Poul Anderson quotes - page 4

Life was too short for anything but amusement at the human race. (Poul Anderson)
There really wasn't much in a man's life that mattered. But those few things mattered terribly. View quote
Poul Anderson
Do you know,” said Maclaren, "there is one sin which is punished with unfailing certainty, and must therefore be the deadliest sin in all time. Stupidity. View quote
Poul Anderson
His conscience must have gotten tired of nagging him and delivered an ultimatum. View quote
Poul Anderson
I do not think the coerced mind ever really learns an art. View quote
Poul Anderson
My mother taught me a Spanish saying,” he remarked, "that it takes four men to make a salad: a spendthrift for the oil, a philosopher for the seasonings, a miser for the vinegar, and a madman for the tossing. View quote
Poul Anderson
You can have more adventure in an hour's walk through a forest than in a year on a spaceship. View quote
Poul Anderson
We must understand that what Pascal said is true of every human being in the whole of space-time, ourselves included-"The last act is tragic, however pleasant all the comedy of the other acts. A little earth on our heads, and all is done with forever.”-understand it in our bones, so that we can live with it calmly if not serenely. View quote
Poul Anderson
One man, one vote: A legal doctrine requiring that, from time to time, old gerrymanders be replaced with new ones. The object of this is the achievement of genuine democracy. View quote
Poul Anderson
Her rank was higher than his, so high that no one in her family worked productively. View quote
Poul Anderson
Hard to say whether personal immortality would be a good thing or not. Not for the masses, surely! Too many of them as it was. But a select few, like Terangi Maclaren-or was it worth the trouble? Even given boats, chess, music, the No Drama, beautiful women and beautiful spectroscopes, life could get heavy. (Poul Anderson)
I'm afraid I'm not a convert or anything. I still see the same blind cosmos governed by the same blind laws. But suddenly it matters. It matters terribly, and means something. What, I haven't figured out yet. I probably never will. But I have a reason for living, or for dying if need be. Maybe that's the whole purpose of life: purpose itself. I can't say. But I expect to enjoy the world a lot more. View quote
Poul Anderson
Better a life like a falling star, bright across the dark, than a deathlessness which can see naught above or beyond itself. View quote
Poul Anderson
Keep on thinking. Keep your thinking close to the ground, where it belongs. Don't ever trade your liberty for another man's offer to do your thinking and make your mistakes for you. View quote
Poul Anderson
He was no respecter of windy theories about inborn racial traits, but there was something to be said for traditions so ancient as to be unconscious and ineradicable. View quote
Poul Anderson
I'll give you one thing to mull over, though. If the body's such a valueless piece of pork, and we'll all meet each other in the sweet bye and bye, and so on, why're you busting every gut you own to get back to your wife? View quote
Poul Anderson
You are very honest about the situation of your own country.” Deirdre said roughly, "Most of us won't admit it, but I think it best to look truth in the eyes. View quote
Poul Anderson
For a space he faltered, when Goltan fell with a spear through him. "Now I am one friend poorer,” he said, "and that is a wealth not gained back.”. View quote
Poul Anderson
Inland, all except criminals lived in a tightly pulled net of regulations, duties, social standing, tax collection, expectations of how to act and speak and think-"sort of like late twentieth-century USA” Everard grumbled to himself. View quote
Poul Anderson
Silence fell. The clock on my mantel ticked aloud and the wind outside flowed past like a river. View quote
Poul Anderson
A cultured, sensitive, observant man is a pleasure to be with in any age. (Poul Anderson)
The universe held as many surprises as it did stars. No, more. That was its glory. But someday one of them was bound to kill you. View quote
Poul Anderson
What's the point of our living all these centuries if we haven't grown up even a little? View quote
Poul Anderson
Before the spirit could seek into it, the mind must. She studied the tensor equations as once she studied the sutras, she meditated upon the koans of science, and at last she began to feel her oneness with all that was, and in the vision find peace. View quote
Poul Anderson
I don't pretend to understand what the physicists mean by time, but for people, it isn't so-and-so many measured units; it's events, experiences. A man who crowds his life and dies young has lived longer than one who got old sitting in tame sameness. View quote
Poul Anderson