Will Not Back Down Quotes & Sayings

I just want to tell you: the only good thing in these days is that I still believe there's something good behind all these things. I don't know what that good thing is but the idea of it keeps me smile. Stories will be finished. Money has its way to come. Admission result will be announced, and if I get rejected, it does not mean I failed (though I'm pretty sure I will cry, either a lot or a little). There will be something good down the road. There is something meaningful hidden in everything plain but stressful around me right now: A lesson to learn, friends to treasure, stories to create, new places to discover and home to go back, chances to grab, opportunities to develop. — Rio Lam

The time when a nation most craves ease may be the moment when it can least afford to let down its guard. The moment when it most wishes it could address its domestic needs may be the moment when it most urgently has to confront an external threat. The nation that survives is the one that rises to meet that moment: that has the wisdom to recognize the threat and the will to turn it back, and that does so before it is too late. The naive notion that we can preserve freedom by exuding goodwill is not only silly, but dangerous. The more adherents it wins, the more it tempts the aggressor. — Richard M. Nixon

People are like that here. Strangers smile at you on the beach, come up and offer you a shell, for no reason, lightly, and then go by and leave you alone again. Nothing is demanded of you in payment, no social rite expected, no tie established. It was a gift, freely offered, freely taken, in mutual trust. People smile at you here, like children, sure that you will not rebuff them, that you will smile back. And you do, because you know it will involve nothing. The smile, the act, the relationship is hung in space, in the immediacy and purity of the present; suspended on the still point of here and now; balanced there, on a shaft of air, like a seagull.

The pure relationship, how beautiful it is! How easily it is damaged, or weighed down with irrelevancies - not even irrelevancies, just life itself, the accumulations of life and of time. For the first part of every relationship is pure, whether it be with friend or lover, husband or child. It is pure, simple and unencumbered. — Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; j forgive, and you will be forgiven; 38 k give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put l into your lap. For m with the measure you use it will be measured back to you. — Anonymous

not if Shannon is over her illness. Come, Dytyna. We discuss your performance now." "When will we know if I'll be competing?" "We will not know until Monday when we check in at the Olympic arena. Coach Taylor will know then." "I'm going back to the hotel to call your father, Kerri. We plan on meeting for lunch then will head on over to the hockey arena. Two kids in the Olympics! Whoa. I'll see you later." She leaned down and gave Kerri a hug before she kissed her forehead. "Stay out of trouble." "I can hardly get into any trouble in the Olympic village, Mom." At almost seventeen, Kerri was still able to feel embarrassed at receiving her mother's counsel, and she thought that her mother's advice was unfounded. The village was closed off, after all, from the rest of Turin and from the fray of the crowds that converged upon the venues. She watched her mother walk away before she stood up and adjusted the strap — Eleanor Webb

You were coshed with a fireplace poker," Mrs. Seaton said, bending over him to sift through the hair above his nape. "These wounds will require careful cleaning." She wadded up his shirt and folded it to hold against the scalp wound. "Passive voice," the earl said through clenched teeth, "will not protect you, Mrs. Seaton, since you did the coshing. Jesus and the apostles, that hurts." Her hand came up to hold his forehead even as she continued to press the linen of his ruined shirt against the bleeding wound. "The bleeding is slowing down," she said, "and the wounds on your back are not as messy." "Happily for me," her patient muttered. — Grace Burrowes

It is not only the size of these redwoods but their strangeness that frightens them. And why not? For these are the last remaining members of a race that flourished over four continents as far back in geologic time as the upper Jurassic period. Fossils of these ancients have been found dating from the Cretaceous era while in the Eocene and Miocene they were spread over England and Europe and America. And then the glaciers moved down and wiped the Titans out beyond recovery. And only these few are left
a stunning memory of what the world was like once long ago. Can it be that we do not love to be reminded that we are very young and callow in a world that was old when we came into it? And could there be a strong resistance to the certainty that a living world will continue its stately way when we no longer inhabit it? — John Steinbeck

To become what one is, one must not have the faintest notion of what one is ... The whole surface of consciousness - for consciousness -is- a surface - must be kept clear of all great imperatives. Beware even of every great word, every great pose! So many dangers that the instinct comes too soon to "understand itself"
.
Meanwhile, the organizing idea that is destined to rule keeps growing deep down - it begins to command, slowly it leads us back from side roads and wrong roads; it prepares single qualities and fitnesses that will one day prove to be indispensable as a means toward a whole - one by one, it trains all subservient capacities before giving any hint of the dominant task, "goal," "aim," or "meaning. — Friedrich Nietzsche

I slip her shirt over her head and she tries to cover herself, but I move her arms out of the way and kiss up her neck while I talk about all the things that are no longer just mine.
'Will, stop.' She laughs and attempts to pull my hands away from her bra. 'You can't take off my bra, we're in our driveway. What if they come outside?'
'It's dark,' I whisper. 'And it's not your bra. It's our bra and I want it off.' I slip it off her, pulling her against me as I rub my hands down the length of her back, then around to the button on the front of her jeans. 'And I want to take off our pants. — Colleen Hoover

All men of talent, whether they be men of feeling or not; whether they be zealots, or aspirants, or despots--provided only they be sincere--have their sublime moments, when they subdue and rule. I felt veneration for St. John--veneration so strong that its impetus thrust me at once to the point I had so long shunned. I was tempted to cease struggling with him--to rush down the torrent of his will into the gulf of his existence, and there lose my own. I was almost as hard beset by him now as I had been once before, in a different way, by another. I was a fool both times. To have yielded then would have been an error of principle; to have yielded now would have been an error of judgment. So I think at this hour, when I look back to the crisis through the quiet medium of time: I was unconscious of folly at the instant — Charlotte Bronte

When destiny deals, you will find yourself staring at four cards. Inevitably, your hand will not change. Time passes and eventually you face three upturned aces, leaving one unknown. Deep down, you know what the fourth holds. Do you have the courage to flip one last time knowing there is no going back? Fate knows no bounds... — Virginia Alison

Babe, you cannot plan life. You can pull out all the stops to plan for everything and life will find a way to fuck with those plans, sock you in the gut, send you scrambling. Through that, you either have the balls not to back down and the strength to know what's important and hold the fuck on with everything you got, or you don't have that and you give up 'cause you're weak. Know two things for certain: I'm not fuckin' weak and you aren't either. — Kristen Ashley

