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Stop It," Spluttered Eustace, "go Away. Put That Thing Away. It's Not Safe. Stop It, I Say. I'll Tell Caspian. I'll Have You Muzzled And Tied Up." "why Do You Not Draw Your Own Sword, Poltroon!" Cheeped The Mouse. "draw And Fight Or I'll Beat You Black And Blue With The Flat." "i Haven't Got One," Said Eustace. "i'm A Pacifist. I Don't Believe In Fighting." "do I Understand," Said Reepicheep, Withdrawing His Sword For A Moment And Speaking Very Sternly, "that You Do Not Intend To Give Me Satisfaction?
-C. S. Lewis
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Stop It," Spluttered Eustace,

C. S. Lewis
Stop It," Spluttered Eustace, "go Away. Put That Thing Away. It's Not Safe. Stop It, I Say. I'll Tell Caspian. I'll Have You Muzzled And Tied Up." "why Do You Not Draw Your Own Sword, Poltroon!" Cheeped The Mouse. "draw And Fight Or I'll Beat You Black And Blue With The Flat." "i Haven't Got One," Said Eustace. "i'm A Pacifist. I Don't Believe In Fighting." "do I Understand," Said Reepicheep, Withdrawing His Sword For A Moment And Speaking Very Sternly, "that You Do Not Intend To Give Me Satisfaction?
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Believe
Fighting
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You Will Not Find The Warrior, The Poet, The Philosopher Or The Christian By Staring Into His Eyes As If He Were Your Mistress: Better Fight Beside Him, Read With Him, Argue With Him, Pray With Him.
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Experience: That Most Brutal Of Teachers. But You Learn, My God Do You Learn.
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Nothing Can Seem Extraordinary Until You Have Discovered What Is Ordinary.
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We Have A Strange Illusion That Mere Time Cancels Sin. I Have Heard Others, And I Have Heard Myself, Recounting Cruelties And Falsehoods Committed In Boyhood As If They Were No Concern Of The Present Speaker's, And Even With Laughter. But Mere Time Does Nothing Either To The Fact Or To The Guilt Of A Sin. The Guilt Is Washed Out Not By Time But By Repentance And The Blood Of Christ: If We Have Repented These Early Sins We Should Remember The Price Of Our Forgiveness And Be Humble.
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If You Look For Truth, You May Find Comfort In The End; If You Look For Comfort You Will Not Get Either Comfort Or Truth Only Soft Soap And Wishful Thinking To Begin, And In The End, Despair.
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Wouldn't It Be Dreadful If Some Day In Our Own World, At Home, Men Start Going Wild Inside, Like The Animals Here, And Still Look Like Men, So That You'd Never Know Which Were Which.
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Really Great Moral Teachers Never Do Introduce New Moralities: It Is Quacks And Cranks Who Do That.... The Real Job Of Every Moral Teacher Is To Keep On Bringing Us Back, Time After Time, To The Old Simple Principles Which We Are All So Anxious Not To See; Like Bringing A Horse Back And Back To The Fence It Has Refused To Jump Or Bringing A Child Back And Back To The Bit In Its Lesson That It Wants To Shirk.
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A Thing May Be Morally Neutral And Yet The Desire For That Thing May Be Dangerous.
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At Present We Are On The Outside Of The World, The Wrong Side Of The Door. We Discern The Freshness And Purity Of Morning, But They Do Not Make Us Fresh And Pure. We Cannot Mingle With The Splendours We See. But All The Leaves Of The New Testament Are Rustling With The Rumour That It Will Not Always Be So. Some Day, God Willing, We Shall Get In.
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Well, Sir, If Things Are Real, They’re There All The Time." "are They?" Said The Professor; And Peter Did Not Quite Know What To Say.
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Pure, Spiritual, Intellectual Love Shot Form Their Faces Like Barbedlightning. It Was So Unlike The Love We Experience That Its Expressioncould Easily Be Mistaken For Ferocity.
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Unless The Religious Claims Of The Bible Are Again Acknowledged, Its Literary Claims Will, I Think, Be Given Only 'mouth Honour' And That Decreasingly.
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Never Forget That When We Are Dealing With Any Pleasure In Its Healthy And Normal And Satisfying Form, We Are, In A Sense, On The Enemy’s (god’s) Ground…he [god] Made The Pleasure: All Our Research So Far Has Not Enabled Us To Produce One. All We Can Do Is To Encourage The Humans To Take The Pleasures Which Our Enemy [god] Has Produced, At At Times, Or In Ways, Or In Degrees, Which He [god] Has Forbidden.
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But I Will Not Tell You How Long Or Short The Way Will Be; Only That It Lies Across A River. But Do Not Fear That, For I Am The Great Bridge Builder.
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If You Picture Time As A Straight Line Along Which We Have To Travel, Then You Must Think Of God As The Whole Page On Which The Line Is Drawn.
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Joy Is The Serious Business Of Heaven. Our Merriment Must Be Between People Who Take Each Other Seriously.
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At The End Of All Things, The Blessed Will Say, 'we Never Lived Anywhere But In Heaven.'
