Somerville Quotes & Sayings

John the Baptist was supposed to point the way to the Christ. He was just the voice, not the Messiah. So everybody's calling has dignity to it and God seems to know better than we do what is in us that needs to be called forth. — James Green Somerville

No one at this time can duly estimate the importance of Mrs Marcet's scientific works. — Mary Somerville

Even more important than what we do, then, is who we are. — James Green Somerville

Reji kissed him again. "Maybe ... for now, healer. But later, I might need your
help."
"Oh? For a medical condition?"
"Yes. I have this really hard ... "
"Hard ... ?" Kei murmured, teasing Reji's nipple through his shirt.
Reji's voice cracked. " ... Leg ... "
"Oh. Your ... leg. And what might your ... leg ... need?"
Reji cleared his throat, but it seemed his voice was still a little hoarse. "A
rub ... might need a rub ... later. — Ann Somerville

I dropped out of school for a semester, transferred to another college, switched to an art major, graduated, got married, and for a while worked as a graphic designer. — James Green Somerville

-and he flew in to her from the clutter of Somerville, the compost heap behind the Harvard Yard. — Elizabeth Hardwick

I went off to a school with the children of CEOs and diplomats. To be able to be at home with that group of people and at home with the desperately poor has been good for me in preparation for my coming to Washington. — James Green Somerville

Any history buffs, people who like religion, suspense and mystery mixed with history, or anyone who likes 'The Da Vinci Code,' needs to read Ken Follett. — Bonnie Somerville

There are congressmen in our congregation, judges, federal reserve governors. And there are also people who are homeless and some who are mentally ill. To be able to talk to each of those people is something that I've had to learn how to do over the years. — James Green Somerville

I wished, more than anything, to forget. But what I had, more than anything, was time to remember. — Ann Somerville

God watches over every temptation and trial that you will ever face in your life and He will never "allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able. — Robert B. Somerville

Philippa Somerville was annoyed. To her friends the Nixons, who owned Liddel Keep, and with whom Kate had deposited her for one night, she had given an accurate description of Sir William Scott of Kincurd, his height, his skill, his status, and his general suitability as an escort for Philippa Somerville from Liddesdale to Midculter Castle. And the said William Scott had not turned up. She fumed all the morning of that fine first day of May, and by afternoon was driven to revealing her general dissatisfaction with Scotland, the boring nature of Joleta, her extreme dislike of one of the Crawfords and the variable and unreliable nature of the said William Scott. She agreed that the Dowager Lady Culter was adorable, and Mariotta nice, and that she liked the baby. — Dorothy Dunnett

As long as I loved and served Christ I could be anything I wanted to be. — James Green Somerville

I have to confess that there have been some times when I was less than glad to be a minister, and some Sundays still when I tremble under the weight of trying to speak a word for God. — James Green Somerville

He's asked Master Zitwitz to leave the duke and travel with him as household controller to the Ambassador's residence in Turkey.'

Philippa Somerville blew her nose sharply. 'On the strength of his sweet cherry sauce?'

'On the strength, I think, of that handy right uppercut,' said Jerott. — Dorothy Dunnett

Chancellor said, 'She is concerned for your future.'

'She is concerned for her dog and her cat,' Lymond said. 'It is a Somerville failing. — Dorothy Dunnett

A week goes by and I don't call Lucy or Dylan. I want to drift away from them - more than anything, I want to drift away. I sometimes imagine myself totally alone and I enjoy the feeling. And I mean something by alone, something more than the word holds. I mean something blank and pure and vacant, plus me. And also moral. This blank and pure vacancy that includes me that is also moral is so empty, it is so no one, that my presence in it makes me not exist, although I am still there, and that's what lifts all the weight. — Patrick Somerville

Philippa Somerville, standing back a little, did not withdraw her arm. In her white face, a shadow of motherly irritation appeared. 'Has no one here any sense? Be quiet and sit down. The world will look after itself for a night, without your hand on the rim. — Dorothy Dunnett

She was a great and insatiable reader, surprisingly well acquainted with the classics of literature, and unexpectedly lavish in the purchase of books. Her neighbours never forgot to mention, in describing her, the awe-inspiring fact that she 'took in the English Times and the Saturday Review, and read every word of them,' but it was hinted that the bookshelves that her own capable hands had put up in her bedroom held a large proportion of works of fiction of a startlingly advanced kind, 'and,' it was generally added in tones of mystery, 'many of them French. — Edith Somerville

