Robert Is Here Quotes & Sayings

It's marvelous when you visit Tokyo: they have these clubs, and they'll have 'Motown Night' or 'The Beatles - Totally Authentic and Live!' You know it's shrunk, but at least there's some sort of youthful figure to it. Whereas, the blues scene in Europe is more like, 'Here we go again.' — Robert Palmer

Making a movie is like chipping away at a stone. You take a piece off here, you take a piece off there and when you're finished, you have a sculpture. You know that there's something in there, but you're not sure exactly what it is until you find it. — Robert Altman

It was only after the conclusion, after everything was over, that the sense of reality returned, long after, in fact, when I had been able to gather the pieces of the puzzle up and put them together to see the pattern. This is not remarkable, for, as we know, reality is not a function of the event as event, but of the relationship of that event to past, and future, events. We seem here to have a paradox: that the reality of an event, which is not real in itself, arises from other events which, likewise, in themselves are not real. But this only affirms what we must affirm: that direction is all. And only as we realize this do we live, for our own identity is dependent upon this principle. — Robert Penn Warren

O never star Was lost; here We all aspire to heaven and there is heaven Above us. If I stoop Into a dark tremendous sea of cloud, It is but for a time; I press God's lamp Close to my breast; its splendor soon or late Will pierce the gloom. I shall emerge some day. — Robert Browning

I never know when the seeds are being laid, I'm just like, "Wow, that's a pretty cool scene. Is that? Are we laying seeds here?" — Robert Downey Jr.

Vohannes turns and grins at her. "So! Here is the triumphant warrior, fresh off of her conquest. What an epic night you've had!" "Vo, I honestly do not have time for your supposed charms. How did you get in?" "By liberally applying my supposed charms, of course," says Vohannes. — Robert Jackson Bennett

The feet-on-the-stove stance of this book is a deliberate attempt to cure myself, and anyone else who will listen, of the nasty habit of worrying the world to pieces like a terrier with a rag. What we are up to here is not the hasty shaking loose of a culinary result, but a patient rumination on cooking itself. There are more important things to do than hurry. — Robert Farrar Capon

I am a close friend of Robert Loggia. And I just love how, with actors, there's the screen persona. Here is Robert, known for his portrayal of many characters, including gangsters. But in real life, he is elegant and erudite. He sits in the garden reading the sonnets of William Shakespeare. — Luanne Rice

Nobody goes "AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" when they sing it. Maybe because it puts the life adventure in such clear and simple terms. The small creature is alive and looks for adventure. Here's the drainpipe
a long tunnel going up toward some light. The spider doesn't even think about it
just goes. Disaster befalls it
rain, flood, powerful foces. And the spider is knocked down and out beyond where it started. Does the spider say, "To hell with that"? No. Sun comes out
clears things up
dries off the spider. And the small creature goes over to the drainpipe and looks up and thinks it really wants to know what is up there. — Robert Fulghum

History has to live with what was here,
clutching and close to fumbling all we had -
it is so dull and gruesome how we die,
unlike writing, life never finishes. — Robert Lowell

This is boring, my brain said; nothing to see here. Let's do something else. Let's start a fire. — Robert Brockway

Here's what it is, here's what it isn't, now here's why you need to go tell everyone how smart I am. — Robert Anton Wilson

Meanwhile here I am- Earthborn woman, a mere barbaric maula, geting deeper into Imperial Space with each passing light second. I should be trembling with fear, I suppouse.
No. Let the Emperor tremble. Laylah is here! — Robert Silverberg

But, mate, my heart is sore for Christian diet. You mightn't happen to have a piece of cheese about you, now? No? Well, many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese
toasted, mostly
and woke up again, and here I were. — Robert Louis Stevenson

Eva knows I'm terra incognita and explores me unhurriedly, like you did. Because she's lean as a boy. Because her scent is almonds, meadow grass. Because if I smile at her ambition to be an Egyptologist, she kicks my shin under the table. Because she makes me think about something other than myself. Because even when serious she shines. Because she prefers travelogues to Sir Walter Scott, prefers Billy Mayerl to Mozart, and couldn't tell a C major from a sergeant major. Because I, only I, see her smile a fraction before it reaches her face. Because Emperor Robert is not a good man - his best part is commandeered by his unperformed music - but she gives me that rarest smile, anyway. Because we listened to nightjars. Because her laughter spurts through a blowhole in the top of her head and sprays all over the morning. Because a man like me has no business with this substance "beauty," yet here she is, in these soundproof chambers of my heart. — David Mitchell

