8 quotes
All the human beings I met were either sure that there would be no afterlife or else that they would get preferential treatment in the hereafter.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
His wife had held him in her arms as if she could keep death away from him.
He had cried out, "My God, I am a dead man!"
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
Burton, though an infidel, made it his business to investigate thoroughly every religion. Know a man’s faith, and you knew at least half the man. Know his wife, and you knew the other half.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
Burton did not believe in miracles. Nothing happened that could not be explained by physical principles — if you knew all the facts.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
It was like no hell or heaven of which he had ever heard or read, and he had thought that he was acquainted with every theory of the afterlife.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
Burton sighed, laughed loudly, and said, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.” Another fairy tale to give men hope. The old religions have been discredited — although some refuse to face even that fact — so new ones must be invented.”
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
In a frenzy, kicking his legs and moving his arms in a swimmer's breaststroke, he managed to fight toward the rod. The closer he got to it, the stronger the web of force became. He did not give up. If he did, he would be back where he had been and without enough strength to begin fighting again. It was not his nature to give up until all his strength had been expended.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)
The aerial canoe had no visible means of support, he thought, and it was a measure of his terror that he did not even think about his pun. No visible means of support. Like a magical vessel out of The Thousand and One Nights.
To Your Scattered Bodies Go (1971)