I am a tea, he thought. I am some kind of tea. And I have wishes. — Patrick Somerville

It's not just being called to the ministry that counts. — James Green Somerville

We should look for the light, the good, the grace of Heaven wherever it might be, even admist the filth we are so quick to judge beneath us. We cannot assume we are the arbiters of righteousness. We don't shape Heaven; Heaven shapes us. Nor do we shape Hell. — Sunshine Somerville

Women do love each other; this whole women-against-each other, 'Dynasty' thing ... we're not all after each other. — Bonnie Somerville

Washington is a great international city and in the congregation we have people who are rich and poor, black and white, and from every part of the world. — James Green Somerville

Human beings, you see, fall apart all the time. In many different ways. That is the central theme. There is no need to disguise it. — Patrick Somerville

She had been living like a hermit herself, in a cramped, seedy apartment in Somerville, spending long hours in the lab. All-nighters had become a regular thing. She didn't have any close friends, didn't go out on dates, didn't even go to the movies by herself. She had sacrificed a normal life in order to get a PhD, and become a scientist. — Michael Crichton

Nobody, anywhere, has any real sense what is actually going on." This doesn't seem to get a very good reaction from the crowd - no doubt I'm scowling as I say it, but still. I continue: "I don't either, but at least I know I don't. I'm sorry but you people aren't like me." This is me trying to take the edge off. Being friendly. "You haven't done the shit I've done. — Patrick Somerville

For an hour, blended with all she could offer, something noble had been created which had nothing to do with the physical world. And from the turn of his throat, the warmth of his hair, the strong, slender sinews of his hands, something further; which had. Though she combed the earth and searched through the smoke of the galaxies there was no being she wanted but this, who was not and should not be for Philippa Somerville. — Dorothy Dunnett

The craft of a master is not imposing dominance, but winning submission. — Ann Somerville

I say, "My trigger is everything in the universe."
Everyone laughs.
I stare back at them, one by one. I hate it when I make people laugh. It's unintentional. I don't joke. To clear this up, I stare at Dr. Billy for a long time. Yes, like a threat.
"I know we sometimes feel that way," says Dr. Billy, after absorbing my look with his fat face. "Of course. But part of the exercise is to hone it down and get more specific."
"No," I say. "I'm being specific when I say that. Everything that exists, now, makes me angry. all. I don't know any other way to say it. all." I nod the last time I say "all"; I'm getting somewhere. — Patrick Somerville

The most savage people are also the ugliest. — Mary Somerville

Life doesn't happen to us, but because of us. — Avril Somerville

I was born in Somerville, but I don't remember very much about it because we moved from there to Arlington when I was five years old, and it was in Arlington that I spent most of my childhood. — Alan Hovhaness

Nothing has afforded me so convincing a proof of the unity of the Deity as these purely mental conceptions of numerical and mathematical science which have been by slow degrees vouchsafed to man, and are still granted in these latter times by the Differential Calculus, now superseded by the Higher Algebra, all of which must have existed in that sublimely omniscient Mind from eternity. — Mary Somerville

Moving forward quietly to Jerott's side, Adam Blacklock had heard. 'Don't you understand? The authorities are afraid of them both,' he said gently. 'Why do you supose this cordon is here, which only an unarmed girl was allowed to pass through? Lymond, loyal to Scotland, might be a threat to French power greater than even Gabriel, one of these days - Philippa!' And a wordless shout, like a cry at a cockfight, rose among the stone pillars and sank muffled into the old, dusty banners above the choir roof. For Philippa Somerville, who believed in action when words were not enough, had leaned over and snatched the knife from Lymond's left hand. — Dorothy Dunnett

My father was a Presbyterian minister, working among the poor in West Virginia. He had taken what amounted to a vow of poverty when he accepted that call and so we never had much money. — James Green Somerville

We were growing up in West Virginia. Everybody was poor there in the southern part of the state. It was like growing up in the Great Depression from the stories I hear people tell. Everybody was poor and so we didn't know that we were any different from anybody else. — James Green Somerville

