“Give as few orders as possible," his father had told him once long ago. "Once you've given orders on a subject, you must always give orders on that subject.”
―
Frank Herbert
“A ruler must learn to persuade and not to compel... he must lay the best coffee hearth to attract the finest men... a good ruler has to learn his world's language... it's different for every world... the language of the rocks and growing things... the language you don't hear just with your ears... the Mystery of Life... not a problem to solve, but a reality to experience...
Understanding must move with the flow of the process.”
―
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
“The Fremen were supreme in that quality the ancients called "spannungsbogen" -- which is the self-imposed delay between desire for a thing and the act of reaching out to grasp that thing.”
―
Frank Herbert
“The mind can go either direction under stress—toward positive or toward negative: on or off. Think of it as a spectrum whose extremes are unconsciousness at the negative end and hyperconsciousness at the positive end. The way the mind will lean under stress is strongly influenced by training.”
―
Frank Herbert
“they’d chosen always the clear, safe course that leads ever downward into stagnation.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Scientists seek the lawfulness of events. It is the task of Religion to fit man into this lawfulness.”
―
Frank Herbert
“He 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 be difficult.”
―
Frank Herbert
“The Fremen were supreme in that quality the ancients called “spannungsbogen”—which is the self-imposed delay between desire for a thing and the act of reaching out to grasp that thing.”
―
Frank Herbert
“The Duke said: “Paul, I’m doing a hateful thing, but I must.” He stood beside the portable poison snooper that had been brought into the conference room for their breakfast. The thing’s sensor arms hung limply over the table, reminding Paul of some weird insect newly dead. The Duke’s”
―
Frank Herbert
“I’ll never be a Mentat,” he said. “I’m something else…a freak.”
―
Frank Herbert
“You see, Count, I have the Emperor’s prison planet, Salusa Secundus, to inspire me.”
―
Frank Herbert
“When religion and politics ride the same cart, when that cart is driven by a living holy man (baraka), nothing can stand in their path.”
―
Frank Herbert
“people with a goal. Such people would be easy to imbue with fervor and fanaticism.”
―
Frank Herbert
“What do you despise? By this are you truly known.”
―
Frank Herbert