I have to go in with Raquel and fix this curse. Why don't you come in and . . . umm, lie down on the couch or something."
Reth gave me a humorless smile. "In all our time with each other, have I ever struck you as the type to nap on a couch?"
I snickered. "Not really. But it would be entertaining for me, at least. I'll bet you snore, even."
He looked indignant. "What makes you think I even sleep?"
"Do you?"
"Not in the same way you do. Go and waste your time trying to 'fix' Lend. I will try my best not to die waiting."
I took a step away, then turned back. "Wait, seriously? Are you going to die?"
He smiled, this time a genuine one. "I knew you cared. Not at the moment, but I will need you for something very soon. — Kiersten White

Have you been having fun, Eliza?" Gloria asked. "She's danced every dance," Hamilton said before Eliza could respond. "How wonderful," Gloria exclaimed. "See, I told you there was no reason for your earlier distress." "You were distressed?" Mr. Murdock inquired as he leaned forward over Agatha. "It was only a little case of nerves," Eliza returned, her eyes widening when Hamilton absently traced a finger down her arm. The action was not lost on Mr. Murdock. He sat back in his seat and turned his head to address the guest on his left. "What are you doing?" Eliza hissed. "If you're not careful, everyone will believe there's soon to be an announcement." "That would bother you?" And just what did he mean by that? She took a deep breath and slowly released it. "You've obviously lost your mind." Hamilton sent her a wicked smile and refused to say another word, although he did remove his finger from her skin. — Jen Turano

Life will knock us down, but we can choose whether or not to stand back up. — Jackie Chan

Chinese whisper games will start, where one woman will nod at a young dancing girl, asking a question that is passed down the row from one woman to another, before a response comes back up the line in the same manner. These women are in the business of finding wives for their sons and they offer up occasional commentary on the performance before them.
"Not so pretty. Her sister is better."
"That poor one will have a hard time, yes. The dark skin - she is already an old woman. She will have to wait, yes."
Information about the girl's family's honor, purity, and place in society is also exchanged — Jenny Nordberg

I realize I have a lot of amazing opportunities, but I don't know how you can play a human being going through real human experiences without being able to walk down the street. If you can't live a real life, how do you play a real person? It always confuses me when actors work back-to-back-to-back with no break. If you live your life on a film set, how the hell can you relate to real people? You don't know what its like to not have people fussing over you all day, and that's not life - that's silly movies. I will always want to take breaks and I wouldn't be OK with losing that. — Emma Stone

Somehow it felt familiar, an old story retold, the claws in my shoulder, my arms twisted behind my back, the drag down the street, Will assisting my father and thinking how much fun it was to hunt someone down. I knew it all. Each snarled command was a line from an old but faithless song. "Pipe down! I'm not going to hurt you! I just want to talk to you! This is for your own good! — Kaimana Wolff

I love you, Godric St. John, and now I'm breaking my word. I will not leave you. You may either come with me to Laurelwood or I'll stay here with you in your musty old house in London and drive you mad with all my talking and relatives and ... and exotic sexual positions until you break down and love me back, for I'm warning you that I'm not giving up until you love me and we're a happy family with dozens of children. — Elizabeth Hoyt

I think the democratic movement will be repressed for now, only to erupt again somewhere down the line.And more blood will be shed, just like it was when Americans fought and died to bring independence, democracy, and freedom to the United States. It's not something you can sit back and wait for someone to give to you voluntarily. — Nien Cheng

The ads in the papers all said 'help wanted, will train,' but wherever she went she was turned down. "The position's just been filled," she was told again and again. Or, "We wouldn't want to upset the other employees." At the department store where she had once bought all her hats and silk stockings they would not hire her as a cashier because they were afraid of offending the customers. Instead they offered her work adding up sales slips in a small dark room in the back where no one could see her but she politely declined.
"I was afraid I'd ruin my eyes back there," she told us. "I was afraid I might accidentally remember who I was and ... offend myself. — Julie Otsuka

In looking back now, I see how it began in my childhood, altho' I was not conscious of the necessity until '67 or '68 when I broke down first, acutely, and had violent turns of hysteria. As I lay prostrate after the storm with my mind luminous and active and susceptible of the clearest, strongest impressions, I saw so distinctly that it was a fight simply between my body and my will, a battle in which the former was to be triumphant to the end ... So, with the rest, you abandon the pit of your stomach, the palms of your hands, the soles of your feet, and refuse to keep them sane when you find in turn one moral impression after another producing despair in the one, terror in the others, anxiety in the third and so on until life becomes one long flight from remote suggestion and complicated eluding of the multifold traps set for your undoing. — Alice James

Love is a great thing, yea, a great and thorough good.
By itself it makes that which is heavy light;
and it bears evenly all that is uneven.
It carries a burden which is no burden;
it will not be kept back by anything low and mean;
It desires to be free from all wordly affections,
and not to be entangled by any outward prosperity,
or by any adversity subdued.
Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of trouble,
attempts what is above its strength,
pleads no excuse of impossibility.
It is therefore able to undertake all things,
and it completes many things and warrants them to take effect,
where he who does not love would faint and lie down.
Though weary, it is not tired;
though pressed it is not straightened;
though alarmed, it is not confounded;
but as a living flame it forces itself upwards and securely passes through all.
Love is active and sincere, courageous, patient, faithful, prudent, and manly. — Thomas A Kempis

I saw behind me those who had gone, and before me, those who are to come. I looked back and saw my father, and his father, and all our fathers, and in front, to see my son, and his son, and the sons upon sons beyond.
And their eyes were my eyes.
As I felt, so they had felt, and were to feel, as then, so now, as tomorrow and forever. Then I was not afraid, for I was in a long line that had no beginning, and no end, and the hand of his father grasped my father's hand, and his hand was in mine, and my unborn son took my right hand, and all, up and down the line stretched from Time That Was, to Time That Is, and is not yet, raised their hands to show the link, and we found that we were one, born of Woman, Son of Man, had in the Image, fashioned in the Womb by the Will of God, the eternal Father.
I was one of them, they were of me, and in me, and I in all of them. — Richard Llewellyn

