“The vision of time is broad, but when you pass through it, time becomes a narrow door.”
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Frank Herbert
“I will tell you a thing about your new name,” Stilgar said. “The choice pleases us. Muad’Dib is wise in the ways of the desert. Muad’Dib creates his own water. Muad’Dib hides from the sun and travels in the cool night. Muad’Dib is fruitful and multiplies over the land. Muad’Dib we call ‘instructor-of-boys.’ That is a powerful base on which to build your life, Paul-Muad’Dib, who is Usul among us. We welcome you.” Stilgar”
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Frank Herbert
“I have been a stranger in a strange land, Halleck quoted. Paul stared at him, recognizing the quotation from the O.C. Bible, wondering: Does Gurney, too, wish an end to devious plots?”
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Frank Herbert
“The Harkonnens discouraged investigation of the spice, didn’t they?”
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Frank Herbert
“Paul shrugged. “Then she said a good ruler has to learn his world’s language, that it’s different for every world. And I thought she meant they didn’t speak Galach on Arrakis, but she said that wasn’t it at all. She said she meant the language of the rocks and growing things, the language you don’t hear just with your ears. And I said that’s what Dr. Yueh calls the Mystery of Life.” Hawat chuckled. “How’d that sit with her?” “I think she got mad. She said the mystery of life isn’t a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.”
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Frank Herbert
“There’s another thing, Jessica thought. Paul must be cautioned about their women. One of these desert women would not do as wife to a Duke. As concubine, yes, but not as wife.”
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Frank Herbert
“I told my nephew of the great esteem our Emperor holds for you, Count Fenring,” the Baron said. And he thought: Mark him well, Feyd! A killer with the manners of a rabbit—this is the most dangerous kind.”
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Frank Herbert
“Shishakli presented two thin, whiplike shafts as Paul approached. The shafts were about a meter and a half long with glistening plasteel hoods at one end, roughened at the other end for a firm grip. Paul accepted them both in his left hand as required by the ritual. “They are my own hooks,” Shishakli said in a husky voice. “They never have failed.”
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Frank Herbert
“I observed you in pain, lad. Pain’s merely the axis of the test. Your mother’s told you about our ways of observing. I see the signs of her teaching in you. Our test is crisis and observation.”
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Frank Herbert
“Prophecy and prescience—How can they be put to the test in the face of the unanswered question? Consider: How much is actual prediction of the “wave form” (as Muad’Dib referred to his vision-image) and how much is the prophet shaping the future to fit the prophecy? What of the harmonics inherent in the act of prophecy? Does the prophet see the future or does he see a line of weakness, a fault or cleavage that he may shatter with words or decisions as a diamond-cutter shatters his gem with a blow of a knife?”
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Frank Herbert
“As long as my Duke remains unmarried some of the Great Houses can still hope for alliance.”
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Frank Herbert
“Then came the Butlerian Jihad—two generations of chaos. The god of machine-logic was overthrown among the masses and a new concept was raised: “Man may not be replaced.” Those”
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Frank Herbert
“Move slowly and the day of your revenge will come," Tuek said. "Speed is a device of Shaitan. Cool your sorrow–we’ve the diversions for it; three things there are that ease the heart–water, green grass, and the beauty of woman.”
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Frank Herbert
“What delicious abandon in the sleep of the child. Where do we lose it?”
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Frank Herbert
“Do not count a human dead until you’ve seen his body. And even then you can make a mistake.”
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Frank Herbert