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Muad'Dib
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I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.
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The highest function of ecology is understanding consequences. Pardot Kynes (voice heard by his son during a dying hallucination)
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Let us not rail about justice as long as we have arms and the freedom to use them. Duke Leto Atreides
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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. from Collected Sayings of Muad’Dib by the Princess Irulan
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Anything outside yourself, this you can see and apply your logic to it. But it’s a human trait that when we encounter personal problems, these things most deeply personal are the most difficult to bring out for our logic to scan. We tend to flounder around, blaming everything but the actual, deep-seated thing that’s really chewing on us. Jessica speaking to Thufir Hawat
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Do you wrestle with dreams? Do you contend with shadows? Do you move in a kind of sleep? Time has slipped away. Your life is stolen. You tarried with trifles. Victim of your folly. Dirge for Jamis on the Funeral Plain, from Songs of Muad'Dib by the Princess Irulan
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Muad'Dib could indeed see the Future, but you must understand the limits of this power. Think of sight. You have eyes, yet cannot see without light. If you are on the floor of a valley, you cannot see beyond your valley. Just so, Muad'Dib could not always choose to look across the mysterious terrain. He tells us that a single obscure decision of prophecy, perhaps the choice of one word over another, could change the entire aspect of the future. He tells us "The vision of time is broad, but when you pass through it, time becomes a narrow door." And always, he fought the temptation to choose a clear, safe course, warning "That path leads ever down into stagnation." from Arrakis Awakening by the Princess Irulan
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Then, as his planet killed him, it occurred to Kynes that his father and all the other scientists were wrong, that the most persistent principles of the universe were accident and error. The last thought of Liet Kynes before he died
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Prophecy and prescience — How can they be put to the test in the face of the unanswered questions? Consider: How much is actual prediction of the "wave form" (as Muad'Dib referred to his vision-image) and how much is the prophet shaping the future to fit the prophecy? What of the harmonics inherent in the act of prophecy? Does the prophet see the future or does he see a line of weakness, a fault or cleavage that he may shatter with words or decisions as a diamond-cutter shatters his gem with a blow of a knife? Private Reflections on Muad'Dib by the Princess Irulan
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The vision made him want to freeze into immobility, but this, too, was action with its consequences. Said of Paul Muad'Dib
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The concept of progress acts as a protective mechanism to shield us from the terrors of the future. from Collected Sayings of Muad'Dib by the Princess Irulan
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Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.
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It occurred to Paul then that he had seen his own dead body along countless reaches of the time web, but never once had he seen his moment of death.
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It was a time of sorceresses whose powers were real. The measure of them is seen in the fact they never boasted how they grasped the firebrand.
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Religion must remain an outlet for people who say to themselves, "I am not the kind of person I want to be." It must never sink into an assemblage of the self-satisfied.
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Between depriving a man of one hour from his life and depriving him of his life there exists only a difference of degree.
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He is the fool saint, The golden stranger living forever On the edge of reason. Let your guard fall and he is there! The Ghola's Hymn
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If you need something to worship, then worship life — all life, every last crawling bit of it! We're all in this beauty together!
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Eternity takes back its own. Our bodies stirred these waters briefly, danced with a certain intoxication before the love of life and self, dealt with a few strange ideas, then submitted to the instruments of Time. What can we say of this? I occurred. I am not . . . yet, I occurred.
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Power tends to isolate those who hold too much of it. Eventually, they lose touch with reality... and fall.
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When law and duty are one, united by religion, you never become fully conscious, fully aware of yourself. You are always a little less than an individual.
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I hear the wind blowing across the desert and I see the moons of a winter night rising like great ships in the void.
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I will be known for kindliness more than for knowledge. My face will shine down the corridors of time for as long as humans exist.
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Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating
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Good government never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the will of those who administer that machinery. The most important element of government, therefore, is the method of choosing leaders.
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If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you believe something is right or wrong, true or false, you believe the assumptions in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of holes, but remain most precious to the convinced.
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Religion is the encystment of past beliefs: mythology, which is guesswork, the assumptions of trust in the universe, those pronouncements which men have made in search of personal power, all of it mingled with shreds of enlightenment. And always the ultimate unspoken commandment is "Thou shalt not question!" But we question. We break that commandment as a matter of course.
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The work to which we have set ourselves is the liberating of the imagination, the harnessing of imagination to humankind's deepest sense of creativity.
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Some actions have an end but no beginning; some begin but do not end. It all depends upon where the observer is standing.
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The one-eyed view of our universe says you must not look far afield for problems. Such problems may never arrive. Instead, tend to the wolf within your fences. The packs ranging outside may not even exist.