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No One Ever Told Me That Grief Felt So Like Fear. I Am Not Afraid, But The Sensation Is Like Being Afraid. The Same Fluttering In The Stomach, The Same Restlessness, The Yawning. I Keep On Swallowing.
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We Cannot Understand. The Best Is Perhaps What We Understand Least.
The Essence Of Religion, In My View, Is The Thirst For An End Higher Than Natural Ends.
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The Desire For Bad Art Is The Desire Bred Of Habit: Like The Smoker's Desire For Tobacco, More Marked By The Extreme Malaise Of Denial Than By Any Very Strong Delight In Fruition.
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It Would Be Impossible To Accept Naturalism Itself If We Really And Consistently Believed Naturalism. For Naturalism Is A System Of Thought. But For Naturalism All Thoughts Are Mere Events With Irrational Causes. It Is, To Me At Any Rate, Impossible To Regard The Thoughts Which Make Up Naturalism In That Way And, At The Same Time, Regard Them As A Real Insight Into External Reality...if It Is True, Then We Can Know No Truths. It Cuts Its Own Throat.
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Some Day You Will Be Old Enough To Start Reading Fairy Tales Again.
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The Proper Good Of A Creature Is To Surrender Itself To Its Creator—to Enact Intellectually, Volitionally, And Emotionally, That Relationship Which Is Given In The Mere Fact Of Its Being A Creature. When It Does So, It Is Good And Happy.
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...if All We Mean By Our Love Is A Craving To Be Loved, We Are In A Very Deplorable State.
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If You Have A Religion It Must Be Cosmic.
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In The Midst Of A World Of Light And Love, Of Song And Feast And Dance, [lucifer] Could Find Nothing To Think Of More Interesting Than His Own Prestige.
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Walking And Talking Are Two Very Great Pleasures, But It Is A Mistake To Combine Them. Our Own Noise Blots Out The Sounds And Silences Of The Outdoor World; And Talking Leads Almost Inevitably To Smoking, And Then Farewell To Nature As Far As One Of Our Senses Is Concerned. The Only Friend To Walk With Is One Who So Exactly Shares Your Taste For Each Mood Of The Countryside That A Glance, A Halt, Or At Most A Nudge, Is Enough To Assure Us That The Pleasure Is Shared.
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Nothing Is Yet In Its True Form.
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When We Are Lost In The Woods, The Sight Of A Signpost Is A Great Matter.
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Perfect Humility Dispenses With Modesty.
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Precisely Because We Cannot Predict The Moment, We Must Be Ready At All Moments.
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For The Past Twenty Years You And I Have Been Fed All Day Long On Good Solid Lies About Sex
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Lying
Past
Suspicion Often Creates What It Suspects.
Screwtape Letters
Suspicion
Suspects
The Typical Expression Of Opening Friendship Would Be Something Like, 'what? You Too? I Thought I Was The Only One!
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You Must Have A Capacity To Receive, Or Even Omnipotence Can't Give.
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As Image And Apprehension Are In Organic Unity, So, For A Christian, Are Human Body And Human Soul.
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The More We Get What We Now Call 'ourselves' Out Of The Way And Let Him Take Us Over, The More Truly Ourselves We Become.
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The Worldly Man Treats Certain People Kindly Because He 'likes' Them: The Christian, Trying To Treat Every One Kindly, Finds Him Liking More And More People As He Goes On - Including People He Could Not Even Have Imagined Himself Liking At The Beginning.
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All The Things That Have Ever Deeply Possessed Your Soul Have Been But Hints Of It, Tantalizing Glimpses, Promises Never Quite Fulfilled, Echoes That Died Away Just As They Caught Your Ear. But If It Should Really Become Manifest - If There Ever Came An Echo That Did Not Die Away But Swelled Into The Sound Itself - You Would Know It. Beyond All Possibility Of Doubt You Would Say 'here At Last Is The Thing I Was Made For.'
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..(t)here Are Two Opposite Reasons For Being A Democrat. You May Think All Men So Good That They Deserve A Share In The Government Of The Commonwealth, And So Wise That The Commonwealth Needs Their Advice. That Is, In My Opinion, The False, Romantic Doctrine Of Democracy. On The Other Hand, You May Believe Fallen Men To Be So Wicked That Not One Of Them Can Be Trusted With Any Irresponsible Power Over His Fellows.
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Man, Even Now, Can Do Wonders To Animals: My Cat And Dog Live Together In My House And Seem To Like It. It May Have Been One Of Man's Functions To Restore Peace To The Animal World, And If He Had Not Joined The Enemy He Might Have Succeeded In Doing So To An Extent Now Hardly Imaginable.
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The Process Of Growing Up Is To Be Valued For What We Gain, Not For What We Lose.
