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Humanity Does Not Ask To Be Happy.it Merely Asks Us To Be Brilliant On Its Behalf. Survival First, And Then Happiness As We Can Manage It... Take What Pleasure You Can In The Interstices Of Your Work, , But Your Work Is First, Learning First, Winning Is Everything Because Without It There Is Nothing.

-Orson Scott Card

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Humanity Does Not Ask

Orson Scott Card

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Humanity Does Not Ask To Be Happy.it Merely Asks Us To Be Brilliant On Its Behalf. Survival First, And Then Happiness As We Can Manage It... Take What Pleasure You Can In The Interstices Of Your Work, , But Your Work Is First, Learning First, Winning Is Everything Because Without It There Is Nothing.

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Make Friends. Be A Leader. Kiss Butts If You Have To, But If The Other Guys Despise You-you Know What I Mean?

Your Dream Is A Good One. [. . .] The Desire That Is The Very Root Of Life Itself: To Grow Until All The Space You Can See Is Part Of You, Under Your Control. It's The Desire For Greatness.

Oh, Val," Said Father. "all You Have To Do Is Live Your Life, And Everyone Around You Will Be Happier." "no Greatness, Then." "val," Said Mother, "goodness Trumps Greatness Any Day." "not In The History Books," Said Valentine. "then The Wrong People Are Writing History, Aren't They?" Said Father.

In All My Study Of History, I Have Never Found A Time Or Place I Would Rather Have Lived Than Now.

I Always Tell What I Believe. Whether It's True, I'm No More Sure Than Any Man.

Early To Bed And Early To Rise," Mazer Intoned, "makes A Man Stupid And Blind In The Eyes.

We Care About Moral Issues, Nobility, Decency, Happiness, Goodness—the Issues That Matter In The Real World, But Which Can Only Be Addressed, In Their Purity, In Fiction.

Civilisation Is Only A Pretense. In Crisis We Have Become Mere Apes Again, Forgetting The Rational Biped Of Our Pretensions And Instead Becoming The Hairy Primate At The Mouth Of The Cave, Screeching At The Enemy Wishing It Would Go Away, Fingering The Heavy Stone We Will Use The Moment It Comes Close Enough

There Were Crimes And Quarrels, Alongside Kindness And Cooperation; There Were People Who Loved Each Other And People Who Did Not; It Was A Human World.

That's What So Many People Didn't Understand About Life. The Real World Is The One Within The Walls Of Homes; The Outside World, Of Careers And Politics And Money And Fame, That Was The Fake World, Where Nothing Lasted, And Things Were Real Only To The Extent They Harmed Or Helped People Inside Their Homes.

Regardless Of Law, Marriage Has Only One Definition, And Any Government That Attempts To Change It Is My Mortal Enemy. I Will Act To Destroy That Government And Bring It Down.

Debased Men, But They All Had Something In Common: They Showed A Keen Regard For Virtue, And Tried To Dress Themselves In That Costume. Hypocrisy, For All Its Bad Reputation, At Least Showed A Decent Respect For Goodness.

Miro, I'm So Sorry. I Always Felt Such Pity For You Humans Because You Could Only Think Of One Thing At A Time And Your Memories Were So Imperfect And . . . Now I Realize That Just Getting Through The Day Without Killing Somebody Can Be An Achievement." It Gets To Be A Habit. Most Of Us Manage To Keep Our Body Count Quite Low. It's The Neighborly Way To Live.

I Think That Most Of Us, Anyway, Read These Stories That We Know Are Not "true" Because We're Hungry For Another Kind Of Truth: The Mythic Truth About Human Nature In General, The Particular Truth About Those Life-communities That Define Our Own Identity, And The Most Specific Truth Of All: Our Own Self-story. Fiction, Because It Is Not About Someone Who Lived In The Real World, Always Has The Possibility Of Being About Oneself. --from The Introduction

I Don't Care If I Pass Your Test, I Don't Care If I Follow Your Rules. If You Can Cheat, So Can I. I Won't Let You Beat Me Unfairly - I'll Beat You Unfairly First. - Ender

To Expect Wickedness From Human Beings Is The Best Way I Know Of To Avoid Surprises. And When I Am Surprised, It's Always Pleasantly.

The Criminal Misuse Of Time Was Pointing Out The Mistakes. Catching Them―noticing Them―that Was Essential. If You Did Not In Your Own Mind Distinguish Between Useful And Erroneous Information, Then You Were Not Learning At All, You Were Merely Replacing Ignorance With False Belief, Which Was No Improvement. The Part Of The Man's Statement That Was True, However, Was About The Uselessness Of Speaking Up. If I Know That The Teacher Is Wrong, And Say Nothing, Then I Remain The Only One Who Knows, And That Gives Me An Advantage Over Those Who Believe The Teacher.