And we tell ourselves all kinds of similarly implausible no-consequences stories all the time, about how we can ravage the world and suffer no adverse effects. Indeed we are always surprised when it works out otherwise. We extract and we do not replenish and we wonder why the fish have disappeared and the soil requires ever more "inputs" to stay fertile. We drive down wages, ship jobs overseas...then wonder why people can't afford to shop as much as they used to...At every stage our actions are marked by a lack of respect for the powers we are unleashing - a certainty, or at least a hope, that the nature we have turned to garbage, and the people we have treated like garbage, will not come back to haunt us. — Naomi Klein

Tell me how you could say such a thing, she said, staring down at the ground beneath her feet. You're not telling me anything I don't know already. 'Relax your body, and the rest of you will lighten up.' What's the point of saying that to me? If I relaxed my body now, I'd fall apart. I've always lived like this, and it's the only way I know how to go on living. If I relaxed for a second, I'd never find my way back. I'd go to pieces, and the pieces would be blown away. Why can't you see that? How can you talk about watching over me if you can't see that? — Haruki Murakami

George stared across the street. 'There is only one trouble with the Poldarks,' he said after a moment. 'They cannot take a beating.'
'And only one trouble with the Warleggans,' said Ross. 'They never know when they are not wanted.'
George's color deepened. 'But they can appreciate and remember an insult.'
'Well, I trust you will remember this one.' Ross turned his back and went down the steps into the tavern. — Winston Graham

Maybe you cannot be the CEO of a multinational corporation, but you can frighten a few people, or cause them to scurry around like chickens, or steal from them, or - maybe best of all - create situations that cause them to feel bad about themselves. And this is power, especially when the people you manipulate are superior to you in some way. Most invigorating of all is to bring down people who are smarter or more accomplished than you, or perhaps classier, more attractive or popular or morally admirable. This is not only good fun; it is existential vengeance. And without a conscience, it is amazingly easy to do. You quietly lie to the boss or to the boss's boss, cry some crocodile tears, or sabotage a coworker's project, or gaslight a patient (or a child), bait people with promises, or provide a little misinformation that will never be traced back to you. — Martha Stout

You know," she said, pulling back from his neck. "I've always been wrong about something."
"And that is?"
"I thought there was nothing in the world more seductive than a troubadour singing his observations about his lady love. But I was wrong."
She trailed her fingernail down his arm, raising chills in its wake. "The most incredible seduction is when a knight who is renowned for his strength speaks from his heart. Not as a knave out to woo a woman because he can, but as a man who wants only to give of himself." Her gaze seared him as she stared into his eyes and he saw her innermost sincerity. "I love you, Stryder. I always will."
-Stryder and Rowena — Kinley MacGregor

Retaining 'Monday Night Football' simply did not make smart financial sense for ABC. We could not reconcile the fees against the revenue. We love football at ABC. It's been a love affair for 36 years. It will go down in the history of sports television, being created on ABC and with this magnificent run. But at this point, given the success we're having with our entertainment product and the financials, we deemed that this was the proper move for us. We're not looking back . — George Bodenheimer

From here on," Kanin said, "you will have to decide what kind of demon you will be. Not all meals will come to you so easily, ignorant and seeking to do you harm. What will you do if your prey invites you inside, offers you a place at the table? What will you do if they flee, or cower down, begging you not to hurt them? How you stalk your prey is something you must come to terms with, or you will quickly drive yourself mad. And once you cross that threshold, there is no coming back from it. — Julie Kagawa

There are times now, and my life has changed so completely, that I think back on the early years and I find myself thinking: It was not that bad. Perhaps it was not. But there are times, too - unexpected - when walking down a sunny sidewalk, or watching the top of a tree bend in the wind, or seeing a November sky close down over the East River, I am suddenly filled with the knowledge of darkness so deep that a sound might escape from my mouth, and I will step into the nearest clothing store and talk with a stranger about the shape of sweaters newly arrived. This must be the way most of us maneuver through the world, half knowing, half not, visited by memories that can't possibly be true. But when I see others walking with confidence down the sidewalk, as though they are free completely from terror, I realize I don't know how others are. So much of life seems speculation. — Elizabeth Strout

I can't believe that this world can go on beyond our generation and on down to succeeding generations with this kind of weapon on both sides poised at each other without someday some fool or some maniac or some accident triggering the kind of war that is the end of the line for all of us. And I just think of what a sigh of relief would go up from everyone on this earth if someday-and this is what I have-my hope, way in the back of my head-is that if we start down the road to reduction, maybe one day in doing that, somebody will say, 'Why not all the way? Let's get rid of all these things'. — Ronald Reagan

Once a person is at the center of love, there is very rarely a possibility for him to fall back down, because he has tasted something of the heights. Now valleys will be very dark, ugly; he has seen sunlit peaks, not very high, but still high; now his whole desire will be ... — Rajneesh

A woman in Bower Bank, Jamaica, had eight children. The father was in jail in the United States, no longer sending remittances.

Her fourteen-year-old daughter "get burn up from her face, breast, chest, down to her legs with boiling water February 2 1999. That night just because I never have any money earlier to cook, me go town and get a money, buy something to cook cause them never eat from morning. Me daughter bend down, to pick up something near the stove and bounce off the pot of boiling water pan herself. Me tek her to hospital and me never have the money fe register her. Me beg somebody the money and register her. Me owe the hospital $10,500 for the bill, a caan [can't] pay it. She's to go back for treatment because her hand caan stretch out or go up, but the hospital will not see her if I don't pay the bill. — William Easterly

If you will only consider, you will remember many a person of whom the world never heard and will never hear, whose years have been as full of generosity, loyalty to duty, faith in God, fidelity to every day's work, as those of Franklin or Garfield, Lincoln or Emerson. They, also, have put their hands to the plough and have not looked back. Having made up their minds to what ought to be done, they did not hesitate, did not procrastinate, did not worry or grow anxious, but faithfully performed the duty of the hour. They had faith in Providence, and so did with their might what their hands found to do. They gave, and it was given to them again, "full measure, pressed down and running over." They did good, hoping for nothing again, and the reward came in lives full of content; in cheerfulness, peace, and satisfaction. — James Clarke

Must you go? I was rather hoping you'd stay and be a ministering angel, but if you must go, you must."
"I'll stay," Will said a bit crossly, and threw himself down in the armchair Tessa had just vacated. "I can minister angelically."
"None too convincingly. And you're not as pretty to look at as Tessa is," Jem said, closing his eyes as he leaned back against the pillow.
"How rude. Many who have gazed upon me have compared the experience to gazing at the radiance of the sun."
Jem still had his eyes closed. "If they mean it gives you a headache, they aren't wrong. — Cassandra Clare