Here is something to set both critics and Christians thinking. A decree of a Persian king was deemed to be divine, and any attempt to thwart it was usually met by prompt and drastic punishment; and yet the decree directing the rebuilding of the Temple, issued by King Cyrus in the zenith of his power, was thwarted for seventeen years by petty local governors. How was this? The explanation is that until the very last day of the seventy years of "the Desolations" had expired, God would not permit one stone to be laid upon another on Mount Moriah. Dismissing from our minds, therefore, all mere theories on this subject, we arrive at the following definitely ascertained facts: — Robert Anderson

Here is America Now: smoke, greasy fumes, the friction of tire rubber, the memory of terrifying refineries with their rubbery rotten-egg smells. — Robert D. Kaplan

And here a most heinous charge is made, that the nation has been burdened with unnecessary expenses for the sole purpose of preventing the discharge of our debts and the abolition of taxes. — Robert Walpole

What I've found is that there is a tremendous interest in these issues, across the political spectrum, sort of left-right terms we used to describe people don't really hold here exactly. — Robert McChesney

To be honest ... here is a task for all that a man has of fortitude. — Robert Louis Stevenson

Suddenly, I get this giddy desire to shock these guys a little. I continue, "These baboons really are our relatives. In fact, this baboon is my cousin." And with that I lean over and give Daniel a loud messy kiss on his big ol' nose. I get more of a response than I bargained for. The Masai freak and suddenly, they are waving their spears real close to my face, like they mean it. One is yelling, "He is not your cousin, he is not your cousin! A baboon cannot even cook ugali!" (Ugali is the ubiquitous and repulsive maize meal that everyone eats here. I almost respond that I don't really know how to cook the stuff either, but decide to show some prudence at last.) "He is not your cousin! — Robert M. Sapolsky

- It's a small matter, but one which I think shouldn't be overlooked.
- Oh Yes? And that is?
- That is the simple matter that time travel is an impossibility, you craven buffoon!
- Not with the latest miracle of modern horticulture ... Gentlemen, please allow me to introduce you to THE TIME SPROUT !
'Pleased to be here' said the vegetable in question. — Robert Rankin

As we've already mentioned, the main premise of the worrier is that things are uniformly dangerous. No risks can be tolerated. It is here, in the mind of the worrier, that the four rules of anxiety come into play: detect danger, catastrophize danger, control all the circumstances, and avoid discomfort. Sticking to this set of rules greatly interferes with one's ability to assess risks in a balanced and rational way. — Robert L. Leahy

I was very struck by the fact that Colin Powell said he would produce evidence and then never produced it. Then Tony Blair produced a document of seventy paragraphs, but only the last nine referred to the World Trade Center, and they were not convincing. So we have a little problem here: If they're guilty, where is the evidence? And if we can't hear the evidence, why are we going to war? — Robert Fisk

The orange turns to dull bronze light and continues to show what it has shown all day long, but now it seems to show it without enthusiasm. Across those dry hills, within those little houses in the distance are people who've been there all day long, going about the business of the day, who now find nothing unusual or different in this strange darkening landscape, as we do. If we were to come upon them early in the day they might be curious about us and what we're here for. but now in the evening they'd just resent our presence. The workday is over. It's time for supper and family and relaxation and turning inward at home. We ride unnoticed down this empty highway through this strange country I've never seen before, and now a heavy feeling of isolation and loneliness becomes dominant and my spirits wane with the sun. — Robert M. Pirsig

Our maester chuckled at me and told us that Prince Rhaegar was certain to defeat this rebel. That was when Stark said, 'In this world only winter is certain. We may lose our heads, it's true ... but what if we should prevail?' My father sent him on his way with his head still on his shoulders. 'If you lose,' he told Lord Eddard, 'you were never here.'"
"No more than I was," said Davos Seaworth. — George R R Martin

