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Litvak knew that charisma was a real if indefinable quality, a chemical fire that certain half-fortunate men gave off. Like any fire or talent, it was amoral, unconnected to goodness or wickedness, power or usefulness or strength.

— Michael Chabon The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

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More quotes by Michael Chabon

Miracles prove nothing except to those whose faith is bought very cheap, sir.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

Every generation loses the messiah it has failed to deserve.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

He’s too superstitious not to see this as a bad omen, but when you're a pessimist, all omens are bad.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

He didn’t want to be what he wasn’t, he didn’t know how to be what he was.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

The rest of Sitka’s homicides are so-called crimes of passion, which is a shorthand way of expressing the mathematical product of alcohol and firearms.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union (2007)

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The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the law of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.

John Adams A Defence of the Constitutions of Government (1787)

There is no governor anywhere; you are all absolutely free. There is no restraint that cannot be escaped.

Robert Anton Wilson

When we see a great man desiring power instead of his real goal we soon recognize that he is sick, or more precisely that his attitude to his work is sick.

Martin Buber What is Man? (1938)

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

C. S. Lewis God in the Dock (1970)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Michael Chabon (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.