Dune (Dune #1)

by Frank Herbert

“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.”

A world is supported by four things….” She held up four big-knuckled fingers. “…the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous and the valor of the brave. But all of these are as nothing….” She closed her fingers into a fist. “…without a ruler who knows the art of ruling. Make that the science of your tradition!”

There is probably no more terrible instant of enlightenment than the one in which you discover your father is a man—with human flesh.

The meeting between ignorance and knowledge, between brutality and culture—it begins in the dignity with which we treat our dead.

The concept of progress acts as a protective mechanism to shield us from the terrors of the future.

“When religion and politics travel in the same cart, the riders believe nothing can stand in their way. Their movement becomes headlong—faster and faster and faster. They put aside all thought of obstacles and forget that a precipice does not show itself to the man in a blind rush until it’s too late.”

How often it is that the angry man rages denial of what his inner self is telling him.