The Hod King Quotes

“The rich “learn lessons.” The poor commit crimes. “Mistakes” are generally considered a mark of the middle class.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“All I know is that, at the end of the day, dreams don't matter, but neither does regret. We aren't what we want or wish for. We are only what we do.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“My sense of being, my identity, whatever you want to call it, it doesn't reside in my parts. It lives in my past, and in the continuity of my present thoughts, and in my hopes for the future. I'm more afraid of losing a memory than a limb.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“The universe breathes in ragged breaths. The body dies. The fungus grows. The loam spreads. The tree roots. The forest burns. The cloud bursts. The flood drowns. The alluvium feeds the fields. In, out. In, out. There is no stasis, no stillness. The source of all misery lies in our insistence that tomorrow be like today. But if it were, if it ever were, it would spell the end of everything.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Sometimes a wheel squeaks not because it is faulty but because it bears the most weight.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“The mob does two things well: nothing and revolution.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“The only event I'm certain to attend is my funeral, and I hope to arrive very, very late.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Don’t saw off your arm to feed a dog. You only have two arms, and the world is full of dogs.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“We cannot raise a man up by lowering ourselves, no more than we can save a sunken ship by draining away the sea.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“The wonderful thing about regrets is that it's never too late to have them.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“She is imperfect, but absolutely peerless.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“An earnest failure is superior to immaculate potential.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Only people who go to bed early believe in happy endings. We night owls understand that happiness does not dwell in finales. It resides in anticipation, in revelry, and in worn-out welcomes. Endings are always sad.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Why do we call a dishonest person two-faced? Is it really so honest to wear the same face day in, day out, regardless of our mood, our condition, or the event? We are not clocks! Have a face for every occasion, I say! Be honest: Wear a mask.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Memory is not like a box of stationery—easy to browse, reorder, and read. No, memories accumulate like leaves upon the forest floor. They are irregular and fragile. They crumble and break upon inspection. They turn to soil the deeper you go.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“But Senlin knew that while tyrants had many strengths, their weakness was generally the same. They were gullible. For the tyrant, there were no reigning facts, no universal systems of inquiry, no demonstrable truths. Because they preferred their own rationalization to reason, their dogma to discourse, the main means a tyrant had for testing another man’s integrity and loyalty were oaths and intuition. But since the tyrants had no choice but to teach everyone exactly what they wished to hear, they were simple to pander to and easy to fool.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“We aren’t what we want or wish for. We are only what we do.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“If you lie loud and long enough, it eventually becomes the truth. —Oren Robinson of the Daily Reverie”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“A man may rot like an egg: His shell does not show it, but all that is within him has gone foul.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“At the round table of color, orange sits supreme. Orange is sublime. Orange is ablaze. And seated across from Lady Orange, we have Sir Purple. I ask you, is any color more vulgar? The word alone emerges like something from a lavatory. Purple. Plopple. It’s all prunes, liver spots, and ink stains. If I ever utter a word of praise for that wretched hue, please snatch my pen away and gore me with it.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“I distrust sweet cocktails and cheerful men for the same reason: It’s hard to tell how dangerous they are until they’ve knocked you on your ear.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“But if I refused to engage anyone who I found the least bit detestable, corrupt, or stupid, I'd never work with anyone. Nothing would get done. The inability to compromise isn't a sign of moral rectitude - she spoke the phrase with haughty emphasis - "it's a sign of immaturity. You know who can't be bargained with? Little children and madmen.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“I love a good scandal. There’s nothing more comforting than tut-tutting the public sins of another from the privacy of your own squalor.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Do you know what a treaty is, Captain Winters? It is a document that tells us what the next war will be over.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Songs are emotional. It’s better to play sincere mistakes than lifeless perfection.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Intimacy was not about maintaining the idealistic charade of courtship; it was about embracing and adoring the flaws.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“A man who is not suspicious of a philosophy that appeals to his nature is like the bull comforted by the rutted path that leads to the slaughterhouse. —I Sip a Cup of Wind by Jumet”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“there’s nothing that threatens a bully’s delicate virility so much as the honest passions of other men”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“All I know is that, at the end of the day, dreams don’t matter, but neither does regret. We aren’t what we want or wish for. We are only what we do.”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King

“Voleta surveyed her options miserably. “I think humanity peaked at the spoon, don’t you? A spoon can serve as a fork, a knife, a ladle … A good spoon is all you need, really.” “And I will tell you again, if you ever eat your fish with a spoon, I will appear out of thin air wherever you are in the world, snatch the spoon from your hand, and rap you on the head with it!”
― Josiah Bancroft, The Hod King