18 quotes
I have modeled and remodeled, and cannot get exactly to my liking. So it is necessary that I keep laboring at it, until the figure is to my thinking and my desire.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I judge not, but am judged: and a man whose life has gone out of him, my pigs, is not even good bacon.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I shall never of my own free will expose the naked soul of Manuel to anybody.
Figures of Earth (1921)
If you have been yourself you cannot reasonably be punished, but if you have been somebody else you will find that this is not permitted.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I am not so wonderful but that in the hour of my triumph I am frightened by my own littleness.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I am Manuel, and I follow after my own thinking and my own desire.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I had thought the transformation surprising enough when King Ferdinand was turned into a saint, but this tops all!
Figures of Earth (1921)
I am quite content, in this Comedy of Appearances, to follow the old romancers' lead.
Figures of Earth (1921)
He had a quiet way with the girls, and with the men a way of solemn, blinking simplicity which caused the more hasty in judgment to consider him a fool.
Figures of Earth (1921)
"Eh, Manuel, and will you re-model the world?"
"Who knows?" says Manuel, in the high pride of his youth. "At all events, I do not mean to leave it unaltered."
Figures of Earth (1921)
A man has but one life. It is his all.
Figures of Earth (1921)
Manuel gave it up, and shrugged. Well, let us conquer as we may, so that God be on our side.
Miramon replied: "Never fear! He shall be, in every shape and attribute."
Figures of Earth (1921)
They of Poictesme narrate that in the old days when miracles were as common as fruit pies, young Manuel was a swineherd, living modestly in attendance upon the miller's pigs. They tell also that Manuel was content enough: he knew not of the fate which was reserved for him.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I seem to see drowned there the loves and the desires and the adventures I had when I wore another body than this. For the water of Haranton, I must tell you, is not like the water of other fountains, and curious dreams engender in this pool.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I am Manuel. I have lived in the loneliness which is common to all men, but the difference is that I have known it. Now it is necessary for me, as it is necessary for all men, to die in this same loneliness, and I know that there is no help for it.
Figures of Earth (1921)
You are now a famous champion, that has crowned with victory a righteous cause for which many stalwart knights and gallant gentlemen have made the supreme sacrifice, because they knew that in the end the right must conquer. Your success thus represents the working out of a great moral principle, and to explain the practical minutiae of these august processes is not always quite respectable.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I must tell you that in this moment all doubt as to my attested worth went out of me, who had redeemed a kingdom, and begotten a king, and created a god. So you waste time, my friend, in trying to convince me of all human life's failure and unimportance, for I am not in sympathy with this modern morbid pessimistic way of talking. It has a very ill sound, and nothing whatever is to be gained by it.
Figures of Earth (1921)
I seem to see only the strivings of an ape reft of his tail, and grown rusty at climbing, who has reeled blunderingly from mystery to mystery, with pathetic makeshifts, not understanding anything, greedy in all desires, and always honeycombed with poltroonery. So in a secret place his youth was put away in exchange for a prize that was hardly worth the having; and the fine geas which his mother laid upon him was exchanged for the common geas of what seems expected.
Figures of Earth (1921)