Favorite Book Excerpt

[gamzultovah]

It’s always interesting to see what people read or are reading at a certain point in time. I am going back through Paulo Coehlo’s The Pilgrimage. Here is one of me favorite excerpts:

The Prayer of Petrus

At a certain point during my pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, we came to a flat, monotonous field of wheat stretching all the way to the horizon. The only thing breaking the dull landscape was a medieval column with a cross on top, marking the pilgrims’ way. Petrus – my guide – put down his backpack and knelt down.

– Have pity on those who pity themselves, and think life has been unjust to them – for they will never manage to engage in the Good Fight.

But have more pity on those who are cruel to themselves, and can only see evil in their own acts, and who consider themselves guilty for the injustices of the world. For they know not Your law which says: even the strands of hair on your head have been counted.

Have pity on those who command and those who serve many hours of work, and sacrifice themselves in exchange for a Sunday, when everything is closed and there is nowhere to go.

But have more pity on those who sanctify their work and go beyond the limits of their own madness, and end up in debt or nailed to the cross by their own brothers. For they know not Your law which says: be as prudent as a serpent and as simple as the pigeons.

Have pity on those who eat, drink and are merry, but are unhappy and lonely in their abundance.

But have more pity on those who fast, censure, forbid and feel saintly, and who preach Your name in public places. For they know not Your law which says: if I testify about myself, my testimony is not true.

Have pity on those who fear Death and do not know the many kingdoms they have crossed and the many deaths they have died, and are unhappy because they think that everything will come to an end one day.

But have more pity on those who have known their many deaths and think they are immortal, for they know not Your law which says: he who is not born again may not see the kingdom of God.

Have pity on those who cannot see anyone but themselves, and are shut in their limousines, locked in their air conditioned penthouse offices, and suffer in silence the solitude of power.

But have pity on those who go without everything, and are charitable, and seek to overcome evil with love only, for they know not Your law which says: he who has no sword, may he sell his cloak and buy one.

Have pity on us, Lord. For we often think we are dressed when we are naked, we think we commit a crime and in reality save someone. Do not forget, in Your mercy, that we unsheathe the sword with the hand of an angel and the hand of a demon gripping the same hilt. For we are in the world, we continue in the world and need You. We always need Your law which says: when I sent you without bag, pouch or sandals, you lacked nothing.

Petrus stopped praying. The silence continued. He was gazing at the wheat field around us. ~ The Pilgrimage

What is a favorite excerpt from a book you are currently reading (or have read)?

 

[brian64]

There are so many from Dostoevsky. The legend of the Grand Inquisitor from from The Brothers Karamazov is one of his most interesting and provocative.

https://www.stephenhicks.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/DostoevskyF-Grand-Inquisitor-text.pdf

 

[wolflarsen]

The beet is the most intense of vegetables. The radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not of passion. Tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undercurrent of frivolity. Beets are deadly serious.

Slavic peoples get their physical characteristics from potatoes, their smoldering inquietude from radishes, their seriousness from beets.

The beet is the melancholy vegetable, the one most willing to suffer. You can't squeeze blood out of a turnip ...

The beet is the murderer returned to the scene of the crime. The beet is what happens when the cherry finishes with the carrot. The beet is the ancient ancestor of the autumn moon, bearded, buried, all but fossilized; the dark green sails of the grounded moon-boat stitched with veins of primordial plasma; the kite string that once connected the moon to the Earth now a muddy whisker drilling desperately for rubies.

The beet was Rasputin's favorite vegetable. You could see it in his eyes.

In Europe there is grown widely a large beet they call the mangel-wurzel. Perhaps it is mangel-wurzel that we see in Rasputin. Certainly there is mangel-wurzel in the music of Wagner, although it is another composer whose name begins, B-e-e-t—.

Of course, there are white beets, beets that ooze sugar water instead of blood, but it is the red beet with which we are concerned; the variety that blushes and swells like a hemorrhoid, a hemorrhoid for which there is no cure. (Actually, there is one remedy: commission a potter to make you a ceramic asshole—and when you aren't sitting on it, you can use it as a bowl for borscht.)

An old Ukranian proverb warns, "A tale that begins with a beet will end with the devil."

That is a risk we have to take.

 

[ashdigger]

Oh what a wicked web we weave, when first we practice to deceive. ~ The Professor, Gilligan’s Island.




Relax, I know it’s actually a Walter Scott, but I heard about it first as a little kid and it stuck with me and absolutely guides my life.

 

[tbradsim1]

Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see.. Mark Twain, low brow reader that I am.