No Human Being, When You Understand His Desires, Is Worthless. No One's Life Is Nothing. Even The Most Evil Of Men And Women, If You Understand Their Hearts, Had Some Generous Act That Redeems Them, At Least A Little, From Their Sins.

And If You're Going To Criticize Me For Not Finishing The Whole Thing And Tying It Up In A Bow For You, Why, Do Us Both A Favor And Write Your Own Damn Book, Only Have The Decency To Call It A Romance Instead Of A History, Because History's Got No Bows On It, Only Frayed Ends Of Ribbons And Knots That Can't Be Untied. It Ain't A Pretty Package, But Then It's Not Your Birthday That I Know Of So I'm Under No Obligation To Give You A Gift.

My Own Feeling Is That Human Happiness Is A Very Random Thing, And Bestows Itself Willy-nilly, And There's Not Much Deserving About The Matter.

If You Try And Lose Then It Isn't Your Fault. But If You Don't Try And We Lose, Then It's All Your Fault.

Motivational Work

Folks Always Seemed To Think That As Long As They Didn't Know About Something Bad, It Wasn't Happening, So Whoever Told Them Actually Caused It To Be True.

Ah, I Am The Judge Of Dreams, And You Are The Judge Of Love. Well, I Find You Guilty Of Dreaming Good Dreams, And Sentence You To A Lifetime Of Working And Suffering For The Sake Of Your Dreams. I Only Hope That Someday You Won't Declare Me Innocent Of The Crime Of Loving You.

Reasonable Argument Is Impossible When Authority Becomes The Arbiter.

Maybe That's All Demons Ever Are. People Like Us, Doing Things Without Even Knowing What We're Doing.

It's The Middle Class That Feels The Luxury Of Being Able To Have Causes.

What You Are Is A Man Who Means To Be Good, And Undo The Bad He's Done, And That's As Good As Any Man Ever Gets.

When You Really Know Someone, You Can't Hate Him.

I Be Crazy Too, Little Buddy, But At Least When I Be Craziest, I Be Floating All Alone In Space And The Crazy, She Float Out Of Me, She Soak Into The Walls, And She Don't Come Out Till There Be Battles And Little Boys Bump Into The Walls And Squish Out De Crazy.

Do Not Shout At Me, Mr. Quill," Said John [adams]. "justice May Be Blind, But She Is Not Deaf.

In Order To Learn, One Must Change One's Mind.

Metaphors Have A Way Of Holding The Most Truth In The Least Space.

The First Of A Thousand Lies. Truth Flowed To Micah Quill, Was Sucked In And Disappeared, And Emerged Again Looking Ever So Much Like It Used To, But Changed Subtly, At The Edges, Where None Would Notice, So That Simple Truth Became A Complicated Fabric Indeed, One That Could Wrap You Up So Tightly And Close You Off From The Air Until You Suffocated In It.

Sometimes Good People Have To Do Terrible Things.

The Ways Of Love Are Strange And Hard: The Love You Want Is Always Barred; The Love You Have You Want To Change. The Ways Of Love Are Hard And Strange.

But The Truth Is That No Person Ever Understands Another, From Beginning To End Of Life, There Is No Truth That Can Be Known, Only The Story We Imagine To Be True, The Story They Really Believe To Be True About Themselves; And All Of Them Lies.

Sickness And Healing Are In Every Heart; Death And Deliverance In Every Hand.

And Then He Thought: Is This How Idiots Rationalize Their Stupidity To Themselves?

No Matter How Sexually Attracted A Man Might Be Toward Other Men, Or A Woman Toward Other Women, And No Matter How Close The Bonds Of Affection And Friendship Might Be Within Same-sex Couples, There Is No Act Of Court Or Congress That Can Make These Relationships The Same As The Coupling Between A Man And A Woman.

The Commercial Work Of Today Is The Classics Of Tomorrow.

In A Way She Actually Preferred Peter To Other People Because Of This. He Always Acted Out Of Intelligent Self-interest.

The Tribe Is Whatever We Believe It Is. If We Say The Tribe Is All The Little Ones In The Forest, And All The Trees, Then That Is What The Tribe Is. Even Though Some Of The Oldest Trees Here Came From Warriors Of Two Different Tribes, Fallen In Battle. We Become One Tribe Because We Say We're One Tribe." Ender Marveled At His Mind, This Small Raman [member Of Another Sentient Species]. How Few Humans Were Able To Grasp This Idea, Or Let It Extend Beyond The Narrow Confines Of Their Tribe, Their Family, Their Nation.

The Problem With Elections Is That Anybody Who Wants An Office Badly Enough To Run For It Probably Shouldn’t Have It. And Anybody Who Does Not Want An Office Badly Enough To Run For It Probably Shouldn’t Have It, Either. Government Office Should Be Received Like A Child’s Christmas Present, With Surprise And Delight. Instead It Is Usually Received Like A Diploma, An Anticlimax That Never Seems Worth The Struggle To Earn It.