How small life is here
and how big nothingness.
The sky, tired of light,
has given everything to the snow.
The two trees bow
their heads to each other.
Clouds cross the world's
silence in a circle dance — Robert Walser

My older son who is, I think, here tonight, is forty-one years old. Which is odd because so am I. — Robert B. Parker

Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Liberation, I guess, is everybody getting what they think they want, without knowing the whole truth. Or in other words, liberation finally amounts to being free from things we don't like in order to be enslaved by things we approve of. Here's to the eternal tandem. — Robert Fulghum

INTO MY OWN
One of my wishes is that those dark trees,
So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze,
Were not, as 'twere, the merest mask of gloom,
But stretched away unto the edge of doom.
I should not be withheld but that some day
Into their vastness I should steal away,
Fearless of ever finding open land,
Or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand.
I do not see why I should e'er turn back,
Or those should not set forth upon my track
To overtake me, who should miss me here
And long to know if still I held them dear.
They would not find me changed from him they knew
Only more sure of all I thought was true. — Robert Frost

Resignation to misfortune is the only attitude, but not an easy one to adopt. It seems undeserved where plans were well laid and so nearly crowned with a first success. I cannot see that any plan would be altered if it were to do again, the margin for bad weather was ample according to all experience and this stormy December - our finest month - is a thing that the most cautious organiser might not have been prepared to encounter. It is very evil to lie here in a wet sleeping-bag and think of the pity of it all. — Robert Falcon Scott

[T]here is nothing brighter, crisper, more antiseptic, and cooler than a really first-rate corner drugstore on a hot summer night. If Anne Stanton is inside the door and the air conditioning is working. — Robert Penn Warren

For inspiration, I would turn again and again to Lieutenant Jason "Jay" Redman, a Navy SEAL who had been shot seven times and had undergone nearly two dozen surgeries. He had placed a hand-drawn sign on the door to his room at Bethesda Naval Hospital. It read: ATTENTION. To all who enter here. If you are coming into this room with sorrow or to feel sorry for my wounds, go elsewhere. The wounds I received I got in a job I love, doing it for people I love, supporting the freedom of a country I deeply love. I am incredibly tough and will make a full recovery. What is full? That is the absolute utmost physically my body has the ability to recover. Then I will push that about 20% further through sheer mental tenacity. This room you are about to enter is a room of fun, optimism, and intense rapid regrowth. If you are not prepared for that, go elsewhere. From: The Management. — Robert M. Gates

It is precisely because no one needs soup, fish, meat, salad, cheese, and dessert at one meal that we so badly need to sit down to them from time to time. It was largesse that made us all; we were not created to fast forever ... Enter here, therefore, as a sovereign remedy for the narrowness of our minds and the stinginess of our souls. — Robert Farrar Capon

Wha Is That At My Bower-Door
1783

Wha is that at my bower-door?
O wha is it but Findlay!
Then gae your gate, ye'se nae be here:
Indeed maun I, quo' Findlay;
What mak' ye, sae like a thief?
O come and see, quo' Findlay;
Before the morn ye'll work mischief:
Indeed will I, quo' Findlay.

Gif I rise and let you in-
Let me in, quo' Findlay;
Ye'll keep me waukin wi' your din;"
Indeed will I, quo' Findlay;
In my bower if ye should stay-
Let me stay, quo' Findlay;
I fear ye'll bide till break o' day;
Indeed will I, quo' Findlay.
Here this night if ye remain-
I'll remain, quo' Findlay;
I dread ye'll learn the gate again;
Indeed will I, quo' Findlay.
What may pass within this bower-
Let it pass, quo' Findlay;
Ye maun conceal till your last hour:
Indeed will I, quo' Findlay. — Robert Burns

For all its rooted loveliness, the world has no continuing city here; it is an outlandish place, a foreign home, a session in via to a better version of itself-and it is our glory to see it so and to thirst until Jerusalem comes home at last. We were given appetites, not to consume the world and forget it, but to taste its goodness and hunger to make it great. — Robert Farrar Capon