It seems the older we get, the tighter our inner circle becomes. When life has you down, some of those you thought had your back run, others ... sometimes strangers surprise you and fill that empty space up. Oh, but life has a great balancing act and when that axle turns and you are right side up again ... you will definitely not be looking for any long, lost "friends" because your inner circle is battle-tested to win! — Sanjo Jendayi

People will drive by their high school ten years down the road, just so they can pretend that thinking "not much has changed" is actually true. When really, everything has changed. The air smells the same, but the roads have cracked more. The roads have cracked so much they now look like the skin on a crocodile's back. And all the fields, green in the summers, golden in the autumns, have all been paved over with new reasons to never come back. — Dave Matthes

Perrin told me about his people before I ever came here," she said. He was not a man to brag, but things had a way of coming out. "When hail flattens your crops, when the winter kills half your sheep, you buckle down and keep going. When Trollocs devastated the Two Rivers, you fought back, and when you were done with them, you set about rebuilding without missing a step." She would not have believed that without seeing for herself, not of southerners. These people would have done very well in Saldaea, where Trolloc raids were a matter of course, in the northern parts at least. "I cannot tell you the weather will be what it should tomorrow. I can tell you that Perrin and I will do what needs to be done, whatever can be done. And I don't need to tell you that you will take what each day brings, whatever it is, and be ready to face the next. That is the kind of people the Two Rivers breeds. That is who you are. — Robert Jordan

People everywhere, enjoying life, smiling, and just slowing down to let the world take care of itself for a few hours.
The feeling was contagious. Especially when I stepped into McPherson's Pub to grab a bite of the special and listen to some traditional Irish music. The fiddle made me want to dance with myself, and many did. The drum beat like my very own heart. And some little flute that looked no wider than a pencil reminded me of the Aran Islands floating not too far from Abbeyglen.
God was here tonight. In the strings of the guitar and the call of the singer's voice. I realize how often I overlook him back at home.
And I know I don't want to do that anymore.
The LORD will send His faithful love by day; His song will be with me in the night a prayer to the Gid of my life. — Jenny B. Jones

You have to be willing to enter a situation where you know that you probably will not make it - while you absolutely believe that you will. You've got to know somewhere deep inside that you can take it, that you are in it to the end, whenever that may be. You have to know that what you are pursuing is worth it and that it means that much to you. So when you get knocked down, you can pick yourself back up and go at it again. Even though you might lose rounds five and six, a championship bout is 12 rounds. You've got to be willing to lose some of those rounds and still believe that you will win the match. Through all of that, you've got to be willing to bleed. — Patrick Sweeney

Everyone's for a free Tibet, but no one's for freeing Tibet. So Tibet will stay unfree - as unfree now as it was when the first Free Tibet campaigner slapped the very first "FREE TIBET" sticker on the back of his Edsel. Idealism as inertia is the hallmark of the movement...He's [the guy with the bumper sticket] advertising his moral superiority, not calling for action. If Rumsfeld were to say, "Free Tibet? Jiminy, what a swell idea! The Third Infantry Division goes in on Thursday," the bumper-sticker crowd would be aghast. They'd have to bend down and peel off the "FREE TIBET" stickers and replace them with "WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER. — Mark Steyn

Oh, I suppose they're not exactly gone, those green boys. It's rather like a sapling turning into a tree. Can't scrape off the bark, and whittle it down until you find that sapling again, now can you? No, of course not. The sapling becomes an oak. Forever changed. The realities of that war will remain inside us through heaven or hell. Best try and face it, Ty. Running from it won't help. You'll never turn back into the innocent sapling you once were." Robert lifted his glass and grinned. "My friend, we've become a pair of gnarled old trees. — Kathleen Baldwin

Straight guys only feel three ways about girls ... First, either they love you, and they show it by writing a song about you, like Gabriel, and asking you out, and everything is nice and fun like it should be. Second, they love you, but they're scared of their passion for you because it's so strong, like your boy Christopher, so they stuff it way, way down and ignore you, or do stupid things like make fun of you because they don't know how to express it any other way, because they're immature little babies and are too shy to, say, write a song about you. Or third, there's something wrong with them, and they start out nice and loving and then turn around and do stupid things like sleep with other girls behind your back, like Justin Bay. But we'll never figure out what went wrong with them, and neither will they, so it's not worth thinking about. Okay? That's it. The end.
Lulu Collins — Meg Cabot

I believe strongly in condoms. They avert babies and disease. They make you seem responsible, not slutty. They make the girl relax too, because you're taking care of the risky part. Like you're a professional. Roll it on, squeeze the tip, turn back to her, ready, set go. Like I'd just done a little disappearing act on myself and became something confident and wonderful. You can't see through my latex disguise! You will love this so let's get down! You don't want to know how many times this worked in my favor.
God I feel like a fucking asshole sometimes. All the time, really. — Carrie Mesrobian

She perks up and smiles. "Are you asking me out on a real, live date?"
I nod my head.
"Well, you suck at it, you know. You always have. Sometimes girls like to be asked and not told."
She's trying to play hard to get, which is pointless. I've already got her ... but I play her game anyway. I kneel down on the floor in front of her and look into her eyes. "Lake, will you do me the honor of accompanying me on a date tomorrow night? "
She leans back into the couch and looks away. "I don't know, I'm sort of busy," she says. "I'll check my schedule and let you know." She tries to look put out, but a smile breaks out on her face. She leans forward and hugs me, but I lose my balance and we end up in the floor. I roll her onto her back and she stares up at me and laughs. "Fine. Pick me up at seven. — Colleen Hoover

All your seriousness is about sandcastles. And you yourself will leave them one day, trampling them down, and you will not look back. The people who take it seriously miss the beauty of playfulness. — Rajneesh

