doubt have known half the man's history already.
"Henry."
George took Henry's hand firmly in his own and looked into his eyes. This had to be done delicately, to make sure this Henry did not think him a fool. He tried to think of how his father would do it.
"Thank you, Henry, for your concern. It is a comfort to know I am so well guarded. I will make sure to praise you when next I speak to the lord general. But for now I think there is no need to worry. — Mette Ivie Harrison

Sorry!I just couldn't control myself!" would be the excuse any virile man would offer to a girl he had just deflowered- after the event. He would offer the same excuse to Jupiter Foo. The King of the Gods would surely blow his top- like Vulcan, the Volcano God!Yak! Yak! Yak![MMT] — Nicholas Chong

And to what end?" she asked sharply. "If you are, as I understand, to shut yourself forever in your cell within the four walls of an abbey, then of what use would it be were your prayer to be answered?" "The use of my own salvation." She turned from him with a pretty shrug and wave. "Is that all?" she said. "Then you are no better than Father Christopher and the rest of them. Your own, your own, ever your own! My father is the king's man, and when he rides into the press of fight he is not thinking ever of the saving of his own poor body; he recks little enough if he leave it on the field. Why then should you, who are soldiers of the Spirit, be ever moping or hiding in cell or in cave, with minds full of your own concerns, while the world, which you should be mending, is going on its way, and neither sees nor hears you? Were ye all as thoughtless of your own souls as the soldier is of his body, ye would be of more avail to the souls of others." "There — Arthur Conan Doyle

It should know that any strange and much-talked-of event is always followed by imitations, the world being so well supplied with excitable people who only need a little stirring up to make them lose what is left of their heads and do things which they would not have thought of ordinarily. It should know that if a man jump off Brooklyn Bridge another will imitate him; that if a person venture down Niagara Whirlpool in a barrel another will imitate him; that if a Jack the Ripper make notoriety by slaughtering women in dark alleys he will be imitated; that if a man attempt a king's life and the newspapers carry the noise of it around the globe, regicides will crop up all around. — Mark Twain

The ancient Greeks told of a philosopher eating bread and lentils for dinner. He was approached by another man, who lived sumptuously by flattering the king. Said the flatterer, "If you would learn to be subservient to the king, you would not have to live on lentils." The philosopher replied, "If you would learn to live on lentils, you would not have to give up your independence in order to be docile and acquiescent to the king. — John Robbins

I remember, I walked in to the house expecting to be consoled by my father, but he yelled, 'What, you fucking lost!' At this stage I was still only a kid, if I lost then I was given a good kicking by him. He would suddenly turn in to King Kong and proceeded to paint the walls seven colours of shite with me! — Stephen Richards

Gods be good, why would any man ever want to be king? When everyone was shouting King in the North, King in the North, I told myself ... swore to myself ... that I would be a good king, as honorable as Father, strong, just, loyal to my friends and brave when I faced my enemies ... now I can't even tell one from the other. — George R R Martin

I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of conformity — Martin Luther King Jr.

Put on what weary negligence you please,
You and your fellows; I'll have it come to question:
If he dislike it, let him to our sister,
Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,
Not to be over-ruled. Idle old man,
That still would manage those authorities
That he hath given away! Now, by my life,
Old fools are babes again; and must be used
With cheques as flatteries,
when they are seen abused.
Remember what I tell you. — William Shakespeare

The Essenes forbade idols, as we did, but they were far stricter in their practices and would not even touch a coin with an imprint upon it. They believed no man should be king. Still they would not lift up arms or fight their oppressors. We were in the hands of Adonai, they insisted, therefore arrows and spears were meaningless. There were children of darkness and children of light and the true battle on earth was to remain in the light and praise the one who knows all, Elohim. — Alice Hoffman

Thus all consent to that maxim of Crassus, that a prince cannot have treasure enough, since he must maintain his armies out of it; that a king, even though he would, can do nothing unjustly; that all property is in him, not excepting the very persons of his subjects; and that no man has any other property but that which the king, out of his goodness, thinks fit to leave him. And they think it is the prince's interest that there be as little of this left as may be, as if it were his advantage that his people should have neither riches nor liberty, since these things make them less easy and willing to submit to a cruel and unjust government. Whereas necessity and poverty blunts them, makes them patient, beats them down, and breaks that height of spirit that might otherwise dispose them to rebel. — Thomas More