You didn't listen to me," Lan whispered. One last lesson. The hardest. Demandred struck, and Lan saw his opening. Lan lunged forward placing Demandred's sword point against his own side and ramming himself forward onto it.
"I did not come here to win," Lan whispered, smiling. "I came here to kill you. Death is lighter than a feather."
Demandred's eyes opened wide, and he tried to pull back. Too late. Lan's sword took him straight though the throat. — Robert Jordan

The young man went to India, where he was drowned. As there is no mystery in this matter, it may as well be stated here that young Heaton ultimately returned to England, as drowned men have ever been in the habit of doing, when their return will mightily inconvenience innocent persons who have taken their places. It is a disputed question whether the sudden disappearance of a man, or his reappearance after a lapse of years, is the more annoying.
("The Vengeance Of The Dead") — Robert Barr

What are you doing here, anyway? You don't strike me as the speed dating type.'
'I lost a bet with Alfie,' he says. 'You met him at The Cow that day . . .?' Waistcoat Guy, I think, nodding. 'I said to him that if you didn't text me back then I'd try speed dating, because I'm officially the worst single man in London.'
'You're not!' I say. 'I mean, it wasn't a bad date. I was just . . .'
'Don't say you were drunk! It's the biggest post-sex insult ever.'
'. . . drunk, I mean drinking, a bit more than I ought, and I was, uh, cringing at the thought that I'd been a nightmare date.'
'No. You were great,' says Mark/Skinny Jeans.
'Actually, the biggest post-sex insult is "we did?"' says Robert. 'But that's another story. — Gemma Burgess

Here is the basic question: Are we marionettes, or are we creatures of free will who just happen to have a lot of jerky reflexes? — Robert Breault

And he sees that what he is talking about can never really be accepted here because to see it one has to be free from social authority and this is an institution of social authority. — Robert M. Pirsig

Pearl was hurring around my apartment, sniffing everything, including Rich Beaumont and Patty Giacomin, which neither of them like much.
"Can you get Pearl to settle down?" Paul asked.
"I could speak to her, but she'd continue to do what she wants, and I'd look ineffectual. My approach is to endorse everything she does."
Susan said, "Come here, Pearl." And Pearl went over to her, and Susan gave her a kiss on the mouth, and Pearl wagged her tail; and lapped Susan's face, and turned and went back and sniffed at Patty. — Robert B. Parker

Nothing not built with hands of course is sacred.
But here is not a question of what's sacred;
Rather of what to face or run away from.
I'd hate to be a runaway from nature. — Robert Frost

Quality is better seen up at the timberline than here obscured by smoky windows and oceans of words, and he sees that what he is talking about can never really be accepted here because to see it one has to be free of social authority and this is an institution of social authority. Quality for sheep is what the shepherd says. And if you take a sheep and put it up at the timberline at night when the wind is roaring, that sheep will be panicked half to death and will call and call until the shepherd comes, or comes the wolf. — Robert M. Pirsig

But what if I fail of my purpose here? It is but to keep the nerves at strain, to dry one's eyes and laugh at a fall, and baffled, get up and begin again. — Robert Browning

We live at a time that is notable for the polemical nature of discussions about identity, consciousness, rationality, agency, memory, and feeling. 'New atheists' and reductive materialists conduct gladiatorial debates against defenders of faith and enemies of reductionism. Lots of heat is produced, but, alas, little light is shed. How marvelous it is, then, to see this fine new book by Lenn E. Goodman and Gregory Caramenico. Here is a learned, illuminating, and decidedly non-polemical treatment of the classic questions of soul, mind, and brain-an exemplary work of scholarship. — Robert P. George

The mechanic, when a wheel refuses to turn, never thinks of dropping on his knees and asking the assistance of some divine power. He knows there is a reason. He knows that something is too large or too small; that there is something wrong with his machine; and he goes to work and he makes it larger or smaller, here or there, until the wheel will turn. — Robert G. Ingersoll

Within the blink of an eye, another waitress - this one giving her no more than a small smile and a "Here you are, shug" - has slipped her a ponderous mug of steaming coffee, along with some cream and sugar. Mona takes a sip, and she can immediately understand why it's talked about: it is rich and strong and faintly chocolatey, so good it induces a sigh of satisfaction. — Robert Jackson Bennett