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Christianity Is A Fighting Religion.
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Christianity Tells People To Repent And Promises Them Forgiveness. It Therefore Has Nothing (as Far As I Know) To Say To People Who Do Not Know They Have Done Anything To Repent Of And Who Do Not Feel That They Need Forgiveness.
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For The Church Is Not A Human Society Of People United By Their Natural Affinities But The Body Of Christ, In Which All Members, However Different, (and He Rejoices In Their Differences And By No Means Wishes To Iron Them Out) Must Share The Common Life, Complementing And Helping One Another Precisely By Their Differences.
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Good And Evil Increase At Compound Interest. That's Why The Little Decisions We Make Every Day Are Of Infinite Importance.
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I Am A Product Of Long Corridors, Empty Sunlit Rooms, Upstairs Indoor Silences, Attics Explored In Solitude, Distant Noises Of Gurgling Cisterns And Pipes, And The Noise Of Wind Under The Tiles. Also, Of Endless Books.
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The Homemaker Has The Ultimate Career. All Other Careers Exist For One Purpose Only - And That Is To Support The Ultimate Career.
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Perhaps Your Own Reiterated Cries Deafen You To The Voice You Hoped To Hear
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This Is My Password," Said The King As He Drew His Sword. "the Light Is Dawning, The Lie Broken. Now Guard Thee, Miscreant, For I Am Tirian Of Narnia.
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Men Propound Mathematical Theorems In Besieged Cities, Conduct Metaphysical Arguments In Condemned Cells, Make Jokes On The Scaffold, Discuss A New Poem While Advancing To The Walls Of Quebec, And Comb Their Hair At Thermopylae. This Is Not Panache; It Is Our Nature.
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Be Confident Small Immortals. You Are Not The Only Voice That All Things Utter, Nor Is There Eternal Silence In The Places Where You Cannot Come.
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The Enemy Wants To Bring The Man To A State Of Mind In Which He Could Design The Best Cathedral In The World, And Know It To Be The Best, And Rejoice In The Fact, Without Being Any More (or Less) Or Otherwise Glad At Having Done It Than He Would Be If It Had Been Done By Another. The Enemy Wants Him, In The End, To Be So Free From Any Bias In His Own Favour That He Can Rejoice In His Own Talents As Frankly And Gratefully As In His Neighbour's Talents--or In A Sunrise, An Elephant, Or A Waterfall.
Men
Elephants
Design
When You Go To Church You Are Really Listening In To The Secret Wireless From Our Friends.
Secret
Listening
Church
The Christian View Is That Men Were Created To Be In A Certain Relationship To God (if We Are In That Relation To Him, The Right Relation To One Another Will Follow Inevitably).
Christian
Men
Views
Nonsense Remains Nonsense Even When We Talk It About God.
Nonsense
Remains
The Church Exists For Nothing Else But To Draw Men Into Christ.
Men
Church
Christ
If You Haven't Met Satan Recently, You Are Probably Going His Way!
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Satan
Mets
But In General, Take My Advice, When You Meet Anything That Is Going To Be Human And Isn’t Yet, Or Used To Be Human Once And Isn’t Now, Or Ought To Be Human And Isn’t, You Keep Your Eyes On It And Feel For Your Hatchet.
Eye
Advice
Used
And That's Why, Gentleman, If Your Little Girl Doesn't Come Up To Scratch, It Will Be Our Painful Duty To Cut All Your Throats. Merely In A Way Of Business, As You Might Say, And No Offense, I Hope.
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Cutting
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One Must Never Be Either Content With, Or Impatient With, Oneself.
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And The Seriousness With Which The Other Party Takes My Words Always Raises The Doubt Whether I Have Taken Them Seriously Enough Myself.
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...this New Idea Of Cure Instead Of Punishment, So Humane In Seeming, Had In Fact Deprived The Criminal Of All Rights And By Taking Away The Name Punishment Made The Thing Infinite.
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Punishment
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A Concentrated Mind And A Sitting Body Make For Better Prayer Than A Kneeling Body And A Mind Half Asleep.
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Most People, If They Had Really Learned To Look Into Their Own Hearts, Would Know That They Do Want, And Want Acutely, Something That Cannot Be Had In This World. There Are All Sorts Of Things In This World That Offer To Give It To You, But They Never Quite Keep Their Promise.
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Really, A Young Atheist Cannot Guard His Faith Too Carefully. Dangers Lie In Wait For Him On Every Side. You Must Not Do, You Must Not Even Try To Do, The Will Of The Father Unless You Are Prepared To "know Of The Doctrine." All My Acts, Desires, And Thoughts Were To Be Brought Into Harmony With Universal Spirit. For The First Time I Examined Myself With A Seriously Practical Purpose. And There I Found What Appalled Me; A Zoo Of Lusts, A Bedlam Of Ambitions, A Nursery Of Fears, A Harem Of Fondled Hatreds. My Name Was Legion.
