Frank Herbert
08/2018
Sci-fi coming-of-age
Once men turned their thinking over to machines in hopes that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them (12)
Then she said a good ruler has to learn his world's language, that it's different for every world... She said she meant the language of the rocks and growing things, the language you don't hear with just you ears (34)
She said the mystery of life isn't a problem to solve, but a reality to experience (34)
First Law of Mentat: A process cannot be understood by stopping it. Understanding must move with the flow of the process, must join it and flow with it (34)
Think you the fact that a deaf person cannot hear. Then, what deafnass may we not all possess? What senses do we lack that we cannot see and cannot hear another world around us? (43)
What is a the son but an extension of the father? (44)
Play on certain knowledge of their superiority, the mystique of secret covenant, the esprit of shared suffering (47)
Many have marked the speed with which Muad'dib learned the necessities of Arrakis. The Bene Gesserit, of course, know the basis of this speed. For others, we can say that Muad'dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to difficult. Muad'dib knew that every experience carries its lesson (70)
Law of Minumum: Growth is limited by that necessity which is present in the least amount. And, naturally, the least favorible condition controls the rate of growth (145)
He tells us 'the vision of time is broad, but when you pass through it, time becomes a narrow door.' And always, he fought the temptation to choose a clear, safe course, warning 'That path leads ever down into stagnation.' (228)
Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past me I will turn to see fear's path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain (239)
Religion and law among our masses must be one and the same. An act of disobediaence must be a sin and require religious penalties. This will have the dual benefit of bringing both greater obedience and greater bravery. We must depend not so much on the bravery of individuals, you see, as the bravery of the whole population (288)
That his father and all the other scientists were wrong, that the most persistent principles of the universe were accident and error (289)
The Fremen were supreme in that quality the ancients called "spannungsbogen"-- which is the self-imposed delay between desire for a thing nd the act of reaching out to grasp that thing (301)
Paul swallowed. He felt that he had played a part already played over countless times in his mind... yet ... there were differences. He could see himself perched on a dizzying summit, having experienced much and possessed of a profound store of knowledge, but all around him was abyss (321)
There is in all things a pattern that is part of our universe. It has symmetry, elegance, and grace-- those qualities you find always in that which the true artist captures. You can find it in the turning of the seasons, in the way sand trails along a ridge, in the branch clusters of the creosote bush or the pattern of its leaves. We try to copy these patterns in our lives and our society, seeking rhythms, the dances, the forms that comfort. Yet, it is possible to see the peril in the finding of the ultimate perfection. It is clear that the ultimate pattern contains its own fixity. In such perfection, all things move toward death (398)
You cannot avoid the interplay of politics with an orthodox religion. This power struggle permeates the training, educating and discipining of the orthodox community. Because of this pressure, the leaders of such a community inevitably must face that ultimate internal question: to succumb to complete opportunism as the price of maintaining their rule, or risk sacrificing themselves for the sake of the orthodox ethic (420)