The need here is professional closeness tempered by emotional distance. — Robert Audi

The difference between happiness is no-where and happiness is now-here has something to do with the event, and everything to do with how you see the event. Your perception is key. — Robert Holden

Talk to her, goddamnit. She ain't a stick of furniture. She is one of God's creatures, and she will hear you. I see these goddamned people walkin' dogs, yakking on their phones, makes me wanna kick their sissy asses. What they got a dog for, they want to talk on their phones? That dog there will understand you, Officer James. She will understand what's in your heart. Am I just shouting at the grass and dog shit out here, or are you reading what I am telling you? — Robert Crais

The second we put a bullet in the head of one of those undead monsters
the moment one of us drove a hammer into one of their faces
or cut a head off. We became what we are! And that's just it. THAT's what it comes down to. You people don't know what we are.
We're surrounded by the DEAD. We're among them
and when we finally give up we become them! We're living on borrowed time here. Every minute of our life is a minute we steal from them! You see them out there. You KNOW that when we die
we become them. You think we hide behind walls to protect us from the walking dead?
Don't you get it? We ARE the walking dead! WE are the walking dead. — Robert Kirkman

REQUIEM
Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie:
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he long'd to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill. — Robert Louis Stevenson

Here is a tree rooted in African soil, nourished with waters from the rivers of Afrika. Come and sit under its shade and become, with us, the leaves of the same branch and the branches of the same tree — Robert Sobukwe

Now is the time to become a disciple of Jesus Christ, which means accepting His invitation to 'come, follow me' (Luke 18:22). This is the decision we made in our premortal lives. Now we must make it again here in mortality, every day, in every situation by taking the Savior's name upon us, remembering His atoning sacrifice, and keeping His commandments. This we covenanted to do when we were baptized, and we have the opportunity to renew those covenants each week as we partake of the sacrament. — Robert D. Hales

Gift better than Himself God doth not know,
Gift better than God no man can see;
This gift doth here the giver given bestow
Gift to this gift let each receiver be;
God is my gift, Himself He freely gave me,
God's gift am I, and none but God shall have me. — Robert Southwell

A job is a sacrifice. Following an interest - that's a contribution. And we're here on the planet, not to sacrifice ourselves, but to make a contribution. — Robert Holden

Drink wine, and live here blitheful while ye may;
The morrow's life too late is; live to-day. — Robert Herrick

You have killed?" Robert Jordan asked. "Yes. Several times. But not with pleasure. To me it is a sin to kill a man. Even fascists whom we must kill." "Yet you have killed." "Yes. And will again. But if I live later, I will try to live in such a way, doing no harm to any one, that it will be forgiven." "By whom?" "Who knows? Since we do not have God here anymore, who forgives, I do not know. — Ernest Hemingway,

Being on the frontier, as I've said, required doing rather than imagining: clearing land, building shelter, obtaining food supplies. Frontiers test ideologies like nothing else. There is no time for the theoretical. That, ultimately, is why America has not been friendly to communism, fascism, or other, more benign forms of utopianism. Idealized concepts have rarely taken firm root in America, and so intellectuals have had to look to Europe for inspiration. People here are too busy making money - an extension, of course, of the frontier ethos, with its emphasis on practical initiative. — Robert D. Kaplan

Dedicated

to all who have a dream

to all who struggle
two jobs to get by

to all who have been
ignored all their lives

to all who feel empty

to all who cannot sleep
because there is so much
in their mind

to all who have died a little
in the name of love

to all who are called weird,
strange and odd

to all who create because
that is the only thing they know
how to do

to all who believe in something

to all who breathe and to all
who are no longer here

this one is for you. — Robert M. Drake

The ultimate test is always your own serenity. If you don't have this when you start and maintain it while you're working you're likely to build our personal problems right into the machine.
The machine responds to your personality. It's just that the personality that it responds to is your real personality, the one that genuinely feels and reasons and acts, rather than any false, blown up personality images your ego may conjure up. These false images are defaulted so rapidly and completely you're bound to be very discouraged very soon if you've derived your gumption from ego rather than Quality.
The real machine you're working on is a cycle called yourself. The machine that appears to be out there and the person that appears to be in here are not 2 separate things. They grow toward Quality or fall away from Quality together. — Robert M. Pirsig