I have always had a weakness for footnotes. For me a clever or a wicked footnote has redeemed many a text. And I see that I am now using a long footnote to open a serious subject - shifting in a quick move to Paris, to a penthouse in the Hotel Crillon. Early June. Breakfast time. The host is my good friend Professor Ravelstein, Abe Ravelstein. My wife and I, also staying at the Crillon, have a room below, on the sixth floor. She is still asleep. The entire floor below ours (this is not absolutely relevant but somehow I can't avoid mentioning it) is occupied just now by Michael Jackson and his entourage. He performs nightly in some vast Parisian auditorium. Very soon his French fans will arrive and a crowd of faces will be turned upward, shouting in unison, 'Miekell Jack-sown'. A police barrier holds the fans back. Inside, from the sixth floor, when you look down the marble stairwell you see Michael's bodyguards. One of them is doing the crossword puzzle in the 'Paris Herald'. — Saul Bellow

When hope dies, you breathe it back to life again! No matter how long it takes, or what time's required to heal the wound. Disappointment will not last a lifetime unless you lie down and give in. — Janny Wurts

She is a slut," I said, "because she went up on the mountain with a man, instead of to bed with her husband. Is it, Dada?"
My father was quiet for a little, with his back to me, looking down into the Valley.
"Yes," my father said. "That is why she is a slut."
"Then what is Chris Phillips, then?" I asked.
"He did very wrong," said my father, but there was no body in his voice. "Mr. Gruffydd will have a word with him."
"But not in front of all the people," I said. "If Meillyn Lewis is a slut, Chris Phillips is a coward. And I know which of them is the worst. — Richard Llewellyn

Creativity is sacred, and it is not sacred. What we make matters enormously, and it doesn't matter at all. We toil alone, and we are accompanied by spirits. We are terrified, and we are brave. Art is a crushing chore and a wonderful privilege. Only when we are at our most playful can divinity finally get serious with us. Make space for all these paradoxes to be equally true inside your soul, and I promise - you can make anything. So please calm down now and get back to work, okay? The treasures that are hidden inside you are hoping you will say yes. — Elizabeth Gilbert

I would like to say to the men and women of the generations which will come after us: you will look back at us with astonishment. You will wonder at passionate struggles that accomplished so little, at the, to you, obvious paths to attain our ends which we did not take. At the intolerable evils before which it will seem to you we sat down passive. At the great truths staring us in the face which we failed to see, at the great truths we grasped at but could not get our fingers quite 'round. You will marvel at the labour that ended in so little. But what you will never know that it was how we were thinking of you and for you that we struggled as we did and accomplished the little that we have done. That it was in the thought of your larger realization and fuller life that we have found consolation for the futilities of our own. All I aspire to be and was not, comforts me. — Olive Schreiner

When Marvel approached me about possibly bringing back a She-Hulk solo series, a few touchstones for a take immediately popped into my head - make her an attorney. Make her charming and fun, not weighed down by the various things life will throw at her. Give her a vibrant social life. — Charles Soule

Each of us has a role to play, and we all need to contribute to making the world a better place. You cannot sit back and do nothing and hope for change; one person can make the biggest difference. Throughout history people have tried to say that we need love and we need to work together, which we do, but you cannot truly love anything unless you learn to love yourself. It all boils down to you, the individual.
When individuals accept themselves, they are liberated from their suffering, and are capable of fully embracing the world around them. You are the only one who can change your life. When the people recognize this, real change will come. Do not wait around for someone else to save the world. You are unique and you have knowledge from your own experience that no one else has. You have ideas and passions that nobody else can claim. You could be the one to help us out of the dreadful situation that we are in, but if you do not act on your ambition the world will never know. — Joseph P. Kauffman

In the square below,' said the Happy Prince, 'there stands a little match-girl. She has let her matches fall in the gutter, and they are all spoiled. Her father will beat her if she does not bring home some money, and she is crying. She has no shoes or stockings, and her little head is bare. Pluck out my other eye, and give it to her, and her father will not beat her.'

'I will stay with you one night longer,' said the Swallow, 'but I cannot pluck out your eye. You would be quite blind then.'

'Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow,' said the Prince, 'do as I command you.'

So he plucked out the Prince's other eye, and darted down with it. He swooped past the match-girl, and slipped the jewel into the palm of her hand. 'What a lovely bit of glass,' cried the little girl; and she ran home, laughing.

Then the Swallow came back to the Prince. 'You are blind now,' he said, 'so I will stay with you always. — Oscar Wilde

The classic scenario unfolds like this. An ambitious and successful woman heads down a challenging career path with the thought of having children in the back of her mind. At some point, this thought moves to the front of her mind, typically once she finds a partner. The woman considers how hard she is working and reasons that to make room for a child she will have to scale back. A law associate might decide not to shoot for partner because someday she hopes to have a family. A teacher might pass on leading curriculum development for her school. A sales representative might take a smaller territory or not apply for a management role. — Sheryl Sandberg

When I hung up, Gabriel said, "Now you're going out that - "
"I'm not leaving you."
"Don't be stupid. I have a gun." He reached into his pocket and pulled out the .45.
"Which will knock you on your ass if you try firing with a bad leg. Sit down before you fall."
"I'm - "
"Sit down."
I walked to the door and peered out. If I strained, I could hear footsteps above. Anderson would
search the other rooms first. Then he'd come down here.
When I returned, Gabriel was still standing, leaning against the washing machine. Stubborn bastard.
"So you're staying with me?" he said.
"Yep."
"You may not want to do that."
"Too bad."
"I wouldn't stay for you."
"Probably not."
His mouth opened, as if he'd been prepared for me to disagree. He paused and then said, "I wouldn't. You know I wouldn't."
"Doesn't matter. You're my partner. I watch your back. — Kelley Armstrong

Judd's fists were so tight, he was in danger of fracturing his own bones. He understood why Brenna had needed to talk to Dorian. He even understood that the leopard saw Brenna as a young sister, not a potential lover. None of that made any difference. Judd wanted to be the one she turned to when in need.
Ice picks of pain shoved through his skull, dissonance so vicious it nearly shut down his consciousness. The countdown was getting inexorably closer to the end. Uncurling his fingers with sheer force of will, he watched the blood rush back in. Last night had made it clear that he'd already crossed too many lines, broken too many rules. Soon, it would be too late to draw back.
"Thank you, Dorian."
No, he would not pull back. Brenna was his. His to pleasure. And his to comfort ... — Nalini Singh

