Caleb Ringger

“He felt now that he was not simply close to her, but that he did not know where he ended and she began. He felt this from the agonizing sensation of division that he experienced at that instant. He was offended for the first instant, but the very same second he felt that he could not be offended by her, that she was himself. He felt for the first moment as a man feels when, having suddenly received a violent blow from behind, he turns round, angry and eager to avenge himself, to look for his antagonist, and finds that it is he himself who has accidentally struck himself, that there is no one to be angry with, and that he must put up with and try to soothe the pain.”
― Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

“Nothing perhaps distinguishes modern masses as radically from those of previous centuries as the loss of faith in the last judgment: the worst have lost their fear, and the best have lost their hope.”
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism

“Why do you hate the South?"

"I dont hate it," Quentin said, quickly, at once, immediately; “I dont hate it,” he said. I dont hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England dark; I dont. I dont! I dont hate it! I dont hate it!” ”
― William Faulkner, Absalom, Absalom!

“In reply to a minister's inquiry about the distinguishing doctrine of Mormonism, Joseph told him that "we believe the Bible, and they do not." It was the power of the Bible that Joseph and the visionaries sought to recover. Not getting it from the ministry, they looked for it themselves.”
― Richard L. Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling