“they’d chosen always the clear, safe course that leads ever downward into stagnation.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Behold, as a wild ass in the desert, go I forth to my work.”
―
Frank Herbert
“people with a goal. Such people would be easy to imbue with fervor and fanaticism.”
―
Frank Herbert
“This Duke was concerned more over the men than he was over the spice. He risked his own life and that of his son to save the men. He passed off the loss of a spice crawler with a gesture. The threat to men’s lives had him in a rage. A leader such as that would command fanatic loyalty. He would be difficult to defeat. Against his own will and all previous judgments, Kynes admitted to himself: I like this Duke.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Axiom: the best place to conserve your water is in your body. It keeps your energy up. You’re stronger. Trust your stillsuit.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Your own emperor bestowed Arrakis on House Atreides. I am House Atreides.” The”
―
Frank Herbert
“He doesn’t appear much, does he—one frightened old fat man too weak to support his own flesh without the help of suspensors.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Pride overcame Paul's fear. "You dare suggest a duke's son is an animal?" he demanded.
"Let us say I suggest you may be human," she said. "Steady! I warn you not to try jerking away. I am old, but my hand can drive this needle into your neck before you escape me.”
―
Frank Herbert
“There was pain in him - like a blister, all that was left of some lost yesterday that Time had pruned off him.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Greatness is a transitory experience. It is never consistent.”
―
Frank Herbert
“What a dolt my father sends me for weaponry,” Paul intoned. “This doltish Gurney Halleck has forgotten the first lesson for a fighting man armed and shielded.” Paul snapped the force button at his waist, felt the crinkled-skin tingling of the defensive field at his forehead and down his back, heard external sounds take on characteristic shield-filtered flatness. “In shield fighting, one moves fast on defense, slow on attack,” Paul said. “Attack has the sole purpose of tricking the opponent into a misstep, setting him up for the attack sinister. The shield turns the fast blow, admits the slow kindjal!” Paul snapped up the rapier, feinted fast and whipped it back for a slow thrust timed to enter a shield’s mindless defenses.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Any man who retreats into a cave which has only one opening deserves to die.”
―
Frank Herbert
“We faced it and did not resist. The storm passed through us and around us. It's gone, but we remain.”
―
Frank Herbert
“The price we paid was the price men have always paid for achieving a paradise in this life--we went soft, we lost our edge.”
―
Frank Herbert
“We have two chief survivors of those ancient schools: the Bene Gesserit and the Spacing Guild. The Guild, so we think, emphasizes almost pure mathematics. Bene Gesserit performs another function.”
―
Frank Herbert
