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People in intolerable circumstances will pray to anything. Truly, there are no atheists in foxholes: the men there pray to the bombs that they may land somewhere else.

— Thomas M. Disch The Roaches (1965)

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Prayer

More quotes by Thomas M. Disch

The gods, after all, are only human, and once their rage has been placated they are perfectly capable of acts of mercy and grace.

The Man Who Had No Idea (and other stories) (1982)

Shadows are like plants. They need sunlight simply to exist.

There was nothing like shared meals, so the experts at IBM claimed, for overcoming one's basic disbelief in the existence of other people.

The Man Who Had No Idea (and other stories) (1982)

He especially liked ads for shampoos and hair coloring. The women in them seemed to regard their hair as independent, capricious entities, whom they must placate and provide with food.

The Man Who Had No Idea (and other stories) (1982)

All the things that happen and seem so important at the time, and yet you forget them, one after another.

Emancipation: A Romance of the Times to Come (1971)

All Thomas M. Disch quotes →

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When the mind is not dissipated upon extraneous things, nor diffused over the world about us through the senses, it withdraws within itself, and of its own accord ascends to the contemplation of God.

Basil of Caesarea

Oh dear Pan and all the other Gods of this place, grant that I may be beautiful inside.

Plato

To feel the supreme and moving beauty of the spectacle to which Nature invites her ephemeral guests! … that is what I call prayer.

Claude Debussy Claude Debussy: His Life and Works (1933)

"O God, thy sea is so great and my boat is so small."

John F. Kennedy

Attribution

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