It is not always possible to come to an agreement before one goes to sleep but it is possible to go to sleep in a loving and peaceable manner knowing that the problem can be worked out in love at a later time. — Mary Somerville

I know the world is hungry for good ministry. — James Green Somerville

Jerott?' said Lymond. 'What are you not saying?' His eyes, as the orderly cavalcade paced through the muddy streets, had not left that forceful aquiline face since they met. And Jerott, Philippa saw with disbelief, flushed. For a moment longer, the strict blue eyes studied him; and then Lymond laughed. 'She's an eighteen-year-old blonde of doubtful virginity? Or more frightful still, an eighteen-year-old blonde of unstained innocence? I shall control my impulses, Jerott, I promise you. I'm only going to throw her out if she looks like a troublemaker, or else so bloody helpless that we'll lose lives looking after her. Not everyone,' he said, in a wheeling turn which caught Philippa straining cravenly to hear, 'is one of Nature's Marco Polos like the Somerville offspring. — Dorothy Dunnett

I began to pray those same fervent prayers, lying in bed at night, hoping to see a scroll unrolled from the ceiling with a message from God just for me. — James Green Somerville

I don't think of love in terms of relationships. It happens in terms of seconds, but it goes away like that, too. I pass a nurse, I love her, it ends when I go around a corner; at a restaurant I see a forlorn man at the table next to me, and I love him, and the conversation pulls me back, and it's ended. A patient comes in, and she is sick, and I love her, and then she dies, and I never see her again. This is what I live for. Don't think that it's sad. — Patrick Somerville

There's a massive glitter ball in my head and it has never stopped turning — Jimmy Somerville

Every year there's five cop shows, five medical shows and five 'Law & Orders,' but when it's a show about women, they want to pit everyone against each other. I don't think they'd do that if it was a guy show. I think there's room for all of us. — Bonnie Somerville

It would be perfect if they could make it taste like water, but pretending that something that laden with chemicals is somehow remotely connected to fruit or sunshine or chirpy rugrats adds insult to the injury of needing to drink the damn stuff in the first place. — Ann Somerville

Then print this. If you report something that irresponsible, I will kick your arse so hard you'll be able to finger yourself and clean your teeth at the same time. — Ann Somerville

All this hate is very tiring, isn't it? — Ann Somerville

My heart was crazy now; it's too complicated to know what it was beating for, and how much of it was him and how much of it was the hunting - I think I cared about the deer that got shot - but it didn't matter then. Something was there and its source was irrelevant. It was so easy to feel nothing, all the time, and I held on as hard as I could, because the worst thing, I thought, now, would be for it to go away. — Patrick Somerville

My mom took me to see 'Annie' on Broadway when I was little, and I just wanted to be doing what those girls were doing. — Bonnie Somerville

No circumstance in the natural world is more inexplicable than the diversity of form and color in the human race. — Mary Somerville

The moral disposition of the age appears in the refinement of conversation. — Mary Somerville

Only common mortals like the Somervilles have good old rotten hates, dear,' said her mother. 'Sir Graham manages to love everybody and wouldn't know what you're talking about. Have a bun.'

'He doesn't love the Turks,' said Philippa. 'He kills them.'

'That isn't hate,' said Kate Somerville. 'That's simply hoeing among one's principles to keep them healthy and neat. I'm sure he would tell you he bears them no personal grudge; and they think they're going to Paradise anyway, so it does everyone good. — Dorothy Dunnett

He nods, then squints across the room. "Not all those who wander are lost," he says. He's still squinting. I wonder if he's practiced this squint - a squint-stare off into the metaphysical distance. I'm realizing he's kind of handsome. But then again, it might just be that he cares about something.
"What is that?" I ask. "Did Jesus Christ say that?"
"No," he says. "Bilbo Baggins said that. — Patrick Somerville

I grew up in a family of firemen and cops. — Bonnie Somerville

While I am the one who made the choice to enter the ministry, there was a choice before that one, the choice God made in calling me to be his in the first place. — James Green Somerville

Our witness, one Edward Littleton, was as gay as Elton John's handbag. — Ann Somerville

all the while sneering at us deprived Northeastern Somerville kids across the fields. — Bobby S. Richardson

coat that she always — Ethan Somerville

Ululation. We got animals inside of us, man. We've got all this power.
- The Son — Patrick Somerville