Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 114
“O Lord Most High, Creator of the Cosmos, Spinner of Galaxies, Soul of Electromagnetic Waves, Inhaler and Exhaler of Inconceivable Vacuum, Spitter of Fire and Rock, Trifler with Millennia—what could we do for Thee that Thou couldst not do for Thyself one octillion times better? Nothing. What could we do or say that could possibly interest Thee? Nothing. Oh, Mankind, rejoice in the apathy of our Creator, for it makes us free and truthful and dignified at last. No longer can a fool like Malachi Constant point to a ridiculous accident of good luck and say, ‘Somebody up there likes me.’ And no longer can a tyrant say, ‘God wants this or that to happen, and anybody who doesn’t help this or that to happen is against God.’ O Lord Most High, what a glorious weapon is Thy Apathy, for we have unsheathed it, have thrust and slashed mightily with it, and the claptrap that has so often enslaved us or driven us into the madhouse lies slain!”
Source: The Sirens of Titan (1959), Chapter 10 “An Age of Miracles” (p. 215; epigram)
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Kurt Vonnegut 318
American writer 1922–2007Related quotes
Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), pp. 58-59
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 323.
Holly looks at him blankly. Freddy says, “Jones…you’re still new here People suggest ways to improve the company every day. Their ideas go into the suggestion box in the cafeteria—where the cafeteria was, I mean—and they’re never heard from again, except during all-staff meetings when Senior Management picks out the most useless one and announces a cross-functional team to look into it. A year or two later, when everyone’s forgotten about it, we get an e-mail announcing the implementation of something that bears no resemblance to the initial idea and usually has the opposite effect, and in the annual reports this is used as evidence that the company listens and reacts to its workers. That’s what happens when you try to make Zephyr a better place to work.”
Q4/2: November, pp. 208-209
Company (2006)
2010s, Speech at the Republican National Convention (July 20, 2016)
“O Lord! thou knowest how busy I must be this day: if I forget thee, do not thou forget me.”
Prayer before the Battle of Edgehill (1642), quoted by Sir Philip Warwick, Memoires, 1701.
Source: * Hastings ** Max ** 1986 ** The Oxford Book of Military Anecdotes ** Oxford University Press ** United States ** 78-0-19-520528-2 ** 118 https://books.google.com/books?id=1_fwo9-URNEC&pg=PA118 citing C.V. Wedgwood
Part II, section iv, stanza 3
Maud; A Monodrama (1855)
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 197.
1850s, The House Divided speech (1858)
Context: If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. We are now far into the fifth year, since a policy was initiated, with the avowed object, and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under the operation of that policy, that agitation has not only, not ceased, but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease, until a crisis shall have been reached, and passed.