Once You Have The Gallows, You'll Find New Reasons To Hang People From It.

My College Training Was Primarily In Theatre, With An Eye To Becoming A Director, Actor, Or Producer.

Your Trust In Rationality Makes You Irrational.

The Buggers Have Finally, Finally Learned That We Humans Value Each And Every Individual Human Life. But They've Learned This Lesson Just In Time For It To Be Hopelessly Wrong — For We Humans Do, When The Cause Is Sufficient, Spend Our Own Lives. We Throw Ourselves Onto The Grenade To Save Our Buddies In The Foxhole. We Rise Out Of The Trenches And Charge The Entrenched Enemy And Die Like Maggots Under A Blowtorch. We Strap Bombs On Our Bodies And Blow Ourselves Up In The Midst Of Our Enemies. We Are, When The Cause Is Sufficient, Insane.

In Creating The Strange Milieu In Which Your Story Takes Place, You Must First Understand As Well As You Possibly Can The Familiar Milieu In Which Your Own Life Is Taking Place. Until You Have Examined And Comprehended The World Around You, You Can't Possibly Create A Complex And Believable Imaginary World.

The Only Way To Retrieve A Secret,once Known, Is To Replace It With A Lie.

If You Did Not In Your Own Mind Distinguish Between Useful And Erroneous Information, Then You Were Not Learning At All, You Were Merely Replacing Ignorance With False Belief, Which Was No Improvement.

"we've Devoted Our Lives To Learning About Them!" Miro Said. Ender Stopped. "not From Them."

I Own The Whole World, And Folks Haven't Been Keeping Up Too Well On The Payments.

I'm Not Stupid!" In Bean's Experience, That Was A Sentence Never Uttered Except To Prove Its Own Inaccuracy.

I've Watched Through His Eyes, I've Listened Through His Ears, And I Tell You He's The One.

The Funny Thing Was, You See, That Mike Fink Didn't Think Of Himself As A Murderer. He Thought Of Life As A Contest, And Dying Was What Happened To Those Who Came Out Second Best, But It Wasn't The Same As Murder, It Was A Fair Fight.

History Is An Omlette. The Eggs Are Already Broken.

An Enemy, Ender Wiggin," Whispered The Old Man. "i Am Your Enemy, The First One You've Ever Had Who Was Smarter Than You. There Is No Teacher But The Enemy. No One But The Enemy Will Tell You What The Enemy Is Going To Do. No One But The Enemy Will Ever Teach You How To Destroy And Conquer. Only The Enemy Shows You Where You Are Weak. Only The Enemy Tells You Where He Is Strong. And The Rules Of The Game Are What You Can Do To Him And What You Can Stop Him From Doing To You. I Am Your Enemy From Now On. From Now On I Am Your Teacher.

Does It Help If We're So Strong-willed, Stubborn, Ambitious, And Selfish That We Always Overcome Everything In Our Way No Matter What?" Asked Wang-mu. "i Think Those Are The Pertinent Virtues, Yes," Said Peter. "then Let's Do It. That's Us In Spades.

Before We Are Citizens, We Are Children, And It Is As Children That We Come To Understand Freedom And Authority, Liberty And Duty.

A Man Who Can't Read Only Knows What Other Folks Tell Him.

The Only People Who Think Children Are Carefree Are The Ones Who've Forgotten Their Own Childhood.

Nobody Ever Completely Means What They Say. Even When They Think They're Telling The Truth, There's Always Something Hidden Behind Their Words.

Telling The Truth

Peace. That's What Salaam Means. Peace Unto You." The Words Brought Forth An Echo From Ender's Memory. His Mother's Voice Reading To Him Softly, When He Was Very Young. ... The Kiss, The Word, The Peace Were With Him Still. I Am Only What I Remember, And Alai Is My Friend In A Memory So Intense That They Can't Tear Him Out. Like Valentine, The Strongest Memory Of All.

He’d Undone All He Could. You Can Be Sorry, And You Can Be Forgiven, But You Can’t Call Back The Futures That Your Bad Decisions Lost

I'm Crazy," Said Ender. "but I Think I'm Ok.

Personal Affection Is A Luxury You Can Have Only After All Your Enemies Are Eliminated. Until Then, Everyone You Love Is A Hostage, Sapping Your Courage And Corrupting Your Judgment.

I'll Have That Someday, Thought Peter. Someone Who'll Kiss Me Good-bye At The Door. Or Maybe Just Someone To Put A Blindfold Over My Head Before They Shoot Me. Depending On How Things Turn Out.

Unemployment Is Capitalism's Way Of Getting You To Plant A Garden.

It Just Gripes Me Hollow, The Way God Always Sneaks In To Take The Credit.

