Boule de Suif (1880)
Context: The same thing happens whenever the established order of things is upset, when security no longer exists, when all those rights usually protected by the law of man or of Nature are at the mercy of unreasoning, savage force. The earthquake crushing a whole nation under falling roofs; the flood let loose, and engulfing in its swirling depths the corpses of drowned peasants, along with dead oxen and beams torn from shattered houses; or the army, covered with glory, murdering those who defend themselves, making prisoners of the rest, pillaging in the name of the Sword, and giving thanks to God to the thunder of cannon — all these are appalling scourges, which destroy all belief in eternal justice, all that confidence we have been taught to feel in the protection of Heaven and the reason of man.
Source: Some Assembly Required: A Journal of My Son's First Son
Source: The Natural and Artificial Right of Property Contrasted (1832), p. 53
Source: 1960s, Jours effeuillés: Poèmes, essaies, souvenirs (1966), p. 183
Context: I wanted to find another order, another value for man in nature. He should no longer be the measure of all things, nor should everything be compared with him, but, on the contrary, all things, and man as well, should be like nature, without measure. I wanted to create new appearances, to extract new forms from man. This is made clear in my objects from 1917.
“When a thing defies physical law, there's usually politics involved.”
All the Trouble in the World (1994)
Source: Journey Beyond Tomorrow (1962), Chapter 16 “The End of the Journey” (p. 152)
Comment to his staff officers, on the crucial distinction between intensive battle training and actual battle (19 May 1943), quoted in History of COSSAC (May 1944) http://www.history.army.mil/documents/cossac/Cossac.htm by Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force
“All those little maneuvers I did out of things that were happening in my life that upset me.”
Edie : American Girl (1982)
Context: I made a mask out of my face because I didn't realize I was quite beautiful. God blessed me so. I practically destroyed it. I had to wear heavy black eyelashes like bat wings, and dark lines under my eyes, and cut all my hair off, my long dark hair. Cut it off and strip it silver and blonde. All those little maneuvers I did out of things that were happening in my life that upset me.
“The right thing to do and the hard thing to do are usually the same thing.”
Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 61
