“How is clean, painless nonexistence any worse than clean, painless death?”

—  Orson Scott Card , book Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus

Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus (1996)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update May 22, 2020. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "How is clean, painless nonexistence any worse than clean, painless death?" by Orson Scott Card?
Orson Scott Card photo
Orson Scott Card 586
American science fiction novelist 1951

Related quotes

W. S. Gilbert photo

“When your process of extermination begins, let our deaths be as swift and painless as you can conveniently make them.”

W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) English librettist of the Gilbert & Sullivan duo

The Pirates of Penzance (1879)

T. E. Lawrence photo

“the sword also means clean-ness + death”

T. E. Lawrence book Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Motto on the cover of the first edition.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (1922)

Rick Riordan photo

“Let's have a good clean three-legged death race.”

Rick Riordan book The Hidden Oracle

Source: The Hidden Oracle

Temple Grandin photo

“I think using animals for food is an ethical thing to do, but we've got to do it right. We've got to give those animals a decent life and we've got to give them a painless death. We owe the animal respect.”

Temple Grandin (1947) USA-american doctor of animal science, author, and autism activist
Dana Gioia photo

“My blessed California, you are so wise.
You render death abstract, efficient, clean.
Your afterlife is only real estate,
And in his kingdom Death must stay unseen.”

Dana Gioia (1950) American writer

"A California Requiem"
Poetry, Interrogations at Noon (2001)

Hildegard of Bingen photo

“O dawn, you washed them away
in a woman who was clean.
O form of woman, sister of Wisdom,
how great is your glory!
For in you there rose a life unquenchable
that death shall never stifle.
Wisdom exalted you to make
all creatures fairer in your beauty
than they were when the world was born.”

Hildegard of Bingen (1098–1179) Medieval saint, prophetise, mystic and Doctor of Church

Ad Vitam S. Ruperti Epilogus 6, Pitra 364.

Cassandra Clare photo

“There are so many worse things than death. Not to be loved or not to be able to love: that is worse.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Princess

Source: Clockwork Princess

Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves?”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

Sec. 125
The Gay Science (1882)
Context: God is dead! God remains dead! And we have killed him. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?

William Cowper photo

“Absence from whom we love is worse than death,
And frustrate hope severer than despair.”

William Cowper (1731–1800) (1731–1800) English poet and hymnodist

"Hope, like the short-lived ray that gleams awhile", line 35.

Related topics