Cormac McCarthy: Thing

“You know that the things you put it your head stay there, right?'
'Yeah. But you remember some things, don't you?'
'Yeah. You remember the things you want to forget and forget the things you want to remember.”

“It is supposed to be true that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it. I don’t believe knowing can save us. What is constant in history is greed and foolishness and a love of blood, and this is a thing that even God—who knows all that can be known—seems powerless to change.”

“Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said. You might want to think about that.
You forget some things, dont you?
Yes. You forget what you want to remember and you remember what you want to forget.”

“Between the wish and the thing the world lies waiting.”

“What's the bravest thing you ever did?
He spat in the road a bloody phlegm. Getting up this morning, he said.”

“If trouble comes when you least expect it then maybe the thing to do is to always expect it.”

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”

“Perhaps in the world's destruction it would be possible at last to see how it was made. Oceans, mountains. The ponderous counterspectacle of things ceasing to be. The sweeping waste, hydroptic and coldly secular. The silence.”

“People complain about the bad things that happen to em that they don't deserve but they seldom mention the good. About what they done to deserve them things. I don't recall that I ever give the good Lord all that much cause to smile on me. But he did.”

“But there are no absolutes in human misery and things can always get worse”

“Probably I dont believe in a lot of things that I used to believe in but that doesnt mean I dont believe in anything.”

“Just remember that the things you put into your head are there forever, he said.”

“All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”

“If there's one thing on this planet you don't look like it's a bunch of good luck walkin around.”

“I tried to put things in perspective but sometimes you're just too close to it.”

“I have no enemies. I dont permit such a thing.”

“The things that I loved were very frail. Very fragile. I didn't know that. I thought they were indestructible. They weren't.”

“Things happen to you they happen. They dont ask first. They dont require your permission.”

“Ever dumb thing I ever done in my life there was a decision I made before that got me into it. It was never the dumb thing. It was always some choice I'd made before it.”