I do not grieve for him as a wife, as Anne Devereux has grieved for her husband William Herbert. She promised him she would never remarry, she swore she would go to her grave hoping to meet him in heaven. I suppose they were in some sort of love, thought married by contract. I suppose they found some sort of passion in their marriage. It is rare but not impossible. I do hope that they have no given my son ideas about loving his wife; a man who is to be king can marry only for advantage. A woman of sense would marry only for the improvement of her family. Only a lustful fool dreams every night of a marriage of love. — Philippa Gregory

Megga couldn't sing, but she was mad to be kissed. She and Alla played a kissing game sometimes, she confessed, but it wasn't the same as kissing a man, much less a king. Sansa wondered what Megga would think about kissing the Hound, as she had. He'd come to her the night of the battle stinking of wine and blood. He kissed me and threatened to kill me, and made me sing him a song. — George R R Martin

Let us say boldly, that if the total slum violations of law by the white man over the years were calculated and compared with the lawbreaking of a few days of riots, the hardened criminal would be the white man. — Martin Luther King Jr.

For I have shown from the Scriptures, that no one of the sons of Adam is as to everything, and absolutely, called God, or named Lord. But that He is Himself in His own right, beyond all men who ever lived, God, and Lord, and King Eternal, and the Incarnate Word, proclaimed by all the prophets, the apostles, and by the Spirit Himself, may be seen by all who have attained to even a small portion of the truth. Now the Scriptures would not have testified these things of Him, if, like others, He had been a mere man. — Irenaeus Of Lyons

I was thinking about honour. It's a thing that changes doesn't it? I mean, a hundred and fifty years ago we would have had to fight if challenged. Now we'd laugh. There must have been a time when it was rather an awkward question."
"Yes. Moral theologians were never able to stop dueling
it took democracy to do that."
"And in the next war, when we are completely democratic, I expect that it will be quite honourable for officers to leave their men behind. It'll be laid down in King's Regulations as their duty
to keep a cadre going to train new men to take the place of prisoners."
"Perhaps men wouldn't take too kindly to being trained by deserters."
"Don't you think that they'd respect them more for being fly? I reckon our trouble is that we're in the awkward stage
like a man challenged to a duel a hundred years ago. — Evelyn Waugh

Englishmen are not usually softened by appeals to the memory of their mothers. — Rudyard Kipling

You'll never be rid of me now." It would have been a tease from a less serious man, but coming from Dorian, it sounded like a dire warning. "You may come to regret it. My demons will haunt our lives."
Farah reached for his wrist, stilling his hand and capturing his eyes with her own to make certain he understood her words. "I don't mind battling a few demons when I'm living with their king." She smiled. "And I think, after a time, we'll chase them away together. — Kerrigan Byrne

If I woke up one morning and realized that all I ever was going to be was a business man, I'd probably die. All my dreams would be shattered. Early in life I had many dreams. I dreamed of being a great basketball star. I dreamed of being a preacher. I dreamed of saving the world from war and racism. And I dreamed of being a great poet. Today, I dream only of writing. — Harley King

I know exactly who you are." I took a step forward, and another, until I was standing right in front of him. Then my words turned to ice. "You are the selfish, spineless son of a king who is too afraid to be his own man. You would rather hide behind your status than fight for something that could actually mean something." There, that felt good. "And it's a shame, really it is, because, according to you, I was the one true friend you had. — Rachel E. Carter

A man follows the path laid out for him. He does his duty to God and his King. He does what he must do, not what pleases him. God's truth, boy, what kind of world would this be if every man did what pleased him alone? Who would plough the fields and reap the harvest, if every man had the right to say, 'I don't want to do that.' In this world there is a place for every man, but every man must know his place. — Wilbur Smith

Well, the story is that when a woman found out her husband had fallen in love with a girl from West Stave and planned to leave her, she came to the bridge and, rather than live without him, hurled herself into the canal." "Over a man with so little honor?" "You'd never be tempted? All the fruits and flesh of West Stave before you?" "Would you throw yourself off a bridge for a man who was?" "I wouldn't throw myself off a bridge for the king of Ravka." "It's a terrible story," said Matthias. "I doubt it's true. It's just what happens when you let men name the bridges. — Leigh Bardugo

Francis began the actual illumination of the lambskin. The intricacies of scrollwork and the excruciating delicacy of the gold-inlay work would, because of the brevity of his spare-project time, make it a labor of many years; but in a dark sea of centuries wherein nothing seemed to flow, a lifetime was only brief eddy, even for the man who lived it. There was a tedium of repeated days and repeated seasons; then there were aches and pains, finally Extreme Unction, and a moment of blackness at the end-or at the beginning, rather. For then the small shivering soul who had endured the tedium, endured it badly or well, would find itself in a place of light, find itself absorbed in the burning gaze of infinitely compassionate eyes as it stood before the Just One. And then the King would say: "Come," or the King would say: "Go," and only for that moment had the tedium of years existed. It would be hard to believe differently during such an age as Francis knew. — Walter M. Miller Jr.