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And That's Why, When They Want To Get Rid Of Anyone, They Usually Bring Him Down Here (like They Were Doing With Me) And Say They'll Leave Him To The Ghosts. But I Always Wondered If They Didn't Really Drown 'em Or Cut Their Throats. I Never Quite Believed In The Ghosts. But Those Two Cowards You've Just Shot Believed All Right. They Were More Scared Of Taking Me To My Death Than I Was Of Going.
Cutting
Two
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But The Great Thing To Remember Is That, Though Our Feelings Come And Go, His Love For Us Does Not. It Is Not Wearied By Our Sins, Or Our Indifference; And, Therefore, It Is Quite Relentless In Its Determination That We Shall Be Cured Of Those Sins, At Whatever Cost To Us, At Whatever Cost To Him.
Determination
Feelings
Doe
It Is Quite Useless Knocking At The Door Of Heaven For Earthly Comfort. It's Not The Sort Of Comfort They Supply There.
Doors
Heaven
Useless
If War Is Ever Lawful, Then Peace Is Sometimes Sinful.
Peace
War
Community
The Pain I Feel Now Is The Happiness I Had Before. That's The Deal.
Happiness
Happy
Uplifting
If Christianity Is Untrue, Then No Honest Man Will Want To Believe It, However Helpful It Might Be; If It Is True, Every Honest Man Will Want To Believe It, Even If It Gives Him No Help At All
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Giving
Submit To Death, Death Of Your Ambitions And Favorite Wishes Every Day And Death Of Your Whole Body In The End: Submit With Every Fiber Of Your Being, And You Will Find Eternal Life. Keep Back Nothing. Nothing That You Have Not Given Away Will Be Really Yours. Nothing In You That Has Not Died Will Ever Be Raised From The Dead. . . Look To Christ And You Will Find Him, And With Him Everything Else Thrown In.
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Wish
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The Guide Sang: The New Age, The New Art, The New Ethic And Thought, And Fools Crying, Because It Has Begun It Will Continue As It Has Begun! The Wheel Runs Fast, Therefore The Wheel Will Run Faster For Ever, The Old Age Is Done, We Have New Lights And See Without The Sun. (though They Lay Flat The Mountains And Dry Up The Sea, Wilt Thou Yet Change, As Though God Were A God?)
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Light
And There’s Also ‘to Him That Hath Shall Be Given.’ After All, You Must Have A Capacity To Receive, Or Even Omnipotence Can’t Give. Perhaps Your Own Passion Temporarily Destroys The Capacity.
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Omnipotence
Giving
Affection Is Responsible For Nine-tenths Of Whatever Solid And Durable Happiness There Is In Our Lives.
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Valentines Day
Forgiveness
Can A Mortal Ask Questions Which God Finds Unanswerable? Quite Easily, I Should Think. All Nonsense Questions Are Unanswerable. How Many Hours Are In A Mile? Is Yellow Square Or Round? Probably Half The Questions We Ask - Half Our Great Theological And Metaphysical Problems - Are Like That.
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Yellow
...here Also Forgiving Does Not Mean Excusing. Many People Seem To Think It Does. They Think That If You Ask Them To Forgive Someone Who Has Cheated Or Bullied Them You Are Trying To Make Out That There Was Really No Cheating Or Bullying. But If That Were So, There Would Be Nothing To Forgive. (this Doesn't Mean That You Must Necessarily Believe His Next Promise. It Does Mean That You Must Make Every Effort To Kill Every Taste Of Resentment In Your Own Heart - Every Wish To Humiliate Or Hurt Him Or To Pay Him Out.)
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Cheating
Hurt
It Isn't Narnia, You Know," Sobbed Lucy. "it's You. We Shan't Meet You There. And How Can We Live, Never Meeting You?" "but You Shall Meet Me, Dear One," Said Aslan. "are -are You There Too, Sir?" Said Edmund. "i Am," Said Aslan. "but There I Have Another Name. You Must Learn To Know Me By That Name. This Was The Very Reason Why You Were Brought To Narnia, That By Knowing Me Here For A Little, You May Know Me Better There.
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Dear Ones
Knowing
If Nothing In This World Satisfies Me, Perhaps It Is Because I Was Made For Another World.
World
Made
Ifs
God, In The End, Gives People What They Most Want, Including Freedom From Himself. What Could Be More Fair?
Christian
People
Giving
A Perfect Practice Of Christianity Would, Of Course, Consist In A Perfect Imitation Of The Life Of Christ -- I Mean, In So Far As It Was Applicable In One's Own Particular Circumstance. Not In An Idiotic Sense -- It Doesn't Mean That Every Christian Should Grow A Beard, Or Be A Bachelor, Or Become A Travelling Preacher. It Means That Every Single Act And Feeling, Every Experience, Whether Pleasant Or Unpleasant, Must Be Referred To God.
Christian
Mean
Practice
Friendship Exhibits A Glorious "nearness By Resemblance" To Heaven Itself Where The Very Multitude Of The Blessed (which No Man Can Number) Increases The Fruition Which Each Has Of God. For Every Soul, Seeing Him In Her Own Way, Doubtless Communicates That Unique Vision To All The Rest. That, Says An Old Author, Is Why The Seraphim In Isaiah's Vision Are Crying "holy, Holy, Holy" To One Another (isaiah Vi, 3). The More We Thus Share The Heavenly Bread Between Us, The More We Shall All Have.
Blessed
Unique
Men
My Own Eyes Are Not Enough For Me; I Will See Through Those Of Others.
Eye