Firequencher Raised His Hand. "i've Been Staying Out Of Family Conversations. Do I Get Credit For That?

I Also Remembered That You Were Beautiful." "memory Does Play Tricks On Us." "no. Your Face Is The Same, But I Don't Remember What Beautiful Means Anymore.

That Is The Earth, He Thought. Not A Globe Thousands Of Kilometers Around, But A Forest With A Shining Lake, A House Hidden At The Crest Of A Hill, High In The Trees, A Grassy Slope Leading Upwards From The Water, Fish Leaping And Birds Strafing To Take The Bugs That Lived At The Border Between Water And Sky. Earth Was The Constant Noise Of Crickets, And Winds, And Birds

Sometimes Happiness Consists Of Finding The Right Balance Of Misery.

Some Men Are Great Enough That They Can Love A Whole Woman, And Not Just Part Of Her.

So You Love Me," Said Petra Softly When The Kiss Ended. I'm A Raging Mass Of Hormones Thet I'm Too Young To Understand," Said Bean. "you're A Female Of A Closely Related Species. According To All The Best Primatologists, I Really Have No Choice." That's Nice," She Said.

It Is The Downfall Of Evil, That It Never Sees Far Enough Ahead.

Home Is Anywhere That You Know All Your Friends And All Your Enemies.

It's Easy To Manipulate Your Children When They're Absolutely Sure You're Stupid.

You Understand That The Piggies Are Animals, And You No More Condemn Them For Murdering Libo And Pipo Than You Condemn A Cabra For Shewing Up Capim." That's Right," Said Miro. Ender Smiled. "and That's Why You'll Never Learn Anything From Them. Because You Think Of Them As Animals.

Ender Stepped Under The Water And Rinsed Himself, Took The Sweat Of Combat And Let It Run Down The Drain. All Gone, Except They Recycled It And We'll Be Drinking Bonzo's Blood Water In The Morning. All The Life Gone Out Of It, But His Blood Just The Same, His Blood And My Sweat, Washed Down In Their Stupidity Or Cruelty Or Whatever It Was That Made Them Let It Happen.

Perhaps You Don't Desire Poetry As Much As You Would Like To Have My Torchy Knowledge Of Your Possible Futures, But I Dare Say Poetry Will Do You Far More Good. For Knowing The Future Only Makes You Timid And Complacent By Turns, While Poetry Can Shape You Into The Kind Of Souls Who Can Face Any Future With Boldness And Wisdom And Nobility, So That You Need Not Know The Future At All, So That Any Future Will Be An Opportunity For Greatness, If You Have Greatness In You.

Fiction, Because It Is Not About Somebody Who Actually Lived In The Real World, Always Has The Possibility Of Being About Oneself.

Humans Invent An Imaginary Lover And Put That Mask Over The Face Of The Body In Their Bed. That Is The Tragedy Of Language My Friend. Those Who Know Each Other Only Through Symbolic Representations Are Forced To Imagine Each Other. And Because Their Imagination Is Imperfect, They Are Often Wrong.

Someone's Sent A Loving Note In Lines Of Returning Geese And As The Moon Fills My Western Chamber As Petals Dance Over The Flowing Stream Again I Think Of You The Two Of Us Living A Sadness Apart A Hurt That Can't Be Removed Yet When My Gaze Comes Down My Heart Stays Up

No Human Being, When You Understand His Desires, Is Worthless. No One's Life Is Nothing.

Whether He Likes It Or Not, [he] Cannot Remain Incognito Forever. He Has Outraged Too Many Wise Men And Pleased Too Many Fools To Hide Behind His Too-appropriate Order To Assume Leadership Of The Forces Of Stupidity He Has Marshalled, Or His Enemies Will Unmask Him In Order To Better Understand The Disease That Has Produced Such A Warped And Twisted Mind.

If A Pig Goes Upon The Threshing-floor, Or A Field, Or A Garden, And The Owner Of The Meadow, Or The Field, Or The Garden Smites It So That It Die, He Shall Give It Back To Its Owner; But If He Does Not Give It Back, He Becomes A Thief.

The Lives Of All People Flow Through Time, And, Regardless Of How Brutal One Moment May Be, How Filled With Grief Or Pain Or Fear, Time Flows Through All Lives Equally.

The Future Is A Hundred Thousand Threads, But The Past Is A Fabric That Can Never Be Rewoven.

Dona Crista Laughed A Bit. "oh, Pip, I'd Be Glad For You To Try. But Do Believe Me, My Dear Friend, Touching Her Heart Is Like Bathing In Ice." I Imagine. I Imagine It Feels Like Bathing In Ice To The Person Touching Her. But How Does It Feel To Her? Cold As She Is, It Must Surely Burn Like Fire.

You Who Speak Languages, You Are Such Liars.