What a sight the big man made, sitting his horse with a commanding presence as if he were born to the guardianship. If she hadn't known him, Eva would have guessed him to be as regal as a king. — Amy Jarecki

Oh, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Slaying a villain in the service of your king is the stuff of legends and what heroes are made of." [Fanen told Myron]
"It didn't feel very heroic. It made me sick. I don't even know why I ... no, that's a lie. I really have to stop doing that." [Myron said]
"Doing what?"
"Lying. ( ... ) It's evidence of self loathing. You see, when you are so ashamed of your actions, thoughts, or intentions, you lie to hide it rather than accept yourself for who you really are. The idea of how others see you becomes more important than the reality of you.
"It's like when a man would rather die than be thought of a coward. His life is not as important to him as his reputation. In the end, who is the braver? The man who dies rather than be thought of as a coward or the man who lives willing to face who he really is?" [Myron finished]
"I'm sorry, you lost me there" Fanen said with a quizzical look. — Michael J. Sullivan

It is simply my way of saying that I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of conformity. Occasionally in life one develops a conviction so precious and meaningful that he will stand on it till the end. That is what I have found in nonviolence. — Martin Luther King Jr.

In his essay 'Self-Reliance' Emerson wrote, 'Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.' The Apostle Paul reminds us that whoso would be a Christian must also be a a nonconformist. Any Christian who blindly accepts the opinions of the majority and in fear and timidity follows a path of expediency and social approval is a mental and spiritual slave. — Martin Luther King Jr.

If the man who paints only the tree, or flower, or other surface he sees before him were an artist, the king of artists would be the photographer. It is for the artist to do something beyond this. — James Whistler

We are 10 percent of the population of this nation and it would be foolish for me to stand up and tell you we are going to get our freedom by ourselves. There's going to have to be a coalition of conscience and we aren't going to be free here in Mississippi and anywhere in the United States until there is a committed empathy on the part of the white man of this country, and he comes to see along with us that segregation denigrates him as much as it does the Negro. — Martin Luther King Jr.

He looked at her rather as a man looks at a problem that he would very much prefer to do without. She supposed it was a distinction of a sort to be a harassment to a king. — Robin McKinley

It would perhaps not be amiss to point out that he had always tried to be a good dog. He had tried to do all the things his MAN and his WOMAN, and most of all his BOY, had asked or expected of him. He would have died for them, if that had been required. He had never wanted to kill anybody. He had been struck by something, possibly destiny, or fate, or only a degenerative nerve disease called rabies. Free will was not a factor. — Stephen King

So we may well believe that the King's men were shriven on the night before they fought. Something of the young man's vision had penetrated to his captains and his soldiers. Something of the new ideal of the Round Table which was to be born in pain, something about doing a hateful and dangerous action for the sake of decency
for they knew that the fight was to be fought in blood and death without reward. They would get nothing but the unmarketable conscience of having done what they ought to do in spite of fear
something which wicked people have often debased by calling it glory with too much sentiment, but which is glory all the same. This idea was in the hearts of the young men who knelt before the God-distributing bishops
knowing that the odds were three to one, and that their own warm bodies might be cold at sunset. — T.H. White

You don't want to be a king. Trust me. It is not something to be coveted. Only the ignorant covet a throne. Augustine didn't want the job because he knew what it would cost him, and he felt a profound inadequacy to the task. He wanted a quiet, simple life. But he accepted the role on behalf of others. Becoming a king is something we accept only as an act of obedience. The posture of the heart in a mature man is reluctance to take the throne, but willing to do it on behalf of others. — John Eldredge

I'm an old man, and I'm no warrior. But during my years watching the rise and fall of those in power, I've learned that great men do not wait for their greatness to be recognized. If you wish to have the respect that you yearn for, then you must grab it and fight anyone who would say otherwise. If you wish to be a duke, you act like a duke. If you wish to be commander-in-chief, then act like a commander-in-chief."
This was not the sort of speech that a younger Mata Zyndu, certain that each man had a proper place assigned to him in the chain of being, would have believed in. But he realized with a start that his thoughts had changed.
Didn't Kuni Garu become a duke simply by acting as one? Didn't Huno Krima become king simply by declaring that he was one? He, Mata Zyndu, heir of the proudest name in all the Islands, was a greater warrior then either of them, and yet here he sat, unhappy that people had not come to beg him to lead them. — Ken Liu