Enough
My Own
When You And I Met, The Meeting Was Over Very Shortly, It Was Nothing. Now It Is Growing Something As We Remember It, What Will It Be When I Remember It As I Lie Down To Die, What It Makes In Me All My Days Till Then - That Is The Real Meeting. The Other Is Only The Beginning Of It. You Say You Have Poets In Your World. Do They Not Teach You This?
Real
Lying
World
I Read In A Periodical The Other Day That The Fundamental Thing Is How We Think Of God. By God Himself, It Is Not! How God Thinks Of Us Is Not Only More Important, But Infinitely More Important.
Thinking
Important
Fundamentals
The Psalmists In Telling Everyone To Praise God Are Doing What All Men Do When They Speak Of What They Care About.
Men
Care
Speak
When An Artist Is In The Strict Sense Working, He Of Course Takes Into Account The Existing Tastes, Interests And Capacity Of His Audience. These No Less Than The Language , The Marble, The Paint, Are Part Of His Aw Material.; To Be Used, Tamed, Sublimated, Not Ignored Or Defied. Haughty Indifference To Them Is Not Genius, It Is Laziness And Incompetence.
Artist
Culture
Genius
Always Prefer The Plain Direct Word To The Long, Vague One.
Long
Vague
Direct
Now Repentance Is No Fun At All. It Is Something Much Harder Than Merely Eating Humble Pie. It Means Unlearning All The Self-conceit And Self-will That We Have Been Training Ourselves Into For Thousands Of Years. It Means Undergoing A Kind Of Death. In Fact, It Needs A Good Man To Repent. And Here's The Catch. Only A Bad Person Needs To Repent: Only A Good Person Can Repent Perfectly. The Worse You Are The More You Need It And The Less You Can Do It. The Only Person Who Could Do It Perfectly Would Be A Perfect Person - And He Would Not Need It.
Fun
Mean
Humble
Anyone Who Is Honestly Trying To Be A Christian Will Soon Find His Intelligence Being Sharpened: One Of The Reasons Why It Needs No Special Education To Be A Christian Is That Christianity Is An Education Itself. That Is Why An Uneducated Believer Like Bunyan Was Able To Write A Book That Has Astonished The Whole World.
Christian
Book
Writing
To Live His Life In His Own Way, To Call His House His Castle, To Enjoy The Fruits Of His Own Labour, To Educate His Children As His Conscience Directs, To Save For Their Prosperity After His Death -- These Are Wishes Deeply Ingrained In Civilised Man. Their Realization Is Almost As Necessary To Our Virtues As To Our Happiness. From Their Total Frustration Disastrous Results Both Moral And Psychological Might Follow.
Wisdom
Children
Men
Of All Tyrannies, A Tyranny Sincerely Exercised For The Good Of Its Victims May Be The Most Oppressive. It Would Be Better To Live Under Robber Barons Than Under Omnipotent Moral Busybodies. The Robber Baron's Cruelty May Sometimes Sleep, His Cupidity May At Some Point Be Satiated; But Those Who Torment Us For Our Own Good Will Torment Us Without End For They Do So With The Approval Of Their Own Conscience.
Wisdom
Religious
Freedom
Once A Man Is United To God, How Could He Not Live Forever?
Spiritual
Men
Forever
What We Called Love Down There Was Mostly The Craving To Be Loved. In The Main I Loved You For My Own Sake: Because I Needed You...we Shall Have No Need For One Another Now: We Can Begin To Love Truly.
Inspirational
Religious
Needs
The Natural Life In Each Of Us Is Something Self-centred, Something That Wants To Be Petted And Admired, To Take Advantage Of Other Lives, To Exploit The Whole Universe.
Self
Want
Natural
There Ought To Be Things We Should Like To Do And Cannot Do Because Our Charitable Expenditures Excludes Them.
Should
Charitable
Expenditures
Thus The Criminal Ceases To Be A Person, A Subject Of Rights And Duties, And Becomes Merely An Object On Which Society Can Work. And This Is, In Principle, How Hitler Treated The Jews. They Were Objects; Killed Not For Ill Desert But Because, On His Theories, They Were A Disease In Society. If Society Can Mend, Remake, And Unmake Men At Its Pleasure, Its Pleasure May, Of Course, Be Humane Or Homicidal. The Difference Is Important. But, Either Way, Rulers Have Become Owners.
Men
Rights
Differences
He (the Devil) Always Sends Errors Into The World In Pairs--pairs Of Opposites...he Relies On Your Extra Dislike Of One To Draw You Gradually Into The Opposite One. But Do Not Let Us Be Fooled. We Have To Keep Our Eyes On The Goal And Go Straight Through Between Both Errors. We Have No Other Concern Than That With Either Of Them.
Religious
Couple
Eye
We May Ignore, But We Can Nowhere Evade The Presence Of God. The World Is Crowded With Him. He Walks Everywhere Incognito.
Inspirational
God
Religion
Nature Never Taught Me That There Exists A God Of Glory And Of Infinite Majesty. I Had To Learn That In Other Ways. But Nature Gave The Word Glory A Meaning For Me. I Still Do Not Know Where Else I Could Have Found One.
Majesty
Way
Taught
The Smallest Good Act Today Is The Capture Of A Strategic Point From Which, A Few Months Later, You May Be Able To Go On To Victories You Never Dreamed Of.
Victory
Goes On
May
The Terrible Thing, The Almost Impossible Thing, Is To Hand Over Your Whole Self--all Your Wishes And Precautions--to Christ. But It Is Far Easier Than What We Are All Trying To Do Instead. For What We Are Trying To Do Is To Remain What We Call "ourselves," To Keep Personal Happiness As Our Great Aim In Life, And Yet At The Same Time Be "good.
Impossible Things
Self
Hands
Nothing Which Is At All Times And In Every Way Agreeable To Us Can Have Objective Reality. It Is Of The Very Nature Of The Real That It Should Have Sharp Corners And Rough Edges, That It Should Be Resistant, Should Be Itself. Dream-furniture Is The Only Kind On Which You Never Stub Your Toes Or Bang Your Knee.
