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Frank Herbert Quotes - Page 5

All Quotes Art Atheism Attitude Awareness Balance Belief Chaos Children Choices Desire Dignity Eternity Evil Evolution Failing Fear Fear Of Death Feelings Fighting Free Will Giving Greatness Hate Heart History Humanity Ignorance Inspirational Joy Justice Language Life Logic Lying Mask Mediocrity Myth Past Police Politics Power Prophet Purpose Quality Reality Religion Religion And Politics Revenge Risk Science Science Fiction Sleep Suffering Survival Teaching Time Training Understanding Universe Violence War Water Wealth Wisdom Writing

Justice belongs to those who claim it, but let the claimant beware lest he create new injustice by his claim and thus set the bloody pendulum of revenge into its inexorable motion

Justice belongs to those who claim it, but let the claimant beware lest he create new injustice by his claim and thus set the bloody pendulum of revenge into its inexorable motion

Revenge, Justice, Pendulums

Frank Herbert (2002). “The Dosadi Experiment”, p.1, Macmillan

Enemies make you stronger, allies make you weaker.

Enemy, Stronger, Allies

The writing of history is largely a process of diversion. Most historical accounts distract attention from the secret influences behind great events.

Writing, Historical, Secret

Frank Herbert (1987). “Chapterhouse: Dune”, p.70, Penguin

Historians exercise great power and some of them know it. They recreate the past, changing it to fit their own interpretations. Thus, they change the future as well.

Exercise, Past, Fit

You can't build politics on love. People aren't concerned with love; it's too disordered. They prefer despotism. Too much freedom breeds chaos.

People, Too Much, Chaos

Frank Herbert (2008). “Dune Messiah”, p.155, Penguin

If you think of yourselves as helpless and ineffectual, it is certain that you will create a despotic government to be your master. The wise despot, therefore, maintains among his subjects a popular sense that they are helpless and ineffectual.

Wise, Thinking, Government

Frank Herbert (2017). “The Dosadi Experiment and The Eyes of Heisenberg: Two Classic Works of Science Fiction”, p.107, Tor Science Fiction

Demagogues are so easy to identify. They gesture a lot and speak with pulpit rhythms, using words that ring of religious fervour and god-fearing sincerity. Sincerity with nothing behind it takes so much practice. The practice can always be detected. Repetition. Great attempts to keep your attention on words.

Religious, Practice, Attention

You know it's love when you want to give joy and damn the consequences.

Funny Love, Giving, Joy

Frank Herbert (2008). “God Emperor of Dune”, p.272, Penguin

The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in. He must reflect what is projected upon him. And he must have a strong sense of the sardonic. This is what uncouples him from belief in his own pretensions. The sardonic is all that permits him to move within himself. Without this quality, even occasional greatness will destroy a man.

Strong, Moving, Greatness

Frank Herbert (2003). “Dune”, p.116, Penguin

Science fiction, because it ventures into no man's lands, tends to meet some of the requirements posed by Jung in his explorations of archetypes, myth structures and self-understanding. It may be that the primary attraction of science fiction is that it helps us understand what it means to be human.

Mean, Men, Self

"Men on other planets" in "The Craft of Science Fiction" edited by Reginald Bretnor, 1976.

We sift reality through screens composed of ideas . (And such ideas have their roots in older ideas.) Such idea systems are necessarily limited by language , by the ways we can describe them. That is to say: language cuts the grooves in which our thoughts move. If we seek new validity forms (other laws and other orders) we must step outside language.

Moving, Cutting, Reality

"The Santaroga Barrier". Book by Frank Herbert, 1968.

Revenge is for children and the emotionally retarded.

Children, Revenge, Retarded

Frank Herbert (1986). “Chapterhouse: Dune”, Berkley Trade

Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent. It depends in part upon the myth-making imagination of humankind. The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he or she is in. That person must reflect what is projected upon him or her.

Greatness, Imagination, Feelings

The basic lesson of our relativistic universe is that things change. Any power must always meet a greater power.

Lessons, Things Change, Greater Power

Frank Herbert (2008). “Children of Dune”, p.162, Penguin

A ruler must learn to persuade and not to compel... he must lay the best coffee hearth to attract the finest men... a good ruler has to learn his world's language... it's different for every world... the language of the rocks and growing things... the language you don't hear just with your ears... the Mystery of Life... not a problem to solve, but a reality to experience... Understanding must move with the flow of the process.

Coffee, Moving, Men

"Dune (40th Anniversary Edition)". Book by Frank Herbert, Penguin, p. 30, August 2, 2005.

If you want immortality, then deny form. Whatever has form has mortality. Beyond form is the formless, the immortal.

Want, Immortality, Deny

Frank Herbert (2008). “God Emperor of Dune”, p.377, Penguin

Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. This is as true of humans as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who so survive.

Numbers, Space, Molecules

Frank Herbert (2011). “Dune Messiah: The Second Dune Novel”, p.141, Hachette UK

And always, he fought the temptation to choose a clear, safe course, warning 'That path leads ever down into stagnation.

Temptation, Warning, Safe

Frank Herbert (2003). “Dune”, p.194, Penguin

There is only one true wealth in all the universe. I have given you some of it. I have given your father and your mate some of it. And your friends. This wealth is living time.

Wealth, True Wealth, Universe

"The Green Brain".

When religion and politics travel in the same cart, the riders believe nothing can stand in their way. Their movements become headlong - faster and faster and faster. They put aside all thoughts of obstacles and forget the precipice does not show itself to the man in a blind rush until it's to late.

Believe, Men, Doe

Frank Herbert (1999). “Dune”, Ace Hardcover

The gift of words is the gift of deception and illusion.

Deception, Illusion

Frank Herbert (2008). “Children of Dune”, p.236, Penguin

Ecology is often confused with environmentalism, while in fact, environmentalism often leaves out the fact that people, too, can be a legitimate part of an ecosystem.

Funny, Confused, Animal

A leader is one of the things that distinguishes a mob from a people. He maintains the level of individuals. Too few individuals and a people reverts to a mob.

People, Leader, Levels

Frank Herbert (2003). “Dune”, p.256, Penguin

Survival is the ability to swim in strange water.

Water, Swim, Survival

Frank Herbert (2003). “Dune”, p.272, Penguin

What I'm saying in my books boils down to this: Mine religion for what is good and avoid what is deleterious. Don't condemn people who need it. Be very careful when that need becomes fanatical.

Book, People, Needs

"Conversations in Port Townsend". "The Maker of Dune: Insights of a Master of Science Fiction" edited by Tim O'Reilly, 1987.

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