So do I wish I was to be king? That is not a question I ask myself. I ask myself, Would I be a good king? Would I be quick witted and generous of spirit and full of that boundless energy? Or would I be clumsy and stupid and dulled by my own prejudices? I try to be a good man, since I am alive at all, and hope that that teaches me what I would need to know if I was ever faced with a higher challenge. — Sharon Shinn

Alderic, Knight of the Order of the City and the Assault, hereditary Guardian of the King's Peace of Mind, a man not unremembered among the makers of myth, pondered so long upon the Gibbelins' hoard that by now he deemed it his. Alas that I should say of so perilous a venture, undertaken at dead of night by a valorous man, that its motive was sheer avarice! Yet upon avarice only the Gibbelins relied to keep their larders full, and once in every hundred years sent spies into the cities of men to see how avarice did, and always the spies returned again to the tower saying that all was well.
It may be thought that, as the years went on and men came by fearful ends on that tower's wall, fewer and fewer would come to the Gibbelins' table: but the Gibbelins found otherwise.
("The Hoard Of The Gibbelins") — Lord Dunsany

The Romans may be known for many things, but humor isn't one of them. As usual, this interpretation relies on a prima facie reading of Jesus as a man with no political ambitions whatsoever. That is nonsense. All criminals sentenced to execution received a titulus so that everyone know the crime for which they were being punished and thus be deterred from taking part in similar activity. That the wording on Jesus's titulus was likely genuine is demonstrated by Joseph A. Fitzmeyer, who notes that "if [the titulus] were invented by Christians, they would have used Christos, for early Christians would scarcely have called their Lord 'King of the Jews'."[..] the notion that a no-name Jewish peasant would have received a personal audience with the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, who had probably signed a dozen execution orders that day alone, is so outlandish that it cannot be taken seriously. — Reza Aslan

The Offices rerooted me in a tradition where, monk or not, I would always be at home. From long ago I knew the power of their repetition, the incantatory force of the Psalms. But they had an added power now. As a kid, the psalmist (or psalmists) had seemed remote to me, the Psalms long prayers which sometimes rose to great poetry but often had simply to be endured. For a middle-aged man, the psalmists' moods and feelings came alive. One of the voices sounded a lot like a modern New Yorker, me or people I knew: a manic-depressive type A personality sometimes up, more often down, sometimes resigned, more often pissed off, railing about his sneaky enemies and feckless friends, always bitching to the Lord about the rotten hand he'd been dealt. That good old changelessness. — Tony Hendra

I would be the last to condemn the thousands of sincere and dedicated people outside the churches who have labored unselfishly through various humanitarian movements to cure the world of social evils, for I would rather a man be a committed humanist than an uncommitted Christian. — Martin Luther King Jr.

Then I should think of Esther, who went to petition the king contrary to the law. Esther iv. 16. I thought also of Benhadad's servants, who went with ropes upon their heads to their enemies for mercy. 1 Kings xx. 31, etc. The woman of Canaan also, that would not be daunted, though called dog by Christ, Matt. xv., 22, etc., and the man that went to borrow bread at midnight, Luke xi. 5-8, etc., were great encouragements unto me. — John Bunyan

And so it came about that the demon king Mara found himself staring at a most unwelcome intruder. He glared at the naked old man sitting in lotus position before his throne. Nothing like it had happened in a long while.
"Go away," Mara growled. "Just because you got here doesn't mean you can't be destroyed."
The old man didn't move. His yogic concentration must have been strong, because his lean brown body, as tough as the sinew showing under its skin, grew sharper in out-line. Mara would have commanded some lesser demons to torment the intruder, but these hermits weren't so easily dismissed, so Mara bided his time. — Deepak Chopra

The madman's explanation of a thing is always complete, and often in a purely rational sense satisfactory. Or, to speak more strictly, the insane explanation, if not conclusive, is at least unanswerable; this may be observed specially in the two or three commonest kinds of madness. If a man says (for instance) that men have a conspiracy against him, you cannot dispute it except by saying that all the men deny that they are conspirators; which is exactly what conspirators would do. His explanation covers the facts as much as yours. Or if a man says that he is the rightful King of England, it is no complete answer to say that the existing authorities call him mad; for if he were King of England that might be the wisest thing for the existing authorities to do. Or if a man says that he is Jesus Christ, it is no answer to tell him that the world denies his divinity; for the world denied Christ's. — G.K. Chesterton

A pious man is one who would be an atheist if the king were. — Jean De La Bruyere