Dream
Real
Should Have
Oh, Lor!' Said The Boy, Sitting Down On The Grassy Bank At The Edge Of The Shrubbery And Very Quickly Getting Up Again Because The Grass Was Soaking Wet. His Name Was Unfortunately Eustace Scrubb But He Wasn't A Bad Sort.
Boys
Names
Sitting Down
Nothing In Man Is Either Worse Or Better For Being Shared With The Beasts.
Men
Beast
We Are Forbidden To Neglect The Assembling Of Ourselves Together. Christianity Is Already Institutional In The Earliest Of Its Documents. The Church Is The Bride Of Christ. We Are Members Of One Another.
Church
Together
Christianity
Meaningless Combinations Of Words Do Not Suddenly Acquire Meaning Simply Because We Prefix To Them The Two Other Words ' God Can'.
Two
Combination
Acquire
Christianity, If False, Is Of No Importance, And If True, Of Infinite Importance. The Only Thing It Cannot Be Is Moderately Important.
Faith
Religious
Catholic
Ink Is The Great Cure For All Human Ills.
Ink
Cures
Humans
One Of The Reasons Why It Needs No Special Education To Be A Christian Is That Christianity Is An Education Itself.
Christian
Special
Needs
Joy Bursts In Our Lives When We Go About Doing The Good At Hand And Not Trying To Manipulate Things And Times To Achieve Joy.
Hands
Joy
Trying
This Is The Land Of Narnia,' Said The Faun, 'where We Are Now; All That Lies Between The Lamp-post And The Great Castle Of Cair Paravel On The Eastern Sea.
Lying
Sea
Land
But How Can The Characters In A Play Guess The Plot? We Are Not The Playwright, We Are Not The Producer, We Are Not Even The Audience. We Are On The Stage. To Play Well The Scenes In Which We Are "on" Concerns Us Much More Than To Guess About The Scenes That Follow It.
Character
Play
Plot
Death Opens A Door Out Of A Little, Dark Room (that's All The Life We Have Known Before It) Into A Great, Real Place Where The True Sun Shines And We Shall Meet.
Real
Dark
Doors
A Man Who Has Been In Another World Does Not Come Back Unchanged. One Can't Put The Difference Into Words. When The Man Is A Friend It May Become Painful: The Old Footing Is Not Easy To Recover.
Men
Differences
Doe
Our Prayers For Others Flow More Easily Than Those For Ourselves. This Shows We Are Made To Live By Charity.
Prayer
Helping Others
Giving
The Value Of The Individual Does Not Lie In Him. He Receives It By Union With Christ.
Lying
Doe
Unions
We Have Had Enough, Once And For All, Of Hedonism--the Gloomy Philosophy Which Says That Pleasure Is The Only Good.
Philosophy
Had Enough
Pleasure
We Long For More And God's Promise Is That There Is More Awaiting Us. More To Delight Us Than We Will Ever Exhaust.
Long
Promise
Delight
We Shall Not Be Well So Long As We Love And Admire Anything More Than We Love And Admire God.
Long
Admire
Wells
It Is In The Process Of Being Worshipped That God Communicates His Presence To Men.
Men
Worship
Process
I Thought I Could Describe A State; Make A Map Of Sorrow. Sorrow, However, Turns Out To Be Not A State, But A Process. It Needs Not A Map, But A History, And If I Don't Stop Writing That History At Some Quite Arbitrary Point, There's No Reason Why I Should Ever Stop.
Grief
Writing
Suffering
Meanwhile, Little People Like You And Me, If Our Prayers Are Sometimes Granted, Beyond All Hope And Probability, Had Better Not Draw Hasty Conclusions To Our Own Advantage. If We Were Stronger, We Might Be Less Tenderly Treated. If We Were Braver, We Might Be Sent, With Far Less Help, To Defend Far More Desperate Posts In The Great Battle.
Christian
Prayer
People
We Who Have Been True Readers All Our Life Fully Realize The Enormous Of Our Being Which We Owe To Authors.
Realizing
Enormous
Reader
The Dangers Of Apparent Self-sufficiency Explain Why Our Lord Regards The Vices Of The Feckless And Dissipated So Much More Leniently Than The Vices That Lead To Worldly Success.
Self
Vices
Feckless
Really, A Young Atheist Cannot Guard His Faith Too Carefully. Dangers Lie In Wait For Him On Every Side.
Atheist
Lying
Waiting
The Very First Tear He Made Was So Deep That I Thought It Had Gone Right Into My Heart.
Heart
Tears
Gone
Why Love, If Losing Hurts So Much? I Have No Answers Anymore: Only The Life I Have Lived. Twice In That Life I've Been Given The Choice: As A Boy And As A Man. The Boy Chose Safety, The Man Chooses Suffering. The Pain Now Is Part Of The Happiness Then. That's The Deal.
Hurt
Pain
Boys
Nothing Is More Characteristically Juvenile Than Contempt For Juvenility. . . Youth's Characteristic Chronological Snobbery.
Children
Humorous
Parenting
The Mold In Which A Key Is Made Would Be A Strange Thing, If You Had Never Seen A Key: And The Key Itself A Strange Thing If You Had Never Seen A Lock. Your Soul Has A Curious Shape Because It Is A Hollow Made To Fit A Particular Swelling In The Infinite Contours Of The Divine Substance, Or A Key To Unlock One Of The Doors In The House With Many Mansions. Your Place In Heaven Will Seem To Be Made For You And You Alone, Because You Were Made For It -- Made For It Stitch By Stitch As A Glove Is Made For A Hand.
Keys
Doors
Hands
Love May, Indeed, Love The Beloved When Her Beauty Is Lost: But Not Because It Is Lost. Love May Forgive All Infirmities And Love Still In Spite Of Them: But Love Cannot Cease To Will Their Removal. Love Is More Sensitive Than Hatred Itself To Every Blemish In The Beloved… Of All Powers He Forgives Most, But He Condones Least: He Is Pleased With Little, But Demands All.
Lost Love
Love Is
Hatred
Each Day We Are Becoming A Creature Of Splendid Glory Or One Of Unthinkable Horror.
Inspirational
Each Day
Becoming
If Christianity Was Something We Were Making Up, Of Course We Could Make It Easier. But It Is Not. We Cannot Compete, In Simplicity With People Who Are Inventing Religions. How Could We? We Are Dealing With Fact. Of Course Anyone Can Be Simple If He Has No Facts To Bother About.
Simple
People
Simplicity
Her Face Was Working And Twitching With Passion, But His Looked Up At The Sky, Still Quiet, Neither Angry Nor Afraid, But A Little Sad.
Passion
Sky
Littles
The Task Of The Modern Educator Is Not To Cut Down Jungles But To Irrigate Deserts. The Right Defence Against False Sentiments Is To Inculcate Just Sentiments. By Starving The Sensibility Of Our Pupils We Only Make Them Easier Prey To The Propagandist When He Comes. For Famished Nature Will Be Avenged And A Hard Heart Is No Infallible Protection Against A Soft Head.
Heart
Cutting
Tasks
When We Want To Be Something Other Than The Thing God Wants Us To Be, We Must Be Wanting What, In Fact, Will Not Make Us Happy.
Want
Facts
Want U
Extraordinary Things Only Happen To Extraordinary People. Maybe It's A Sign That You've Got An Extraordinary Destiny--something Greater Than You Could've Imagined.
Destiny
People
Extraordinary Things
When You Are Behaving As If You Loved Someone, You Will Presently Come To Love Them.
Love
Christian
Mere
Fallen Man Is Not Simply An Imperfect Creature Who Needs Improvement: He Is A Rebel Who Must Lay Down His Arms.
Men
Rebel
Needs
It May Be Hard For An Egg To Turn Into A Bird: It Would Be A Jolly Sight Harder For It To Learn To Fly While Remaining An Egg. We Are Like Eggs At Present. And You Cannot Go On Indefinitely Being Just An Ordinary, Decent Egg. We Must Be Hatched Or Go Bad.
Life
Change
Wisdom
But In Reading Great Literature I Become A Thousand Men And Yet Remain Myself. Like The Night Sky In The Greek Poem, I See With A Myriad Eyes, But It Is Still I Who See. Here, As In Worship, In Love, In Moral Action, And In Knowing, I Transcend Myself; And Am Never More Myself Than When I Do.
Reading
Eye
Night
Devils Are Depicted With Bats' Wings And Good Angels With Birds' Wings, Not Because Anyone Holds That Moral Deterioration Would Be Likely To Turn Feathers Into Membrane, But Because Most Men Like Birds Better Than Bats.
Angel
Men
Birds Wings
The Term Is Over: The Holidays Have Begun. The Dream Is Ended: This Is The Morning.
Dream
Morning
Holiday
To Enter Heaven Is To Become More Human Than You Ever Succeeded In Being On Earth; To Enter Hell Is To Be Banished From Humanity. What Is Cast (or Casts Itself) Into Hell Is Not A Man: It Is 'remains.'
Men
Heaven
Humanity
The Way For A Person To Develop A Style Is (a) To Know Exactly What He Wants To Say, And (b) To Be Sure He Is Saying Exactly That.
Style
Want
Way
The Game Is To Have Them All Running About With Fire Extinguishers When There Is A Flood, And All Crowding To That Side Of The Boat Which Is Already Nearly Gunwale Under.
Running
Fire
Games
The Full Acting Out Of The Self's Surrender To God Therefore Demands Pain: This Action, To Be Perfect, Must Be Done From The Pure Will To Obey, In The Absence, Or In The Teeth, Of Inclination
Pain
Self
Perfect
Badness Cannot Succeed Even In Being Bad In The Same Way In Which Goodness Is Good. Goodness Is, So To Speak, Itself: Badness Is Only Spoiled Goodness. Evil Is A Parasite, Not An Original Thing.
Evil
Catholic
Way
God Made Us: Invented Us As A Man Invents An Engine. A Car Is Made To Run On Petrol, And It Would Not Run Properly On Anything Else. Now God Designed The Human Machine To Run On Himself.
Running
Men
Car
I Am A Product [...of] Endless Books. My Father Bought All The Books He Read And Never Got Rid Of Any Of Them.... I Had Always The Same Certainty Of Finding A Book That Was New To Me As A Man Who Walks Into A Field Has Of Finding A New Blade Of Grass.
Father
Book
Men
We Have A Strange Illusion That Mere Time Cancels Sin.
Strange
Sin
Illusion
The Human Heart Is Not Unchanging (nay, Changes Almost Out Of Recognition In The Twinkling Of An Eye).
Heart
Eye
Recognition
The Most Valuable Thing The Psalms Do For Me Is To Express The Same Delight In God Which Made David Dance.
Worship Music
Delight
Psalms
I Have At Last Come To The End Of The Faerie Queene: And Though I Say "at Last", I Almost Wish He Had Lived To Write Six Books More As He Had Hoped To Do — So Much Have I Enjoyed It.
Book
Writing
Wish
Progress Means Movement In A Desired Direction, And We Do Not All Desire The Same Things For Our Species.
Mean
Independence
Progress
There Is A Difference Between A Private Devotional Life And A Corporate One. Solemnity Is Proper In Church, But Things That Are Proper In Church Are Not Necessarily Proper Outside, And Vice Versa.
Differences
Church
Vices
He Thinks Great Folly, Child,' Said Aslan. "this World Is Bursting With Life For These Few Days Because The Song With Which I Called It Into Life Still Hangs In The Air And Rumbles In The Ground. It Will Not Be So For Long. But I Cannot Tell That To This Old Sinner, And I Cannot Comfort Him Either; He Has Made Himself Unable To Hear My Voice. If I Spoke To Him, He Would Hear Only Growlings And Roarings. Oh, Adam's Son, How Cleverly You Defend Yourself Against All That Might Do You Good!
Song
Children
Thinking
When You Are Behaving As If You Loved Someone, You Will Presently Come To Love Him. If You Injure Someone You Dislike, You Will Find Yourself Disliking Him More. If You Do Him A Good Turn, You Will Find Yourself Disliking Him Less.