When we think of the masterpieces that nobody praised and nobody read, back there in the past, we feel an impatient superiority to the readers of the past. If we had been there, we can't help feeling, we'd have known that Moby-Dick was a good book - -why, how could anyone help knowing?
But suppose someone says to us, "Well, you're here now: what's our own Moby-Dick? What's the book that, a hundred years from now, everybody will look down on us for not having liked?" What do we say then? — Randall Jarrell

When I'm done skating, I guarantee you that I will not look back and remember standing on the podium. I'm going to remember these days - being with the team. Training alone, in my basement. Training when everybody else is sleeping. Doing things that nobody else is doing. Digging down. Seeing what kind of character I truly have. I love that stuff. — Apolo Ohno

For the first time in years the tears were streaming down his face. But they were for himself now. He did not care about mouth and eyes and moving hands. He wanted to care, and he could not care. For he had gone away and he could never go back any more. The gates were closed, the sun was gone down, and there was no beauty but the gray beauty of steel that withstands all time. Even the grief he could have borne was left behind in the country of illusion, of youth, of the richness of life, where his winter dreams had flourished.
"Long ago," he said, "long ago, there was something in me, but now that thing is gone. Now that thing is gone, that thing is gone. I cannot cry. I cannot care. That thing will come back no more. — F Scott Fitzgerald

And he came to understand that the burial of the broken wasn't eccentric - this was what people did every day, stuffing their brokenness down, pushing it down, smoothing the surface over, making the surface look like nothing was broken underneath. Because, if people see that you are broken, they will not want to stand with you. They will migrate away from you the way groups of people walking down the street will move aside when a shambling ranting man approaches. They will look at the ground and look away so that such a person becomes invisible. So if you are such a person or just an everyday person with some broken places, some places really broken, you will pull them back from view so you can mingle with others without being seen as broken. Because if you have the look of a broken thing, if you are pushed aside and turned from, you will never find your footing again in the world. — Lindsay Hill

At the very least, I hope it means I will get my Briony back again. I know, I'll hold a party for her--and take her on a pony ride--I think that will be quite in order, if I can be spared from my official duties for the afternoon."

"You're the King," Taris reminded him with a smile.

"But you're my conscience, Taris, you know that."

"Then your conscience says we should keep his highness's current location secret, but an announcement of his escape is most desirable. Therefore, a party is quite in order--if not essential--for the morale of the nation."

"Excellent. I really should promote you, old friend. Only trouble is, there's nowhere to go but down from your office."

"I am well aware of that, Your Majesty. — Julia Golding

A discussion between Haldane and a friend began to take a predictable turn. The friend said with a sigh, 'It's no use going on. I know what you will say next, and I know what you will do next.' The distinguished scientist promptly sat down on the floor, turned two back somersaults, and returned to his seat. 'There,' he said with a smile. 'That's to prove that you're not always right.' — John B. S. Haldane

She led them to their pallets, again encircled by other pallets. She sat down, sighing at her aching muscles, and caught his gaze. "You may, er, wrap your arms around me if that will make you feel I am safer."
He chuckled--a hoarse chuckle, rusty, but a chuckle nonetheless. She'd take it.
"May I indeed?" He lay beside her and pulled her back against him, settling her head on his arm, bunching the other hide up to use as a pillow. "If I must." His warm sigh tickled across her neck. "After all, I must ensure that pinkie does not wander."
Would Robert never let her forget that? — Angela Quarles

What the young writer is looking for is not a critic who will slap him on the back and say, 'Greatest thing since O. Henry,' but rather the one who will toss the manuscript down in disgust, with 'You know better than that! It's rotten! Do it all over again!' — Henry Sydnor Harrison

It was a real revolution. But with one missing feature. That is the feeling in a people that "We have done it once, and if the new lot let us down, we can do it again!" It was that proud, menacing confidence which made the French revolution special. But it's not around in 21st-century Europe. After 1989, the people handed over liberty to the experts. Will they ever want it back? — Neal Ascherson

Take heart now in one true thing: You will gain traction. You will grow upwards even when you think you've been slammed back down into that same dark hole. It will start looking like a different hole, one that might still have you
curled up and crying, but that crying will be more transformative than only desperate screams of despair. Your pain can be turned to good account. You're not alone. You've got
this handbook. Keep us with you. — Deborah Pardes

WHEN YOU'RE BETWEEN A ROCK AND A HARD PLACE 1-4 But now, GOD's Message, the God who made you in the first place, Jacob, the One who got you started, Israel: "Don't be afraid, I've redeemed you. I've called your name. You're mine. When you're in over your head, I'll be there with you. When you're in rough waters, you will not go down. When you're between a rock and a hard place, it won't be a dead end - Because I am GOD, your personal God, The Holy of Israel, your Savior. I paid a huge price for you: all of Egypt, with rich Cush and Seba thrown in! That's how much you mean to me! That's how much I love you! I'd sell off the whole world to get you back, trade the creation just for you. 5-7 "So don't be afraid: I'm with you. — Anonymous

Thierry, you must learn not only when to lift a burden, but when to set it down." He patted Shaw's lax face with his paw. "Otherwise, your back will break under the strain, and everyone who depends on you will be left as sheep without their shepherd. Do you understand? — Hailey Edwards

Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountain side
The summer's gone, and all the flowers are dying
'Tis you, 'tis you must go and I must bide.
But come ye back when summer's in the meadow
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow
'Tis I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.
And if you come, when all the flowers are dying
And I am dead, as dead I well may be
You'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an "Ave" there for me.
And I shall hear, tho' soft you tread above me
And all my dreams will warm and sweeter be
If you'll not fail to tell me that you love me
I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me.
I'll simply sleep in peace until you come to me. — Fred E. Weatherly

From the Grapes of Wrath and a woman that would not be moved: 'On'y way you gonna get me to go is whup me.' She moved the jack handle gently again. 'An' I'll shame you, Pa. I won't take no whuppin', cryin' an' a-beggin'. I'll light into you. An' you ain't so sure you can whup me anyways. An' if ya do get me, I swear to God I'll wait till you got your back turned, or you're settin' down, an' I'll knock you belly-up with a bucket. I swear to Holy Jesus' sake I will. — John Steinbeck

