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November, 2024

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Powerful excerpts from books

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ShoulderSurfer
Posts: 456 - Karma: 12
I will start things off...

A man cannot escape the force
of action by abstaining from actions;
he does not attain success
just by renunciation.

No one exists for even an instant
without performing action;
however unwilling, every being is forced
to act by the qualities of nature.

When his senses are controlled
but he keeps recalling
sense objects with his mind,
he is a self-deluded hypocrite.

When he controls his senses
with his mind and engages in the discipline
of action with his faculties of action,
detachment sets him apart.

Perform necessary action;
it is more powerful than inaction;
without action you even fail
to sustain your own body.

Action imprisons the world
unless it is done as sacrifice;
freed from attachment, Arjuna,
perform action as sacrifice!

Nov 22 2009 3:48PM
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Mr.Panda
Posts: 17711 - Karma: 564
"It's the American public for whom the Iraq War is often no more real than a video game. Five years into this war, I am not always confident most American fully appreciate the caliber of the people fighting for them, the sacrifices they have made, and the sacrifices they continue to make. After the Vietnam War ended, the onus of shame largely fell on the veterans. This time around, if shame is to be had when the Iraq conflict ends-and all indications are there will be plenty of it-the veterans are the last people in America to deserve it. When it comes to apportioning shame my vote goes to the American people who sent them to war in a surge of emotion but quickly lost the will to win it or end it. The young troops I profiled in Generation Kill, as well as the other men and women in uniform I've encountered in combat zones throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, are among the finest people of their generation. We misuse them at our own peril." (pg, 370)
Nov 22 2009 3:50PM
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dmc12380
Posts: 3545 - Karma: 792
Not Ron, Not Hermoine, you Harry, you must do it.
-Albus Dumbledore
Nov 22 2009 3:52PM
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ataraxia
Posts: 903 - Karma: 117
He loved Big Brother
-1984
Nov 22 2009 3:55PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
That's not a HP quote.
Nov 22 2009 3:55PM
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Dosh
Posts: 1818 - Karma: 14
"But that had been grief- this was joy. Yet that grief and this joy were alike beyond the ordinary conditions of life; they were openings as it were, in that ordinary life through which there came glimpses of something sublime. And in the contemplation of this sublime something the soul was exalted to inconceivable heights of which it had before had no conception, while reason lagged behind unable to keep up with it." Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
Nov 22 2009 4:04PM
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k-rob
Posts: 14217 - Karma: 2,891
"By all means continue destroying my possessions. I daresay I have too many." - Albus Dumbledore
Nov 22 2009 4:06PM
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lilwhiz165
Posts: 502 - Karma: 47
im too drunk to taste this chicken-cornel sanders
Nov 22 2009 4:07PM
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doublexl
Posts: 8407 - Karma: 27
get over generation kill, fuck.


Nov 22 2009 4:09PM
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kepler.
Posts: 8761 - Karma: 139
Seconded. Jesus christ it's getting old.
Nov 22 2009 4:12PM
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ShoulderSurfer
Posts: 456 - Karma: 12
this book was brilliant!
Nov 22 2009 4:17PM
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MCIRONCOCK
Posts: 3094 - Karma: 30
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Nov 22 2009 4:24PM
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the.hellion.
Posts: 861 - Karma: 698
'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 - "Though 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 "Though Mayest" - it is also true that "Though mayest not". Don't you see?'

'Yes, I see. I do see. But you do not believe this is divine law. Why do you feel its importance?'

'Ah!' said Lee. 'I've wanted to tell you this for a long time. I even anticipated your questions and I am well prepared. Any writing which has influenced the thinking and lives of innumerable people is important. Now, there are many millions in their sects and Churches who feel the order, "Do thou", and throw their weight into obedience. And there are millions more who feel predestination in the "Thou shalt". nothing they may do can interfere with what will be. But "Thou mayest"! Why, that makes a man great, that gives him stature with the gods, for in his weakness and his filth and his murder of his brother he has still the great choice. He can choose his course and fight it through and win.'


John Steinbeck
pg. 288-289; East of Eden
Nov 22 2009 4:26PM
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juliana.
Posts: 751 - Karma: 12
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
Nov 22 2009 4:26PM
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the.hellion.
Posts: 861 - Karma: 698
fuck my rare use of the word 'thou' - ruined the whole god damned thing.
Nov 22 2009 4:28PM
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Mr.Panda
Posts: 17711 - Karma: 564
Want me to use something else? Fine.


"Finally, this book ought not to be regarded as a protest. Protest arises from a belief that one can change things or influence events. I am not egotistical enough to believe I can. Besides, it no longer seems necessary to register an objection to the war, because the war is over. We lost it, and no amount of objecting will resurrect the men who died, without redeeming anything, on calvaries like Hamburger Hill and the Rockpile.
It might, perhaps, prevent the next generation from being crucified in the next war.
But I don't think so."
Nov 22 2009 4:37PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
"It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities."
Nov 22 2009 4:38PM
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k-rob
Posts: 14217 - Karma: 2,891
"Alas! Ear wax!"
Nov 22 2009 4:40PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
"I would assume that you were going to offer me refreshment, but the evidence so far suggests that that would be optimistic to the point of foolishness."
Nov 22 2009 4:41PM
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k-rob
Posts: 14217 - Karma: 2,891
"He cannot kill you if you are already dead."
Nov 22 2009 4:42PM
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MN_Nice
Posts: 3824 - Karma: 56
I killed a man. He had a wife and kids. I slept peacefully that night.
Nov 22 2009 4:42PM
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MCIRONCOCK
Posts: 3094 - Karma: 30
"To the well organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."
Nov 22 2009 4:43PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
"We must try not to sink beneath our anguish, Harry, but battle on."
Nov 22 2009 4:43PM
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k-rob
Posts: 14217 - Karma: 2,891
"I take my hat off to you...or I would, if I were not afraid of showering you with spiders."
Nov 22 2009 4:45PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
"Don't count your owls before they are delivered."
Nov 22 2009 4:46PM
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ElbridgeGerry
Posts: 5902 - Karma: -27
" Eh Bien, mon prince, so Genoa and Lucca are now no more than family estates of the Bonapartes. No, I warn you, if you don't say that this means war, if you still permit yourself to condone all the infamies, all the atrocities, of this Antichrist- and that's what I really believe he is- I will have nothing more to do with you, you are no longer my friend, my faithful slave, as you say. But how do you do, how do you do? I see that I am frightening you. Sit down and tell me all about it"



