Shane

“The world of the Takers is one vast prison, and except for a handful of Leavers scattered across the world, the entire human race is now inside that prison. [...] Naturally a well-run prison must have a prison industry. I'm sure you see why."
"Well... it helps to keep the inmates busy, I suppose. Takes their minds off the boredom and futility of their lives."
"Yes. Can you name yours?"
"Our prison industry? Not offhand. I suppose it's obvious."
"Quite obvious, I would say."
I gave it some thought. "Consuming the world."
Ishmael nodded. "Got it on the first try.”
― Daniel Quinn, Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit

“There seems to be
no unexpressed self
in animals, as if
they are as fully
themselves in flesh
as possible, with no
lag of consciousness
to fill up, while we
keep trying to grow
into something else.”
― Jane Roberts, Dreams, "Evolution", and Value Fulfillment, Vol. 1: A Seth Book

“There is a difference between the inmates of your criminal prisons and the inmates of your cultural prison: The former understand that the distribution of wealth and power inside the prison had nothing to do with justice.”
― Daniel Quinn, Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit

“A man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions.”
― Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., Autocrat of the Breakfast Table