With some justice, I think, I could claim that it is all right as a beginning to leave a principle in a somewhat fuzzy state; the primary question is whether something like it will do. This claim, however, would meet a frosty reception from those many proponents of another principle scrutinized in the next chapter, if they knew how much harder I shall be on their principle than I am here on mine. Fortunately, they don't know that yet. — Robert Nozick

The enemy is here, and if we do not whip him, he will whip us. — Robert E.Lee

I've only have time for one last lesson...
"I have you," Demandred finally growled, breathing heavily. "Who ever you are, I have you. You cannot win."
"You didn't listen to me," Lan whispered.
One last lesson. The hardest...
Demandred struck, and Lan saw his opening. Lan lunged forward, placing Demandred's sword point against his ow side and ramming himself forward onto it.
"I did not come here to win", Lan whispered, smiling, "I came here to kill you. Death is lighter that a feather."
Demandred's eyes opened wide, and he tried to pull back. Too late. Lan's sword took him straight through the throat.
The world grew dark as Lan slipped backward off the sword. He felt Nynaeve's fear and pain as he did, and he sent his love to her. — Robert Jordan

The Cabbage White
The butterfly, a cabbage-white,
(His honest idiocy of flight)
Will never now, it is too late,
Master the art of flying straight,
Yet has- who knows so well as I?-
A just sense of how not to fly:
He lurches here and here by guess
And God and hope and hopelessness.
Even the acrobatic swift
Has not his flying-crooked gift. — Robert Graves

You ever f**k Susan here?" she said, her face almost touching mine.
"I'm impressed," I said. "The question is intrusive, annoying, coarse, and voyeuristic. That's quite a lot to get into a simple question. — Robert B. Parker

I, sir, take a different view of the whole matter. I look upon Ohio and South Carolina to be parts of one whole - parts of the same country - and that country is my country. ... I come here not to consider that I will do this for one distinct part of it, and that for another, but ... to legislate for the whole. And finally Webster turned to a higher idea: the idea - in and of itself - of Union, permanent and enduring. — Robert A. Caro

For me, the idea of being a successful actor is hanging out with my dogs and my boy, down in Venice beach, and going, "I don't have to audition today. I've got a little respite here." — Robert Knepper

Every night I fold myself into her, every night she comes into my life and I feel her hand on my heart and she is saying, I am here ... I am here. — Robert Olmstead

By far the most dangerous people in the world are optimists (those who believe that all can be made well here below). If you think all can be made well in this world, then you will go to any extreme to make it happen. There is the story of the 20th century. As Lenin said, "You can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs". — Robert Barron

While I am opposed to all orthodox creeds, I have a creed myself; and my creed is this. Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. This creed is somewhat short, but it is long enough for this life, strong enough for this world. If there is another world, when we get there we can make another creed. — Robert Green Ingersoll

This involves more than I can discuss here, but do it. Read the writers of great prose dialogue-people like Robert Stone and Joan Didion. Compression, saying as little as possible, making everything carry much more than is actually said. Conflict. Dialogue as part of an ongoing world, not just voices in a dark room. Never say the obvious. Skip the meet and greet. — Janet Fitch

Here is my room, in the yellow lamplight and the space heater rumbling: Indian rug red as Cochise's blood, a desk with seven mystic drawers, a chair covered in material as velvety blue-black as Batman's cape, an aquarium holding tiny fish so pale you could see their hearts beat, the aforementioned dresser covered with decals from Revell model airplane kits, a bed with a quilt sewn by a relative of Jefferson Davis's, a closet, and the shelves, oh, yes, the shelves. The troves of treasure. On those shelves are stacks of me: hundreds of comic books- Justice League, Flash, Green Lantern, Batman, the Spirit, Blackhawk, Sgt. Rock and Easy Company, Aquaman, and the Fantastic Four ... The shelves go on for miles and miles. My collection of marbles gleams in a mason jar. My dried cicada waits to sing again in the summer. My Duncan yo-yo that whistles except the string is broken and Dad's got to fix it. — Robert McCammon