If you want to concentrate deeply on some problem, and especially some piece of writing or paper-work, you should acquire a cat. Alone with the cat in the room where you work ... the cat will invariably get up on your desk and settle placidly under the desk lamp ... The cat will settle down and be serene, with a serenity that passes all understanding. And the tranquility of the cat will gradually come to affect you, sitting there at your desk, so that all the excitable qualities that impede your concentration compose themselves and give your mind back the self-command it has lost. You need not watch the cat all the time. Its presence alone is enough. The effect of a cat on your concentration is remarkable, very mysterious. — Muriel Spark

The room shall speak, it must catch me up and hold me, I want to feel that I belong here, I want to hearken and know when I go back to the front line that the war will sink down, be drowned utterly in the great home-coming tide, know that it will then be past for ever, and not gnaw us continually, that it will have none but an outward power over us ... Nothing stirs; listless and wretched, like a condemned man, I sit there and the past withdraws itself. And at the same time I fear to importune it too much, because I do not know what might happen then. I am a soldier, I must cling to that. — Erich Maria Remarque

When we travel down the path of life, we have so many forks, so many choices, but we have no idea where each path will take us. But there are times when we can look across the abyss and see where we might have been, had we taken the other path. But we cannot go back; we cannot change our past. We can only wonder about the path not taken and continue on the path that we have chosen. — Frank Karkota

Marilla!" Anne sat down on Marilla's gingham lap, took Marilla's lined face between her hands, and looked gravely and tenderly into Marilla's eyes. "I'm not a bit changed - not really. I'm only just pruned down and branched out. The real me - back here - is just the same. It won't make a bit of difference where I go or how much I change outwardly; at heart I shall always be your little Anne, who will love you and Matthew and dear Green Gables more and better every day of her life. — L.M. Montgomery

We Catholics have not only to do our best to keep down our own warring passions and live decent lives, which will often be hard enough in this odd world we have been born into. We have to bear witness to moral principles which the world owned yesterday and has begun to turn its back on today. We have to disapprove of some of the things our neighbors do, without being stuffy about it; we have to be charitable towards our neighbors and make great allowances for them, without falling into the mistake of condoning their low standards and so encouraging them to sin. Two of the most difficult and delicate tasks a man can undertake; and it happens, nowadays, not only to priests, to whom it comes as part of their professional duty, but to ordinary lay people...So we must know what are the unalterable principles we hold, and why we hold them; we must see straight in a world that is full of moral fog. — Ronald Knox

As long as you are forced to be a woman first instead of a person, by default, you need to be a feminist. That's it. Men are people, women are women? Screw that. Screw that. I am sick of having words aimed to shut me up. I am sick of having to be anything other than a person first. Zounds! I enjoy being a girl, whatever that means. For me, that meant Star Wars figurines, mounds of books, skirts and flats. It meant Civil War reenacting and best girlfriends I'd give a kidney to and best guy friends I'd ruin a liver with and making messes and cleaning up some of them and still not knowing how to apply eye shadow. That's being a girl. That's being a person. It's the same damn thing. I wish Rush had just called me an idiot. I'm happy to be called an idiot! On the day when someone on the Internet calls me an idiot first and ugly second, I will set down my feminist battle flag and heave a great sigh. Then I will pick it back up and keep climbing. There are many more mountains to overcome. — Alexandra Petri

I need to give you one last bit of advice in the off chance this rather extraordinary and enviable situation in which you find yourself is actually true- that somehow you've fallen deep down into a Cordova story. I stared back at him. Be the good guy, he said. How do I know I'm the good guy? He pointed at me, nodding. A very wise question. You don't. Most bad guys think they're good. But there are a few signifiers. You'll be miserable. You'll be hated. You'll fumble around in the dark, alone and confused. You'll have little insight as to the true nature of things, not until the very last minute, and only if you have the stamina and the madness to go to the very, very end. But most importantly- and critically- you will act without regard for yourself. You'll be motivated by something that has nothing to do with the ego. You'll do it for justice. For grace. For love. Those large rather heroic qualities only the good have the strength to carry on their shoulders. And you'll listen. — Marisha Pessl

It only took Ysabel one day to screw with one of his finest trackers. Lucifer fought an urge to shake his head. "Let me get this straight. After pissing Ysabel off, to the point she's going to come storming in here any minute demanding I fire you, you still want to work with her? Are you insane?" "I hope so," Remy grinned. A smile cracked Lucifer's face. "Congratulations. Your mother will be ecstatic. Consider it done. I like a male who doesn't back down in the face of a shrew." "Bah, she's not a shrew. Just a little feisty. Besides, I think I might enjoy taming a cougar with claws. — Eve Langlais

God! You hear me, God? Maybe I don't believe in you, but you damned well better believe in me! J. B. Books! See this gun? I kill with it! You kill, too, but I make a slicker job of it. I kill bad men, you kill good. I have reason, you don't. You are killing me hellish slow, and I do not deserve such treatment. You wrong me, and I will not be wronged. So let us have it out, God. Face me! Be a man and face me now if you have the guts - stand and draw or back off! God damn you, God, throw down on me and kill me now or let me live! — Glendon Swarthout

He died of a breaking heart," Pete said, making a stout log fence of his hands around the glove compartment and leaning forward to peer at the luminous clock, "but he was an old man. He was the king of his Yaquis down there and he couldn't live any more when they took the land away. He couldn't live up in the mountains that way. He hid all the treasures - you understand treasures? - in the mountains down there and he died. Now I'm the king of my Yaquis and someday I'll go down there and dig up the treasures again - maybe soon if they don't catch me too much. Then I buy the land back and we will live in the future like in the past only better." Pete let the fence fall, and sunlight showed the clock to be hours wrong, if not years. — Douglas Woolf

We didn't domesticate cats. They domesticated themselves. But not totally, you know? You take a good look at any house cat, and you can tell there's eventually going to be a day when it goes back wild, you know? When it reverts to its true nature. You fall over and die in a house with your dog, and your dog will lie down beside your dead body, maybe right on top of it, and starve to death. But a house cat will feast on your eyes as soon as its stomach starts growling. — Sherman Alexie

I shall be as willing as the next man to fall down in worship before the System, if only I can manage to set eyes on it. Hitherto I have had no success; and though I have young legs, I am almost weary from running back and forth ...
Once or twice I have been on the verge of bending the knee. But at the last moment, when I already had my handkerchief spread on the ground, to avoid soiling my trousers, and I made a trusting appeal to one of the initiated who stood by: "Tell me now sincerely, is it entirely finished; for if so I will kneel down before it, even at the risk of ruining a pair of trousers (for on account of the heavy traffic to and from the system, the road has become quite muddy)," - I always receive the same answer: "No, it is not yet quite finished." And so there was another postponement - of the system, and of my homage.
System and finality are pretty much one and the same, so much so that if the system is not finished, there is no system. — Soren Kierkegaard