Instead, he uttered another complaint. "You're allowing a dusty old book to control your destiny!" A book controlling me? Heat shot to my temples. I shifted in my saddle to face him fully. "Understand this, Your Majesty, there's been a lot of effort to control my life, but it hasn't come from books! Look a little further back! A kingdom that betrothed me to an unknown prince controlled my destiny. A Komizar who commandeered my voice controlled my destiny. And a young king who would force protection on me thought he would control my destiny. Make no mistake about it, Rafe. I am choosing my destiny now - not a book, nor a man or a kingdom. If my goals and heart coincide with something in an old dusty book, so be it. I choose to serve this goal, just as you are free to choose yours!" I lowered my voice and added with cold certainty, "I promise you, King Jaxon, if Morrighan falls, Dalbreck will be next, and then every other kingdom on the continent until the Komizar has consumed them all. — Mary E. Pearson

If you have given up your heart for the Tower, Roland, you have already lost. A heartless creature is a loveless creature, and a loveless creature is a beast. To be a beast is perhaps bearable, although the man who has become one will surely pay hell's own price in the end, but if you should gain your object? What if you should, heartless, storm the Dark Tower and win it? What could you do except degenerate from beast to monster? To gain one's object as a beast would only be bitterly comic, like giving a magnifying glass to an elephant. But to gain one's object as a monster ... To pay hell is one thing. But do you want to own it? — Stephen King

The attendant on William Rufus, who discharged at a deer an arrow, which glanced against a tree and killed the king, was no murderer, because he had no such design. And, on the other hand, a man who should lie in wait to assassinate another, and pull the trigger of a gun with that intent, would be morally a murderer, not the less though the gun should chance to miss fire. — Richard Whately

Apparently, when the arrogant King of Persia beheld the vastness of his troops spread out across boundless plains, he shed copious tears when he realized that not one man amongst his prodigious army would be alive in a hundred years' time. — Seneca.

I would rather win souls than be the greatest king or emperor on earth; I would rather win souls than be the greatest general that ever commanded an army; I would rather win souls than be the greatest poet, or novelist, or literary man who ever walked the earth. My one ambition in life is to win as many as possible. — R.A. Torrey

I would be mute, beautiful, changless as the earth for you. I would be your memory, without age, always innocent, always waiting in the King's white house. I would do that for you and no other man inthe relm. But it would be a lie and I will do anything but lie to you - I swear that. — Patricia A. McKillip

This is the man who hopes to be King of England. He has to marry a princess. He's not going to marry some beggarly widow from the camp of his enemy, who stood out on the road to plead with him to restore her dowry. If he marries an Englishwoman at all, she will be one of the great ladies of the Lancaster court, probably Warwick's daughter Isabel. He's not going to marry a girl whose own father fought against him. He's more likely to marry a great princess of Europe, an infanta from Spain, or a princesse from France. He has to marry to set himself more safely on the throne, to make alliances. He's not going to marry a pretty face for love. Lord Warwick would never allow it. And he is not such a fool as to go against his own interests. — Philippa Gregory

It is night in your Seven Kingdoms now,' the red woman went on, 'but soon the sun will rise again. The war continues, Davos Seaworth, and some will soon learn that even an ember in the ashes can still ignite a great blaze. The old maester looked at Stannis and saw only a man. You see a king. You are both wrong. He is the Lord's chosen, the warrior of fire. I have seen him leading the fight against the dark, I have seen it in the flames. The flames do not lie, else you would not be here. It is written in prophecy as well. When the red star bleeds and the darkness gathers, Azor Ahai shall be born again amidst smoke and salt to wake dragons out of stone. — George R R Martin

The idea in The Man that Would Be King was that the music should recreate all that majestic surrounding and emphasize the adventure, but also speak about the frustration or, rather said, the curse of both protagonists, even before happened what happens them. — Maurice Jarre

I also employed the world-famous Hemingway Defense. Although never clearly articulated (it would not be manly to do so), the Hemingway Defense goes something like this: as a writer, I am a very sensitive fellow, but I am also a man, and real men don't give in to their sensitivities. Only sissy-men do that. Therefore I drink. How else can I face the existential horror of it all and continue to work? — Stephen King

It won't be safe for you to leave here for a while. The soldiers are everywhere." She hesitated, then said, "My father must not know you're here." "Why not?" Rahab shook her head. "He's not an honorable man. He would sell you for the reward I am certain the king has offered to pay for you." She turned to Ardon. "Are you feeling any better?" "I'm all right," Ardon said gruffly. "You must eat and drink all you can, and later we'll have to dress the wound." When Ardon did not answer, she nodded and said, "Good night. — Gilbert Morris