This is not remarkable, for, as we know, reality is not a function of the event as event, but of the relationship of that event to past, and future, events. We seem here to have a paradox: that the reality of an event, which is not real in itself, arises from the other events which, likewise, in themselves are not real. But this only affirms what we must affirm: that direction is all. And only as we realize this do we live, for our own identity is dependent upon this principal. — Robert Penn Warren

Painter"
"I said you are only keeping me here
in the hospital, lying to my parents
and saying I am madder than I am,
because you only want to keep me here,
squeezing my last dollar to the pennies
I'm saner than anyone in the hospital.
I had to say what every madman says
a black phrase, the sleep of reason mothers monsters ...
When I am painting the canvas is a person;
all I do, each blot and line's alive,
when I am finished, it is shit on the canvas ...
But in his sketches more finished than his oils,
sketches made after he did those masterpieces,
constable can make us see the breeze ... — Robert Lowell

Here the contention is not just that the new Darwinian paradigm can help us realize whichever moral values we happen to choose. The claim is that the new paradigm can actually influence - legitimately - our choice of basic values in the first place. Some Darwinians insist that such influence can never be legitimate. What they have in mind is the naturalistic fallacy, whose past violation has so tainted their line of work. But what we're doing here doesn't violate the naturalistic fallacy. Quite the opposite. By studying nature - by seeing the origins of the retributive impulse - we see how we have been conned into committing the naturalistic fallacy without knowing it; we discover that the aura of divine truth surrounding retribution is nothing more than a tool with which nature - natural selection - gets us to uncritically accept its "values." Once this revelation hits norm, we are less likely to obey this aura, and thus less likely to commit the fallacy. — Robert Wright

You don't have to come here to see them, Cory. Or to see me, either. You really don't. You don't have to leave what is, to visit what was. — Robert McCammon

A Language"

Today the sky is blue dust
and the mountains blue shadows
against the dust so only
the snow line across the peaks
actually exists, a scribbled
white cursive, words piling up
here and thinning out there,
like the long sentence you'd write
against the sky if you thought
you had that much to say. — Robert W. King

Well, I like way downtown near the Battery. I lived down there at this time and for, I guess, the following well, this is where I moved to uptown and I've been here for four years and this is 1965. — Robert Rauschenberg

I am constructing here a commonsensical book from which nothing at all can be learned. There are, to be sure, persons who wish to extract from books guiding principles for their lives. For this most estimable individual I am therefore, to my gigantic regret, not writing. Is that a pity? Oh yes. O you driest, most upright, virtuous and respectable, kindest, quietest of adventurers- slumber sweetly, for the while. — Robert Walser

In his own life, then, a man is not to expect happiness, only to profit by it gladly when it shall arise; he is on duty here; he knows not how or why, and does not need to know; he knows not for what hire, and must not ask. Somehow or other, though he does not know what goodness is, he must try to be good; somehow or other, though he cannot tell what will do it, he must try to give happiness to others. — Robert Louis Stevenson

What we have here," I said, "is a roomful of culprits, with varying levels of culpritude. — Robert B. Parker

How shocking must thy summons be, O death, to him that is at ease in his possessions! who, counting on long years of pleasure here, is quite unfurnished for the world to come. — Robert Blair

Most of all I discovered that my change of mind was closely connected with a change of heart. As a young man, I was comfortable with teachings that supported my leadership role. The role of women was a great topic for debate because it really didn't affect me and my identity. However, as I have been able to better receive God's calling to leadership as a call to humility rather than supremacy, I have been more able to receive women in leadership as well. It is here where I believe that my mind and heart and the Scriptures are most connected. — Robert Fryling

Ben Caxton, I will lie right here in the grass and starve before I will get up to push a button that is six inches from your right forefinger. — Robert A. Heinlein

Here by far the most frustrating gumption trap is inadequate tools. Nothing's quite so demoralizing as a tool hang-up. Buy good tools as you can afford them and you'll never regret — Robert M. Pirsig