Anna Scherer

War and Peace- Leo Tolstoy
Nov 22 2009 4:46PM
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user098123
Posts: 6072 - Karma: 18
Click for larger image
Nov 22 2009 4:47PM
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k-rob
Posts: 14217 - Karma: 2,891
"I do love knitting patterns."
Nov 22 2009 4:47PM
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LMPJibbin
Posts: 1607 - Karma: 17
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         \/
Nov 22 2009 4:57PM
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ElbridgeGerry
Posts: 5902 - Karma: -27
You uncultured Baboon!
Nov 22 2009 4:59PM
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Number_9
Posts: 429 - Karma: 8
"Oft hope is born, when all is forlorn" - J.R.R. Tolkien
Nov 22 2009 6:36PM
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TheButterHashira
Posts: 9691 - Karma: 1,702
Click for larger image


That is an illustration someone made for the part in the book "candide" when candide and cacambo meet a slave in south america. He lost his hand and told them of his hardships and said "this is the price you pay to eat sugar in Europe".

Fucking deep.


Nov 22 2009 6:41PM
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Clevinger
Posts: 394 - Karma: 8
”I often wonder whether any of the others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool” (Norton 2462)
Nov 22 2009 6:50PM
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GayWolf420
Posts: 37513 - Karma: 121,358
"i do not like these green eggs and ham"- Dr. Seuss.

such powerful, moving shit right there
Nov 22 2009 6:53PM
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ShoulderSurfer
Posts: 456 - Karma: 12
this book sounds interesting
Nov 22 2009 7:06PM
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MN_Nice
Posts: 3824 - Karma: 56
Agreed. Changed my years in elementary school.
Nov 22 2009 10:22PM
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skiminnesota
Posts: 9093 - Karma: 429
  • So you think that money is the root of all evil? Have you ever asked what is the root of money? Money is a tool of exchange, which can't exist unless there are goods produced and men able to produce them. Money is the material shape of the principle that men who wish to deal with one another must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of the moochers, who claim your product by tears or of the looters, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men who produce. Is this what you consider evil?Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason.

“The source of man’s rights is not divine law or congressional law, but the law of identity. A is A—and Man is Man. Rights are conditions of existence required by man’s nature for his proper survival. If man is to live on earth, it is right for him to use his mind, it is right to act on his own free judgment, it is right to work for his values and to keep the product of his work. If life on earth is his purpose, he has a right to live as a rational being: nature forbids him the irrational.”


ill give whomever can name the book a cookie. be honest, you could google it. however im hoping someone gets it without teh googlz
Nov 22 2009 11:12PM
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ECfreeski3
Posts: 12019 - Karma: 126
okay buddy i think it's time you read a second book. christ
Nov 22 2009 11:27PM
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Mr.Panda
Posts: 17711 - Karma: 564
Click for larger image

I am in the middle of Black Hawk Down and Call of Duty(autobiography of Lynn "Buck" Compton, one of the guys from Band of Brothers)
Nov 22 2009 11:29PM
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Mr.Panda
Posts: 17711 - Karma: 564
Forgot to say, click the picture.
Nov 22 2009 11:30PM
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kepler.
Posts: 8761 - Karma: 139
How can I be the only person who thinks you're a douche?

And that was rhetorical. In case you were getting ready to beat off to another post whoring session.
Nov 22 2009 11:34PM
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MCIRONCOCK
Posts: 3094 - Karma: 30
dun b so hard on teh panda :(
Nov 22 2009 11:35PM
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yellav
Posts: 10056 - Karma: 1,217
"For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons."
Nov 22 2009 11:37PM
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ECfreeski3
Posts: 12019 - Karma: 126
this kid is such a clown i have no idea
Nov 22 2009 11:39PM
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Mr.Panda
Posts: 17711 - Karma: 564
OOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

People making fun of me over the internet, I think I am going to go cut myself now in the corner.
Nov 22 2009 11:54PM
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low_fidelity
Posts: 2673 - Karma: 118
""To hell with reality! I want to die in music, not in reason or in prose. People don't deserve the restraint we show by not going into delirium in front of them. To hell with them!""


Nov 22 2009 11:56PM
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lilwhiz165
Posts: 502 - Karma: 47
"franklin could count by two's and tie his shoes, but he did not know how to be a good friend" or something like that
Nov 23 2009 11:59AM
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Armanzoid
Posts: 2453 - Karma: 26
"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to always tell the difference." - Slaughterhouse V
Nov 23 2009 12:03PM
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Big5hifty
Posts: 3243 - Karma: 1,253
im not going to quote it but in the book Brave New World the last couple chapter talk about some interesting points like people can choose truth or happiness thing of that nature... makes you think
Nov 23 2009 12:13PM
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ElbridgeGerry
Posts: 5902 - Karma: -27
No, seriously Greg. Either join the military or STFU and GTFO. I don't care if your eyes suck, get lasik. I don't care if you're fat, get in shape. Either join the military or stop posting random SHIT!
Nov 24 2009 5:52PM
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