Finding Yourself
Turns
Ifs
The Doors Of Hell Are Locked From The Inside!
Doors
Hell
Locked
He Died Not For Men, But For Each Man. If Each Man Had Been The Only Man Made, He Would Have Done No Less.
Men
Religion
Done
We Were Talking Of Dragons, Tolkien And I In A Berkshire Bar. The Big Workman Who Had Sat Silent And Sucked His Pipe All The Evening, From His Empty Mug With Gleaming Eye Glanced Towards Us: "i Seen 'em Myself!" He Said Fiercely.
Eye
Dragons
Talking
Christian Theology Can Fit In Science, Art, Morality, And The Sub-christian Religious. The Scientific Point Of View Cannot Fit Any Of These Things, Not Even Science Itself.
Christian
Religious
Art
I Was The Lion Who Forced You To Join With Aravis. I Was The Cat Who Comforted You Among The Houses Of The Dead. I Was The Lion Who Drove The Jackals From You While You Slept. I Was The Lion Who Gave The Horses The New Strength Of Fear For The Last Mill So That You Should Reach King Lune In Time. And I Was The Lion You Do Not Remember Who Pushed The Boat In Which You Lay, A Child Near Death, So That It Came To Shore Where A Man Sat, Wakeful At Midnight, To Receive You.
Horse
Kings
Children
I Don't Want Him To Live Forever, And I Know That He's Not Going To Live Forever Whether I Want Him To Or Not.
Forever
Want
Knows
Democracy Demands That Little Men Should Not Take Big Ones Too Seriously; It Dies When It Is Full Of Little Men Who Think They Are Big Themselves.
Men
Thinking
Democracy
Into The Void Of Silence, Into The Empty Space Of Nothing, The Joy Of Life Is Unfurled.
Life
Space
Silence
You Must Therefore Zealously Guard In His Mind The Curious Assumption 'my Time Is My Own'. Let Him Have The Feeling That He Starts Each Day As The Lawful Possessor Of Twenty-four Hours. Let Him Feel As A Grievous Tax That Portion Of This Property Which He Has To Make Over To Him Employers, And As A Generous Donation That Further Portion Which H Allows To Religious Duties. But What He Must Never Be Permitted To Doubt Is That The Total From Which These Deductions Have Been Made Was, In Some Mysterious Sense, His Own Personal Birthright.
Religious
Feelings
Doubt
I Sometimes Wonder Whether All Pleasures Are Not Substitutes For Joy.
Inspirational
Joy
Sometimes
Holiness Is Irresistible. If Even 10% Of The World's Population Had It The Whole World Would Be Converted And Happy Before The Year's End.
Faith
Inspiration
Years
All The Delights Of Sense, Or Heart, Or Intellect, With Which You Could Once Have Tempted Him, Even The Delights Of Virtue Itself, Now Seem To Him In Comparison But As The Half Nauseous Attractions Of A Raddled Harlot Would Seem To A Man Who Hears That His True Beloved Whom He Has Loved All His Life And Whom He Had Believed To Be Dead Is Alive And Even Now At His Door.
Heart
Men
Doors
Repentance Is Not Something God Demands Of You Before He Will Take You Back And Which He Could Let You Off If He Chose; It Is Simply A Description Of What Going Back Is Like.
Demand
Repentance
Description
Quarrelling Means Trying To Show That The Other Man Is In The Wrong. (and) There Is No Sense In Trying To Do That Unless You And He Had Some Sort Of Agreement As To What Righ And Wrong Are.
Mean
Men
Trying
For Me, Reason Is The Natural Organ Of Truth; But Imagination Is The Organ Of Meaning. Imagination, Producing New Metaphors Or Revivifying Old, Is Not The Cause Of Truth, But Its Condition.
Imagination
Causes
Reason
For The Christian, There Are, Strictly Speaking, No Chances. A Secret Master Of The Ceremonies Has Been At Work.
Christian
Secret
Chance
A Man's Physical Hunger Does Not Prove That Man Will Get Any Bread; He May Die Of Starvation On A Raft In The Atlantic. But Surely A Man's Hunger Does Prove That He Comes Of A Race Which Repairs Its Body By Eating And Inhabits A World Where Eatable Substances Exist. In The Same Way, Though I Do Not Believe (i Wish I Did) That My Desire For Paradise Proves That I Shall Enjoy It, I Think It A Pretty Good Indication That Such A Thing Exists And That Some Men Will.
Believe
Men
Thinking
Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.


2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.


2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.


2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.


3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.


3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.


3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.



4. Proper Usage of Quotes


4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.


4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.


4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).


5. Common Mistakes to Avoid


5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.


5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.


5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.



6. Quotes in Different Contexts


6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.


6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.


6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.



7. Punctuation and Formatting


Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:


Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.


Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.


Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.



8. Ethical Considerations


Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes


Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.



Conclusion


Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.


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