"You see, freedom has a way of destroying things."
— Scott Westerfeld (Extras)

"I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale."
— Thomas Jefferson

""In a time of destruction, create something.""
— Maxine Hong Kingston

"The urge to destroy is also a creative urge."
— Pablo Picasso

"Together, they would watch everything that was so carefully planned collapse, and they would smile at the beauty of destruction."
— Markus Zusak (The Book Thief)

"Be led by your talent, not by your self-loathing; those other things you just have to manage."
— Russell Brand (My Booky Wook)

"Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, "Love your enemies." It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can’t stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they’ll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That’s love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There’s something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies. (from "Loving Your Enemies")"
— Martin Luther King Jr. (A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.)

"They have nothing to give. They have no power of making. All their power is to darken and destroy. They cannot leave this place; they are this place; and it should be left to them. They should not be denied nor forgotten, but neither should they be worshiped. The Earth is beautiful, and bright, and kindly, but that is not all. The Earth is also terrible, and dark, and cruel. The rabbit shrieks dying in the green meadows. The mountains clench their great hands full of hidden fire. There are sharks in the sea, and there is cruelty in men’s eyes. And where men worship these things and abase themselves before them, there evil breeds; there places are made in the world where darkness gathers, places given over wholly to the Ones whom we call Nameless, the ancient and holy Powers of the Earth before the Light, the powers of the dark, of ruin, of madness… I think they drove your priestess Kossil mad a long time ago; I think she has prowled these caverns as she prowls the labyrinth of her own self, and now she cannot see the daylight any more. She tells you that the Nameless Ones are dead; only a lost soul, lost to truth, could believe that. They exist. But they are not your Masters. They never were. You are free, Tenar. You were taught to be a slave, but you have broken free."
— Ursula K. LeGuin (The Tombs of Atuan)

"I often see how you sob over what you destroy, how you want to stop and just worship; and you do stop, and then a moment later you are at it again with a knife, like a surgeon. "
— Anaïs Nin

"I am the spirit that negates.
And rightly so, for all that comes to be
Deserves to perish wretchedly;
'Twere better nothing would begin.
Thus everything that that your terms, sin,
Destruction, evil represent—
That is my proper element."
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Faust - Part One)

"Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."
— Robert Oppenheimer

"We have to heal our wounded world. The chaos, despair, and senseless destruction we see today are a result of the alienation that people feel from each other and their environment."
— Michael Jackson

"The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction"
— Rachel Carson

"(In reaction to Hiroshima): If I had known they were going to do this, I would have become a shoemaker."
— Albert Einstein

"I guess humans like to watch a little destruction. Sand castles, houses of cards, that’s where they begin. Their great skill is in their capacity to escalate."
— Marcus Zusak

"The essential act of war is destruction, not necessarily of human lives, but of the products of human labour. War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent."
— George Orwell

"Here they [the Jaredites] became a flourishing nation; but, giving way in time to internal dissensions, they divided into factions, which warred with one another until the people were totally destroyed (p. 15)."
— James E. Talmage (Jesus the Christ)

""What this country needs... what this great land of ours needs is something to happen to it. Something ferocious and tragic, like what happened to Jericho or the cities of the plain - something terrible I mean, son, so that when the people have been through hellfire and the crucible, and have suffered agony enough and grief, they’ll be people again, human beings, not a bunch of smug contented cows rooting at the trough.""
— William Styron (Set This House on Fire)

"Just because you can doesn't mean you should."
— Acheron Parthenopaeus