The Fall of Hyperion (Hyperion Cantos, #2)

by Dan Simmons

It was a dramatization of total chaos, a functional definition of confusion, an unchoreographed dance of sad violence. It was war.

“My son, if you stay here, it is for no other reason than suicide. If you attempt to bring the ship back for M. Lamia and the Templar, you will be helping others.”

“On the contrary, it made me feel that faith is all the more essential. Pain and darkness have been our lot since the Fall of Man. But there must be some hope that we can rise to a higher level … that consciousness can evolve to a plane more benevolent than its counterpoint of a universe hardwired to indifference.”

“Are we so sure that Christ always knew what to do next? He knew what had to be done. It is not always the same as knowing what to do.”

We are created for precisely this sort of suffering. In the end, it is all we are, these limpid tide pools of self-consciousness between crashing waves of pain.

By denying the sacrifice at the last moment, by stopping the knife, God had earned the right—in Abraham’s eyes and the hearts of his offspring—to become the God of Abraham.