I Fell Into Playwriting Accidentally, Took Some Classes In It, And Also Took Creative Writing Classes, But I Really Didn't Expect It To Be A Career Because I Didn't Believe There Was A Way To Make Money As A Playwright Without Being Lucky And I Didn't Feel Particularly Lucky.

Nature Can't Evolve A Species That Hasn't The Will To Survive. Individuals Might Be Bred To Sacrifice Themselves, But The Race As A Whole Can Never Cease To Exist.

Will To Survive

Love Is Random; Fear Is Inevitable.

When Both Parties Are Lying And They Both Know The Other Party's Lying, It Comes Powerful Close To Being The Same Thing As Telling The Truth.

Science Fiction Has Rivets, Fantasy Has Trees.

And Enough For Me That When My Hand Touched Your Shoulder, You Leaned On Me; And When You Felt Me Slip Away, You Called My Name.

Being Young Is An 18 Year Prison Sentence For A Crime Your Parents Committed. But You Do Get Time Off For Good Behavior.

Someday Stars Will Wind Down Or Blow Up. Someday Death Will Cover Us All Like The Water Of A Lake And Perhaps Nothing Will Ever Come To The Surface To Show That We Were Ever There. But We Were There, And During The Time We Lived, We Were Alive. That's The Truth - What Is, What Was, What Will Be - Not What Could Be, What Should Have Been, What Never Can Be.

Because Never In My Entire Childhood Did I Feel Like A Child. I Felt Like A Person All Along―the Same Person That I Am Today.

Welcome To The Human Race. Nobody Controls His Own Life, Ender.

Grief,she Reminded Herself, Is Almost Always For The Mourner's Loss.

Isn't It Possible, He Wondered, For One Person To Love Another Without Trying To Own Each Other? Or Is That Buried So Deep In Our Genes That We Can Never Get It Out? Territoriality. My Wife. My Friend. My Lover. My Outrageous And Annoying Computer Personality Who's About To Be Shut Off At The Behest Of A Half-crazy Girl With Ocd On A Planet That I Never Heard Of And How Will I Live Without [her] When She's Gone?

That's How It Goes Within A Family. You Think You Know Each Other So Well, And So You Don't Bother Hardly Getting To Know Each Other At All.

How Short Life Is For Fools.

How Short Life Is

Yesterday Someone Sent A Message That Was Signed God! Bernard Said. Really? Dap Said. I Didn't Know He Was Signed Onto The System

I Have Lived In The Only Decades I Could Have Lived In, And Hope To Live Through At Least A Few More.

Apparently The Dutch Now Prided Themselves On Being Better At Queues Than The English, Which Was Absurd, Because Standing Cheerfully In Line Was The English National Sport.

I Have To Win This Now, And For All Time, Or I’ll Fight It Every Day And It Will Get Worse And Worse.

...you Believe That The Kind Of Story You Want To Tell Might Be Best Received By The Science Fiction And Fantasy Audience. I Hope You're Right, Because In Many Ways This Is The Best Audience In The World To Write For. They're Open-minded And Intelligent. They Want To Think As Well As Feel, Understand As Well As Dream. Above All, They Want To Be Led Into Places That No One Has Ever Visited Before. It's A Privilege To Tell Stories To These Readers, And An Honour When They Applaud The Tale You Tell.

Human: That's Stupid. Isn't There Grass On Both Sides?

Nobodys Life Ever Goes According To Plan. So Why Do We Keep On Planning? Because That's How We Know Who We Are. By What We Intend To Be. By What We Try To Become. And Fail. I Don't Say 'fail'. I Saw We Aim And Miss. But We Still Hit Something.

Music Isn't Just A Pleasure, A Transient Satisfaction. It's A Need, A Deep Hunger; And When The Music Is Right, It's Joy. Love. A Foretaste Of Heaven. A Comfort In Grief. Is It Too Much To Think That Perhaps God Speaks To Us Sometimes Through Music? How, Then, Could I Be So Ungrateful As To Refuse The Message?

Be Proud, Bonito, Pretty Boy. You Can Go Home And Tell Your Father, Yes, I Beat Up Ender Wiggin, Who Was Barely Ten Years Old, And I Was Thirteen. And I Had Only Six Of My Friends To Help Me, And Somehow We Managed To Defeat Him, Even Though He Was Naked And Wet And Alone--ender Wiggin Is So Dangerous And Terrifying It Was All We Could Do Not To Bring Two Hundred.

I Doubt That America Will Come To Europe Again. You'll Be On Your Own Against Militant Islam.

America's Intellectual Community Has Never Been Very Bright. Or Honest. They're All Sheep, Following Whatever The Intellectual Fashion Of The Decade Happens To Be. Demanding That Everyone Follow Their Dicta In Lockstep. Everyone Has To Be Open-minded And Tolerant Of The Things They Believe, But God Forbid They Should Ever Concede, Even For A Moment, That Someone Who Disagrees With Them Might Have Some Fingerhold Of Truth.

