I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there. – Richard

I cannot know for certain but I think God is very improbable, and I live my life on the assumption that he is not there.

–
Richard Dawkins,

The God Delusion

This was supposed to be yesterday. I was sitting on the Cardiff/London train, supposedly about to write this very column, and realising

This was supposed to be yesterday. I was sitting on the Cardiff/London train, supposedly about to write this very column, and realising something quite terrible. My head was entirely empty. A vast echoing void. Bigger on the inside, but with nothing in it. You could drop a pebble in my brain and wait for an hour to hear it land. No actually, you couldn’t – that would be aggressive and unhelpful, so keep your damn pebbles to yourself.

–
Steven Moffat

Afore me! It is so very late,That we may call it early by and by. – William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Afore me! It is so very late,
That we may call it early by and by.

–
William Shakespeare,

Romeo and Juliet

It is so long before the mind can persuade itself that she whom we saw every day and whose very existence appeared a part of our own can have

It is so long before the mind can persuade itself that she whom we saw every day and whose very existence appeared a part of our own can have departed forever that the brightness of a beloved eye can have been extinguished and the sound of a voice so familiar and dear to the ear can be hushed, never more to be heard. These are the reflections of the first days; but when the lapse of time proves the reality of the evil, then the actual bitterness of grief commences.

–
Mary Shelley,

Frankenstein

Another strike of lightening now accompanied by the deep-bellied rumble, and the horse reared, incidentally setting Henry very picturesquely

Another strike of lightening now accompanied by the deep-bellied rumble, and the horse reared, incidentally setting Henry very picturesquely against the inconstant moon. Alas, Catherine was deeply engaged in her argument with Old Edric and this missed entirely the melodramatic display. But we may assume that, possessing so strong an imagination, Catherine had often pictured Henry thus…

–
Emily C.A. Snyder,

Nachtstürm Castle: A Gothic Austen Novel

You’d think the very thought of a romance writer would bring a smile to people’s lips. Ah, how nice. Love. Making love. Laughter. Kissing.

You’d think the very thought of a romance writer would bring a smile to people’s lips. Ah, how nice. Love. Making love. Laughter. Kissing.
But no, the world is upside down as far as I can see, and romances and their writers are ridiculed, hisses and generally spat upon.
For what reason One of my favorites is that women who read them might get mixed up about reality and imagine a man is going to rescue them from Life. According to this theory, women are so stupid that they can’t tell a story from reality. Is anyone worried that the MEN who read spy thrillers are going to go after their neighbors with an automatic weapon No, I don’t remember anyone thinking that. Nor do I remember anyone worrying about murder mysteries or science fiction. It just seems to be dumb ol’ women who might think some gorgeous, thoughtful, giving hunk is going to rescue them.
Honey, if any woman thought a gorgeous hunk was going to rescue her, romance novels wouldn t be forty percent of the publishing industry.

–
Jude Deveraux,

Remembrance

Know, child, that the One God He is so vast that He cannot be moved, else the Universe falls. Nor can He answer, for the very act of opening

Know, child, that the One God He is so vast that He cannot be moved, else the Universe falls. Nor can He answer, for the very act of opening His Mouth is Movement, indeed the greatest Act of all, for it is the Word. And this is precisely why He has made an infinity of lesser gods, creating them in His own image, so that we can do the lesser things on His behalf. We are His hands and arms and feet and mouths. We are His answers to your prayers, enacted along the great Framework of Being.

–
Vera Nazarian,

Cobweb Forest

I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book. – Groucho

I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.

–
Groucho Marx

He held her and rocked her, believing, rightly or wrongly, that Ellie wept for the very intractability of death, its imperviousness to

He held her and rocked her, believing, rightly or wrongly, that Ellie wept for the very intractability of death, its imperviousness to argument or to a little girl s tears; that she wept over its cruel unpredictability; and that she wept because of the human being s wonderful, deadly ability to translate symbols into conclusions that were either fine and noble or blackly terrifying. If all those animals had died and been buried, then Church could die
any time!
and be buried; and if that could happen to Church, it could happen to her mother, her father, her baby brother. To herself. Death was a vague idea; the Pet Sematary was real. In the texture of those rude markers were truths which even a child s hands could feel.

–
Stephen King,

Pet Sematary

He used to tell her… that it was because Russia had left a chill in his bones. Lola Plum believed it, only because sometimes he’d get a very

He used to tell her… that it was because Russia had left a chill in his bones. Lola Plum believed it, only because sometimes he’d get a very distant and apathetic look around his eyes and he’d sting her with some harsh truth. Always he apologized for it, but she had never blamed him, only the cold of his Russian heritage.

–
Shannon Noelle Long,

Second Coming