"Once upon a time men resisted the implications of actuality. That day is gone. We know now that art is the thing itself together with its extensions into superfluity. Not pop art, I hasten to say, which sneers and exaggerates. This is popular art, which simply exists. This is the age in which we unconditionally accept the unacceptable, and thus proclaim the naturalness of our artificiality."

Robert Sheckley Literature See all quotes by Robert Sheckley →

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“I’ll follow the reedy tenor of his excuses and blast them with the bellowy bass of irrefutable logic!”

“It was one hell of an inspection when you went around finding how many sane men you had left.”

“Even rulers, notoriously the slowest of men to change, realized that something had to be done.”

“Blaine remembered how strange, dark, atavistic and noble Hull’s lordly selection of death has seemed. Pretentious, of course; but then, life itself was a pretension in the vast universe of unliving matter.”

“In a way it made no difference, since nothing is permanent except our illusions.”

“After many centuries we have rediscovered nature’s way of keeping populations in hand. Nature does it the old-fashioned way, by killing people.”

Resonant Thoughts

"The several points of the Dred Scott decision, in connection with Senator Douglas's "care-not" policy, constitute the piece of machinery, in its present state of advancement. This was the third point …"

— Abraham Lincoln

Politics1744–1786

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"We arrived within 11 miles of our old One Ton Camp with fuel for one hot meal and food for two days. For four days we have been unable to leave the tent - the gale howling about us. We are weak, writi…"

— Robert Falcon Scott

Military1868–1912

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"These philosophers of the world place contrarieties in the same subject; for the one attributed greatness to nature and the other weakness to this same nature, which could not subsist; whilst faith te…"

— Blaise Pascal

Mathematics1623–1662

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"As to religion what is my belief? What is my insanity about that? My insanity, Your Honors, Gentlemen of the Jury, is that I wish to leave Rome aside inasmuch as it is the cause of division between th…"

— Louis Riel

Politics1844–1885

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