Hope is the thing that is left to us, in a bad time.
To confront death, in any guise, is to identify with the victim and face what is unsettling and sobering.
It is quite obvious that the human race has made a queer mess of life on this planet. But as a people we probably harbor seeds of goodness that have lain for a long time waiting to sprout when conditions are right. Man’s curiosity, his relentlessness, his inventiveness, his ingenuity have led him into deep trouble. We can only hope that these same traits will enable him to claw his way out.
Can I have a pig, too, Pop?’ asked Avery. ‘No, I only distribute pigs to early risers,’ said Mr Arable. ‘Fern was up at daylight, trying to rid the world of injustice. As a result, she now has a pig. A small one, to be sure, but nevertheless a pig. It just shows what can happen if a person gets out of bed promptly.
I’m glad to report that even now, at this late day, a blank sheet of paper holds the greatest excitement there is for me – more promising than a silver cloud, prettier than a little red wagon. It holds all the hope there is, all fears. I can remember, really quite distinctly, looking a sheet of paper square in the eyes when I was seven or eight years old and thinking, ‘This is where I belong, this is it’.
I shall get up on Sunday morning and wind the clock, as a contribution to order and steadfastness... Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day.
Some of the published news was distorted, but distortion is inherent in partisan journalism, the same as it is in political rallies.
This week, many will be reminded that no explosion of atoms generates so hopeful a light as the reflection of a star, seen appreciatively in a pasture pond.
Familiarity is the thing – the sense of belonging. It grants exemption from all evil, all shabbiness. A farmer pauses in the doorway of his barn and he is wearing the right boots. A sheep stands under an apple tree and it wears the right look, and the tree is hung with puckered frozen fruit of the right color.
Maybe it’s all right,” she said. “But for the first time in my life I’m beginning to feel like an outsider in my own land.
In a sense, the only genuinely secure person is a healthy man possessed of absolutely nothing; such a man stands aloof and safe – there is no way either to reduce his fortune or to debase his currency.
The concern of a democracy is that no honest man shall feel uncomfortable, I don’t care who he is, or how nutty he is.
Louis is a musician. Like most musicians, he is in need of money.
When in love, one must take risks.
It’s been fifteen years since we last wintered in this house. Settling in again to live steadily right around the year, as we used to do, has been full of excitement and the sense of our changed condition.
The world is a wonderful place when you’re young.
Early next morning the craft hit the beach again and resumed loading pulpwood. It was an awesome sight, this tentacle of empire reaching out into so remote and quiet a spot; and it was a fearsome sound, the throbbing engines of an old, dead war furnishing the paper for new conquests in the magazine field.
You goin’ to get your deer?“ I am asked by every man I meet – and they all wait for an answer. My deer-slaying program is a matter of considerable local concern, much to my surprise. It is plain that I now reside in a friendly community of killers, and that until I open fire myself they cannot call me brother.
It was a delicious meal – skim milk, wheat middlings, leftover pancakes, half a doughnut, the rind of a summer squash, two pieces of stale toast, a third of a gingersnap, a fish tail, one orange peel, several noodles from a noodle soup, the scum off a cup of cocoa, an ancient jelly roll, a strip of paper from the lining of the garbage pail, and a spoonful of raspberry jello.
I take Democrats to bed with me for lack of a dachshund, although as a matter of fact on occasions like this I am almost certain to be visited by the ghost of Fred, my dash-hound everlasting, dead these many years. In life, Fred always attended the sick, climbing right into bed with the patient like some lecherous old physician, and making a bad situation worse.