The path to a sustained victory in Afghanistan lies in improving their economy, creating jobs for the Afghanis, strengthening their government and national services, getting the provinces to trust each other and work together, and eliminating the opium trade. Previously, the United States' policy was to not get deeply involved in internal Afghani drug issues; now we've changed the policy and are actively working to eradicate the drugs. But nobody has yet to come up with a way to shut down the poppy fields and get the Afghani people back to work. Until that happens, the Taliban will inevitable creep back in. — Michael DeLong

You see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat ... — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

I'll come back," she promised. "I'll always come back to you."
"I know," he said with cold, calm arrogance. "If I didn't believe that, I wouldn't let you go."
"Believe it. It's true." She took a step back. Then another. "Always."
"Eleanor, if you have any mercy in that dark heart of yours, when you leave right now, you will
walk and not run."
...
crawl and she didn't fly.
She ran. Down the hall she ran as if the hounds of hell nipped at her heels. She ran as if God
himself had ordered her to. She ran as if her life depended on it and in that moment she might
have sworn that it did.
She didn't know why she ran. She didn't know who or what waited for her in the White Room.
She only knew she had to get there as fast as she could and whoever it was, he was worth
running to. — Tiffany Reisz

No, you're the girl I'm in love with. I love you more than my own life," Jack declared fervently. "If anything happens to you Maia, it will be over for me. I'm never gonna come back from losing you - not in ten, not in fifty years. So I'm asking you not to throw away what we have on some fucking job someone else can do. I'm begging you to give what we have a chance. You've done your time; it's OK to slow down, babe. I promise you, I'll make it my life's priority to make you happy."
~Jack to Maia — Victoria Paige

But this was not all, for she soon found that the thread, after going straight down for a little way, turned first sideways in one direction, then sideways in another, and then shot, at various angles, hither and thither inside the heap, so that she began to be afraid that to clear the thread she must remove the whole huge gathering. She was dismayed at the very idea, but, losing no time, set to work with a will; and with aching back, and bleeding fingers and hands, she worked on, sustained by the pleasure of seeing the heap slowly diminish and begin to show itself on the opposite side of the fire. Another thing which helped to keep up her courage was that, as often as she uncovered a turn of the thread, instead of lying loose upon the stone, it tightened up; this made her sure that her grandmother was at the end of it somewhere. — George MacDonald

But the world is round,' said Peter. 'It is not,' said Sean. 'How can you say such a wicked thing? Fie.' 'But it is,' cried Peter, 'and if we go on, we shall come back to where we began.' 'Of course we shall,' replied Sean, 'but that is because it is shaped like a cheese. You may go round, as Loegaire did: but you may not go up or down for ever, or you will fall off the ends, as Maire nic Phiarais did and we ourselves almost when we went too far south of the Horn. The whole world knows that. — Patrick O'Brian

There's going to be no more digital enhancements or digital additions to anything based on any film I direct. I'm not going to do any corrections digitally to even wires that show ... If 1941 comes on Blu-ray I'm not going to go back and take the wires out because the Blu-ray will bring the wires out that are guiding the airplane down Hollywood Blvd. At this point right now I think letting movies exist in the era, with all the flaws and all of the flourishes, is a wonderful way to mark time and mark history. — Steven Spielberg

But he came back to his idea.
"My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat ... "
The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Buddy, you have no idea what I am capable of. Now, put the rifle down on the ground. Step back and walk away. Then leave this place and do not ever come back. If you do that, I will let you live. — James J. Caterino

None of us will become perfect in a day or a month or a year. We will not accomplish it in lifetime, but we can begin now, starting with our more obvious weaknesses and gradually converting them to strengths as we go forward with our lives. this quest may be a long one: in fact, it will be lifelong. It may be fraught with many mistakes, with falling down and getting back up again. And it will take much effort. But we must not sell ourselves short. We must make a little extra effort. We would be wise to kneel before our God in supplication. He will help us. He will bless us. He will comfort and sustain us. He will help us to do more, and be more, than we can ever accomplish or be on our own. — Gordon B. Hinckley

All the Ten Commandments and prayer is an acknowledgement of the Almighty God. We will not back down from that. — Roy Moore

The question in life is not whether you get knocked down. You will. The question is, are you ready to get back up ... And fight for what you believe in? — Dan Quayle

I think about lying down. No, that would not do. I crouch by the trunk, my fingers stroking the bark, seeking a Braille code, a clue, a message on how to come back to life after my long undersnow dormancy. I have survived. I am here. Confused, screwed up, but here. So, how can I find my way? Is there a chain saw of the soul, an ax I can take to my memories or fears? I dig my fingers into the dirt and squeeze. A small, clean part of me waits to warm and burst through the surface. Some quiet Melindagirl I haven't seen in months. That is the seed I will care for. — Laurie Halse Anderson

She frowned, thinking of going down there and explaining herself all over again, reliving the horror of finding Mimi's body and trying not to think of how she'd looked when they'd dragged her up and out of the ravine. No sooner had she thought it than she heard Mimi's voice, chastising her over a year ago.

"You hide from life, Catherine. Even when you're in the middle of it, standing toe to toe with all the bad guys you bring in, you manage to keep an emotional distance. I understand why you do it, but ultimately, you're the one who will suffer. You're the one who's going to grow old alone."

Cat blinked back tears, remembering what she'd told her.

I won't be alone, Mimi. I'll always have you.

Obviously she had been wrong. — Sharon Sala

Lee's hand shook as he filled the delicate cups. He drank his down in one gulp. "Don't you see?" he cried. "The American Standard translation orders men to triumph over sin, and you can call sin ignorance. The King James translation makes a promise in 'Thou shalt,' meaning that men will surely triumph over sin. But the Hebrew word, the word timshel - 'Thou mayest' - that gives a choice. It might be the most important word in the world. That says the way is open. That throws it right back on a man. For if 'Thou mayest' - it is also true that 'Thou mayest not.' Don't you see? — John Steinbeck