Children of the Mind (Ender's Saga, #4)

by Orson Scott Card

“Oh, you’re willing to concede God’s existence, but that’s not what I meant. I mean believe in him the way a mother means it when she says to her son, I believe in you. She’s not saying she believes that he exists—what is that worth?—she’s saying she believes in his future, she trusts that he’ll do all the good that is in him to do. She puts the future in his hands, that’s how she believes in him.

“we decided that Gepetto did not create Pinocchio because he wanted a real boy. It was a puppet he wanted all along. That real-boy business was simply Gepetto’s laziness. He still wanted the puppet to dance—he just didn’t want to go to all the trouble of working the strings.”

“I find out what I really want by seeing what I do,” said Ender. “That’s what we all do, if we’re honest about it.

the only people who ever prize purity of ignorance are those who profit from a monopoly on knowledge.”

Watching a European bow is as painful as watching a pig do ballet.”

Aimaina arose from his breakfast table and went to the computer in his gardening shed. It was just another tool—that’s why he kept it here, instead of enshrining it in his house or in a special office the way so many others did. His

“I think them through very well,” said Miro. “I spend all my time thinking things through. It’s acting on my thoughts that gets tricky. Which ones should I act on, and which ones should I ignore?”

“Nobody’s rational,” said Miro. “We all act because we’re sure of what we want, and we believe that the actions we perform will get us what we want, but we never know anything for sure, and so all our rationales are invented to justify what we were going to do anyway before we thought of any reasons.”

“Religion is tied to the deepest feelings people have. The love that arises from that stewing pot is the sweetest and strongest, but the hate is the hottest, and the anger is the most violent.

if there are no gods, why are we so hungry to believe in them? Just because evil liars stand between us and the gods and block our view of them does not mean that the bright halo that surrounds each liar is not the outer edges of a god, waiting for us to find our way around the lie.”

“Everyone dies. Everyone leaves. What matters is the things you build together before they go. What matters is the part of them that continues in you when they’re gone.

We do what we do and then we make up reasons for it afterward but they’re never the true reasons, the truth is always just out of reach.”

“All the stories are fictions. What matters is which fiction you believe.”

That’s life. It hurts, it’s dirty, and it feels very, very good.

I want all bad things to go away and everybody to be happy. I want my mommy. What kind of childish dolt have I become?

I always felt such pity for you humans because you could only think of one thing at a time and your memories were so imperfect and . . . now I realize that just getting through the day without killing somebody can be an achievement.”

If the purpose of life was just to continue into the future, then none of it would have meaning, because it would be all anticipation and preparation. There’s fruition, Grego. There’s the happiness we’ve already had. The happiness of each moment. The end of our lives, even if there’s no forward continuation, no progeny at all, the end of our lives doesn’t erase the beginning.”

It was more important to her to understand than it was for her to grieve. She felt all things deeply, but she didn’t let her own grief or pain stand between her and learning all she could.

Changing the world is good for those who want their names in books. But being happy, that is for those who write their names in the lives of others, and hold the hearts of others as the treasure most dear.