A Man Always Assumes That Others Are As Virtuous As Himself

She Remembered The Story From Her Childhood, About Adam And Eve In The Garden, And The Talking Snake. Even As A Little Girl She Had Said - To The Consternation Of Her Family - What Kind Of Idiot Was Eve, To Believe A Snake? But Now She Understood, For She Had Heard The Voice Of The Snake And Had Watched As A Wise And Powerful Man Had Fallen Under Its Spell. Eat The Fruit And You Can Have The Desires Of Your Heart. It's Not Evil, It's Noble And Good. You'll Be Praised For It. And It's Delicious.

He's Not A Killer. He Just Wins... Thoroughly

Just Because You Believe It Doesn't Make It So.

My Father Always Said That Government Is Like Watching Another Man Piss In Your Boot. Someone Feels Better But It Certainly Isn't You.

Any Decent Person Who Knows What Warfare Is Can Never Go Into Battle With A Whole Heart.

At First He Thought He Felt Bad Because He Was Afraid Of Leading An Army, But It Wasn't True. He Knew He'd Make A Good Commander. He Felt Himself Wanting To Cry. He Hadn't Cried Since The First Few Days Of Homesickness After He Got Here. He Tried To Put A Name On The Feeling That Put A Lump In His Throat And Made Him Sob Silently, However Much He Tried To Hold It Down. He Bit Down On His Hand To Stop The Feeling, To Replace It With Pain. It Didn't Help.

The Selective Voluntary Blindness Of Human Beings Allows Them To Ignore The Moral Consequences Of Their Choices. It Has Been One Of The Species' Most Valuable Traits, In Terms Of The Survival Of Any Particular Human Community.

In My View, Suicide Is Not Really A Wish For Life To End.' What Is It Then?' It Is The Only Way A Powerless Person Can Find To Make Everybody Else Look Away From His Shame. The Wish Is Not To Die, But To Hide.

For It Is In The Millions Of Small Melodies That The Truth Of History Is Always Found, For History Only Matters Because Of The Effects We See Or Imagine In The Lives Of The Ordinary People Who Are Caught Up In, Or Give Shape To, The Great Events.

At Some Point, Every Science Fiction And Fantasy Story Must Challenge The Reader's Experience And Learning. That's Much Of The Reason Why The Genre Is So Open To Experimentation And Innovation That Other Genres Reject--strangeness Is Our Bread And Butter. Spread It Thick Or Slice It Thin, It's Still Our Staff Of Life.

From Now On The Enemy Is More Clever Than You. From Now On The Enemy Is Stronger Than You. From Now On You Are Always About To Lose.

The Difference Between Science Fiction And Fantasy … Is Simply This: Science Fiction Has Rivets And Fantasy Has Trees.

Darkness Bound Them Closer Than Light.

This Is How Humans Are: We Question All Our Beliefs, Except For The Ones That We Really Believe In, And Those We Never Think To Question.

I Know Everything I Need To Know Already," Rigg Always Said... To Which Father Always Replied,"see How Ignorant You Are? You Don't Even Know Why You Need To Know The Things You Don't Know Yet." "so Tell Me," Said Rigg. "i Would But You're Too Ignorant To Understand The Reasons Why Your Ignorance Is A Fatal Disease.

If Anyone Have Intercourse With A Pig Or A Dog, He Shall Die. If A Man Have Intercourse With A Horse Or A Mule, There Is No Punishment. But He Shall Not Approach The King, And Shall Not Become A Priest... If A Pig Spring Upon A Man For Intercourse, There Is No Punishment.

You Can't Write A Novel All At Once, Any More Than You Can Swallow A Whale In One Gulp. You Do Have To Break It Up Into Smaller Chunks. But Those Smaller Chunks Aren't Good Old Familiar Short Stories. Novels Aren't Built Out Of Short Stories. They Are Built Out Of Scenes.

Like Running The Hurdles. Work So Hard, Jump Over Every One, Fast, High Enough But No Higher, Because You Can't Afford To Hang In The Air. And Then, When The Race Is Over, You're Dripping With Sweat, Either They Beat You Or You Beat Them ... And Then A Couple Of Guys Come Out And Move The Hurdles Out Of The Way. Turns Out They Were Nothing. All That Work To Jump Over Them, But Now They're Gone.

O My Son Absalom,' Bean Said Softly, Knowing For The First Time The Kind Of Anguish That Could Tear Such Words From A Man’s Mouth. 'my Son, My Son Absalom. Would God I Could Die For Thee, O Absalom, My Son. My Sons!

I Always Tell The Truth About What I’m Selling, And Then Nobody Buys It.