 

[warren]

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance,
a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to search and a time to give up,
a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend,
a time to be silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.

 

[Zack Miller]

From The Thirteen Gun Salute.

'What do you know about the last American war?'
'Not very much, sir, except that the French and Spaniards joined in and were finely served out for doing so.'
'Very true. Do you know how it began?'
'Yes, sir. It was about tea, which they did not choose to pay duty on. They called out No reproduction without copulation as they tossed it into Boston Harbour.'

 

[RonB]

From The Thirteen Gun Salute.

'What do you know about the last American war?'
'Not very much, sir, except that the French and Spaniards joined in and were finely served out for doing so.'
'Very true. Do you know how it began?'
'Yes, sir. It was about tea, which they did not choose to pay duty on. They called out No reproduction without copulation as they tossed it into Boston Harbour.'

Haha a lot of good quotes from Patrick O’Brian, some of them hilarious and some profound.

 

[Zack Miller]

From Post Captain


The lane ran straight up hill, rising higher and higher, with God knows what breakneck descent on the other side. The horse slowed to a walk - the bean-fed horse, as it proved by a thunderous, long, long fart.

‘I beg your pardon,’ said the midshipman in silence.

‘Oh, that’s all right,’ said Diana coldly. ‘I thought it was the horse.’

 

[autumnfog]

It began as a mistake.

- Charles Bukowski

 

[mawnansmiff]

My favourite line in any book is "The End" as it means I get to move onto my next book ?

Regards,

Jay.?.

 

[canucklehead]

 

[renfield]

“This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movement of small green pieces of paper, which was odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.”

Douglas Adams - Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

 

[autumnfog]

It began as a mistake.

- Charles Bukowski

From the excellent novel Post Office.

 

[elessar]

Women are often meticulous and safe drivers, but they are very seldom first-class. In general, Bond regarded them as a mild hazard and he always gave them plenty of road and was ready for the unpredictable. Four women in a car he regarded as the highest potential danger, and two women nearly as lethal. Women together cannot keep silent in a car, and when women talk they have to look into each other’s faces. An exchange of words is not enough. They have to see the other person’s expression, perhaps to read behind the others’ words or analyze the reaction to their own. So two women in the front seat of a car constantly distract each other’s attention from the road ahead and four women are more than doubly dangerous for the driver not only has to hear and see, what her companion is saying but also, for women are like that, what the two behind are talking about.”

-Ian Flemming Thunderball

I know a bit sexist. My apologies for that, but damnit if this isn't my wife's driving. She scares me at the best of times.

 

[Jacob74]

And in that very moment, away behind in some courtyard of the city, a cock crowed. Shrill and clear he crowed, recking nothing of war nor of wizardry, welcoming only the morning that in the sky far above the shadows of death was coming with the dawn.
And as if in answer there came from far away another note. Horns, horns, horns, in dark Mindolluin's sides they dimly echoed. Great horns of the north wildly blowing. Rohan had come at last.

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King.

 

[Merton]

" in my younger and more vulnerable days, my father gave me a piece of advice that I have been turning over in my mind ever since. Whenever you feel like criticizing someone he said, always remember that not everyone has had the same advantages that you have had."

" So we beat on, boats against the current ceaselessly borne back into the past."

First and last lines of Fitzgerald's Gatsby

"The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of Western Kansas."

Opening of Capote's In Cold Blood, a book which has mesmerized and haunted me for more than 50 years.

 

[gamzultovah]

Human beings are the only ones in nature who are aware that they will die. For that reason and only for that reason, I have a profound respect for the human race, and I believe that its future is going to be much better than its present. Even knowing that their days are numbered and that everything will end when they least expect it, people make of their lives a battle that is worthy of a being with eternal life. What people regard as vanity-leaving great works, having children, acting in such a way as to prevent one's name from being forgotten- I regard as the highest expression of human dignity.

~ Petrus (The Pilgrimage)

 

[olkofri]

"excerpt

NOUN /ˈɛksɜːpt/ a part or passage taken from a book, speech, play, etc, and considered on its own; extract"​

—Collins Dictionary

 

[gamzultovah]

Any attempt to inflict self punishment - no matter how subtle - should be dealt with vigorously. In order to know when we are being cruel to ourselves, we have to transform any attempt at causing spiritual pain - such as guilt, remorse, indecision, and cowardice - into physical pain. By transforming a spiritual pain into a physical one, we can learn what harm it can cause us. ~ Petrus (The Pilgrimage)