There is therefore now no condemnation for two reasons: you are dead now; and God, as the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, has been dead all along. The blame game was over before it started. It really was. All Jesus did was announce that truth and tell you it would make you free. It was admittedly a dangerous thing to do. You are a menace. Be he did it; and therefore, menace or not, here you stand: uncondemned, forever, now. What are you going to do with your freedom? — Robert Farrar Capon

To be honest, to be kind - to earn a little and to spend a little less, to make upon the whole a family happier for his presence, to renounce when that shall be necessary and not be embittered, to keep a few friends but these without capitulation - above all, on the same grim condition, to keep friends with himself - here is a task for all that a man has of fortitude and delicacy. He has an ambitious soul who would ask more; he has a hopeful spirit who should look in such an enterprise to be successful. — Robert Louis Stevenson

I am part of a minority that is deeply misunderstood. People have very confused ideas about us. Many are frightened of us. I've even heard it said that many people wouldn't want their daughters or sons to marry one of us, and I know of people who have been denied jobs or promotions because they share this trait with me. But being what I am does not make me bad; being what I am does not make me dangerous; being what I am does not mean I don't love, or hurt, or have a sense of humor. My name is Malclom Decter, and I'm here today to tell the whole world what I am ... I am an atheist. — Robert J. Sawyer

On your birthday thank your parents and celebrate with them. They are the reason you are here and it is their day too. — Robert Cheeke

Conversation between Susan's therapist and Spenser -
"And when you find her? Then what?"
"Then she will be free again to come here and work with you until she can make the choices she wishes to make."
"And what if you are not that choice?"
"I think I will be. But I can't control that. What I can do is see that she's free to choose. — Robert B. Parker

One intriguing subplot of the economic crisis is the failure of most economists to predict it. Here we have the most spectacular economic and financial crisis in decades - possibly since the Great Depression - and the one group that spends most of its waking hours analyzing the economy basically missed it. — Robert J. Samuelson

The beer came and I said, "Joe, I'm thinking that there is something larger here than an attorney's zealous defense of his client." The master of understatement. — Robert Crais

What's emerging from the pattern of my own life is the for belief that the crisis is being caused by the inadequacy of existing forms of thought to cope with the situation. It can't be solved by rational means because the rationality itself is the source of the problem. The only ones who're solving it are solving it at a personal level by abandoning 'square' rationality altogether and going by feelings alone. Like John and Sylvia here. And millions of others like them. And that seems like a wrong direction too. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that the solution to the problem isn't that you abandon rationality but that you expand the nature of rationality so that it's capable of coming up with a solution. — Robert M. Pirsig

Men mistook measurement for understanding. And they always had to put themselves at the center of everything. That was their greatest conceit. The earth is becoming warmer-it must be our fault! The mountain is destroying us-we have not propitiated the gods! It rains too much, it rains too little-a comfort to think that these things are somehow connected to our behavior, that if only we lived a little better, a little more frugally, our virtue would be rewarded. But here was nature, sweeping toward him-unknowable, all-conquering, indifferent-and he saw in her fires the futility of human pretensions. — Robert Harris

What we have," Robert tells us, "is not democracy. It is imitative democracy. We have all the external signs. We have elections. We have a parliament. We have legislation. All the accessories of democracy. But anyone with common sense here knows we live in an authoritarian state. Putin has learned that if he offers the accessories of democracy, his regime can be very hard to accuse. The regime does one thing very well: It doesn't listen. So there can be free speech, channels of communication. But normally in a democracy, those voices affect decision making. In this country that doesn't happen. — David Greene

Every morning I have been looking at CNN to see if there is any reason for hope . I see a few large and impressive peace protests here and there around the world, but mostly I see empty robot faces monotonously reciting the magic incantations, "We must support the President" and "We must support our troops", both of which mean the killing must continue. — Robert Anton Wilson

Bit my lip and wrenched myself to my feet. "I sense my presence is no longer needed here. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go find a quiet place to hide until the atomic apocalypse is over." I didn't exactly storm out, but I did break the door behind me. Because of my super-strength, not because I was in a snit. Well ... maybe a little bit of both. — Robert J. Crane