Telling The Truth

Come In, Bean. Come In Julian Delphiki, Longed-for Child Of Good And Loving Parents. Come In, Kidnapped Child, Hostage Of Fate. Come And Talk To The Fates, Who Are Playing Such Clever Little Games With Your Life.

I've Got A Pretty Good Idea What Children Are, And We're Not Children. Children Can Lose Sometimes, And Nobody Cares.

But I Fear That I Also Underestimate The Stupidity Of The Rest Of Mankind. Are We Absolutely Sure That We Ought To Win This War?

The World Is Always A Democracy In Times Of Flux, And The Man With The Best Voice Will Win.

Oh No, Real Life Is Escape. The Great Terrors, The Horrors--we Hope--of Your Life Come From Reading Fiction.

An Eye For An Eye? How Christian Of You.' Unbelievers Always Want Other People To Act Like Christians.

Humanity Does Not Ask To Be Happy.it Merely Asks Us To Be Brilliant On Its Behalf. Survival First, And Then Happiness As We Can Manage It... Take What Pleasure You Can In The Interstices Of Your Work, , But Your Work Is First, Learning First, Winning Is Everything Because Without It There Is Nothing.

I Think That A Good Person Can Sometimes Do Wrong Out Of Ignorance Or Weakness Or Wrong Thinking, But When Hard Times Come, The Goodness Wins Out After All. And A Bad Person Can Often Seem Good And Trustworthy For A Long Time, But When Hard Times Come, The Evil In Him Gets Revealed.

Mazer, I Don't Want To Keep Dreaming These Things. I'm Afraid To Sleep. I Keep Thinking Of Things I Don't Want To Remember. My Whole Life Keeps Playing Out As If I Were A Recorder And Someone Else Wanted To Watch The Most Terrible Parts Of My Life

It Was All Your Genes That Made Us Geniuses, Mom. Said Peter. We Sure Didn't Get Any From Dad. I Heard That. Father Said, Not Looking Up From The News That Was Being Displayed On The Table While He Ate It Would've Been Wasted If You Hadn't

Changing The World Is Good For Those Who Want Their Names In Books. But Being Happy, That Is For Those Who Write Their Names In The Lives Of Others, And Hold The Hearts Of Others As The Treasure Most Dear.

You Will Learn To Defeat The Enemy.

Where Loyalty Bound Creatures Together, They Became Something Larger, Something New And Whole And Inexplicable.

So The Whole War Is Because We Can't Talk To Each Other.

The Only People Who Ever Prize Purity Of Ignorance Are Those Who Profit From A Monopoly On Knowledge.

That's The Problem With Winning Right From The Start, Thought Ender. You Lose Friends.

Rumors Are The Sauce Of A Dry Life.

And Yet.. Even If You Had Been Right, It Would Only Have Been By Accident. A Broken Clock Is Right Two Times A Day.

If Pigs Could Vote, The Man With The Slop Bucket Would Be Elected Swineherd Every Time, No Matter How Much Slaughtering He Did On The Side.

Quim," She Said, "don't Ever Try To Teach Me About Good And Evil. I've Been There, And You've Seen Nothing But A Map.

It Is The Essence Of Dignity To Pretend To Desire What You Cannot Prevent.

To Have A Choice At All Is To Be Free - Even When The Choice Is Between Two Terrible Things.

The Only Process You've Mastered Is The Process Of Elimination, And The Only Reason You've Mastered That Is Because You Can Do It In The Toilet.

I Don't Believe That There Are Aliens. I Believe There Are Really Different People.

I Always Think Of Books As Being Like People. Even The Dull Ones Are Worthy Of Decent Respect, But You Don't Have To Seek Them Out And Spend Time With Them.

We're Like The Wicked Witch. We Promise Gingerbread, Then Eat The Little Brats Alive.

. . . All These Readers Have Placed Themselves Inside This Story, Not As Spectators, But As Participants, And So Have Looked At The World, Not With My Eyes Only, But Also With Their Own.

Just Because The Only Way You Can Maintain Control Over Your Bodily Passions Is To Sit Straight In Your Chair, Knees Together, Hands Delicately Arranged In Our Lap, Fingers Tightly Intertwined, Does Not Mean That I Am Required To Do The Same.

Human Beings Are Free Except When Humanity Needs Them. Maybe Humanity Needs You. To Do Something. Maybe Humanity Needs Me—to Find Out What You're Good For. We Might Both Do Despicable Things, Ender, But If Humankind Survives, Then We Were Good Tools.

I've Learned Much, Father, And This Above All: That No Station In Life Is Above Any Other, If It's Occupied By Someone With A Good Heart.

I Will Never Hurt You. I Will Always Help You. If You Are Hungry Ill Give You My Food. If You Are Frightened I Am Your Friend. I Love You Now. And Love Does Not End.

Soldiers Can Sometimes Make Decisions That Are Smarter Than The Orders They've Been Given.

But Whether There's Some Grand Design Really Matters Little To Me. My Only Hope Was This: To See What Might Be, To Believe That It Should Be, And Then To Do All I Could To Bring It To Pass, Whatever The Cost.

Whenever The Law Gets Its Hands On You, Those Who Use The Law To Their Own Advantage Will Also Turn It Against You. Don't Put Your Trust In The Laws Of Men, Alvin. They Were Designed By Strong Men To Improve Their Power Over Weaker Ones.

The Old Tale Of Sleeping Beauty Might End Happily In French Or English, But He Was In Russia, And Only A Fool Would Want To Live Through The Russian Version Of Any Fairy Tale.

Into The The Air, Into The Earth, Into The Fire, I Am With You.

All The Stories Are Fictions. What Matters Is Which Fiction You Believe.

'i Could Kill You Like This,' Peter Whispered. 'just Press And Press Until You're Dead'.

One Bachelor Is An Irritation. Ten Thousand Bachelors Are A War.

I Learned To Separate The Story From The Writing, Probably The Most Important Thing That Any Storyteller Has To Learn-that There Are A Thousand Right Ways To Tell A Story, And Ten Million Wrong Ones, And You're A Lot More Likely To Find One Of The Latter Than The Former Your First Time Through The Tale.

Here's The Secret That Every Successful Software Company Is Based On: You Can Domesticate Programmers The Way Beekeepers Tame Bees. You Can't Exactly Communicate With Them, But You Can Get Them To Swarm In One Place And When They're Not Looking, You Can Carry Off The Honey.

Because If You Can’t Kill Then You Are Always Subject To Those Who Can, And Nothing And No One Will Ever Save You.

So I Want To Ask You A Hypothetical Question. My Favorite Kind. Next To Rhetorical Ones. I Can Nap Equally Well Through Either Kind.

Ulysses, Obviously. It Was An Elaborate Prank, And Our Supposed Intellectual Elite Continue To Fall For It.

People Above You, They Never Want To Share Power With You. Why You Look To Them? They Give You Nothing. People Below You, You Give Them Hope, You Give Them Respect, They Give You Power, Cause They Don't Think They Have Any, So They Don't Mind Giving It Up.

Sister Carlotta, I'm On A Leave Of Absence Right Now. That Means I've Been Sacked, In Case You Don't Understand How The I.f. Handles These Things.” "sacked! A Miscarriage Of Justice. You Ought To Be Shot.

Good People Aren't Good Because They Never Cause Harm To Others. They're Good Because They Treat Others The Best Way They Know How, With The Understanding That They Have.

I've Lived Too Long With Pain. I Won't Know Who I Am Without It

The Nations That Offer To Arbitrate Are The Ones That Think They Should Rule The World.

Bean Could See The Hunger In Their Eyes. Not The Regular Hunger, For Food, But The Real Hunger, The Deep Hunger, For Family, For Love, For Belonging.

It Was Just Him And Me. He Fought With Honor. If It Weren't For His Honor, He And The Others Would Have Beaten Me Together. They Might Have Killed Me, Then. His Sense Of Honor Saved My Life. I Didn't Fight With Honor . . . I Fought To Win.

Nonsense," Said Graff. "ender Always Has Plans Within Plans.

If It Isn't A Wonderful Story First, Who Cares How "important" It Is?

Most Victories Came From Instantly Exploiting Your Enemy's Stupid Mistakes, And Not From Any Particular Brilliance In Your Own Plan.

Ho Said, 'i Do Not Grieve Because My Feet Have Been Cut Off. I Grieve Because A Precious Jewel Is Dubbed A Mere Stone, And A Man Of Integrity Is Called A Deceiver. This Is Why I Weep.'

Your Work Is First, Learning Is First, Winning Is Everything Because Without It There Is Nothing.

Maybe We're The Fools, For Thinking We Know Things. Maybe Humans Are The Only Ones Who Can Deal With The Fact That Nothing Can Ever Be Known At All.

It's All Just Fictions Anyway. We Do What We Do And Then We Make Up Reasons For It Afterward But They're Never The True Reasons, The Truth Is Always Just Out Of Reach.

Two Sides Of The Same Coin, But Which Side Is Which?

Americans Love To Pick Up, Move On, Start Over. But Instead Of Being Somebody Fresh And New, They Become Somebody Lonely And Lost, Or, Far Too Often These Days, They Become Nobody At All, A Machine For Satisfying Hunger, Without Loyalty Or Honor Or Duty.

It's Called Civilization. Women Invented It, And Every Time You Men Blow It All To Bits, We Just Invent It Again.

Take Me Home, He Said Silently To Graff. In My Dream You Said You Loved Me. Take Me Home

Death Is Not A Tragedy To The One Who Dies; To Have Wasted The Life Before That Death, That Is The Tragedy.

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