It was as if one of these people—he always thought of them as “these people,” much as he had grown to like and to admire them—should find himself dealing with a group of very alert and resourceful chimpanzees.

Walter Tevis, The Man Who Fell to Earth

Consider also:

  1. “The people my mind’s eye has seen have too much of the extravagance of dreams, like all the inventions of art before our crowded life had brought moderation and compromise, to seem more than a dream, and yet all else has grown dim before them.”
  2. “it is an obvious fact that what we name the Universe is only the sum-total of our collective States of Consciousness, the total of our percepts and concepts; and in all our ideas about the existence of the Universe we are dealing, and dealing only, with the modifications of our own sensuous and mental modes”
  3. “We are out to break the political will of another group of nations, and our worst foes are those of our own people who are giving the show away. We go to war to defend the rights of the little nations, and we imprison Irishmen who can not forget that their mothers were raped by British soldiers. We are particularly strong on Belgium, and her representative complains that there is to be no seat for Belgium on the Allied war council. The Germans go to war for Kultur, yet they cannot find an expedient for contracting out of the shelling of cathedrals. And if these things are done in the green tree of the people in power, what shall be done in the dry tree, and withered sticks of the mediocre.”
  4. “The Tendencies of thy Mind lie deeper far than any Thought, for they are the Conditions and the Laws of Thought; and it is these that thou must bring to Nought.”
  5. “Loved, and no sin done! Ay, the world shall see The quest is first–a love less terrible. Yet, as I ride toward the edge of snow That cuts the blue, I think. For even so Comes reason to me: ‘Oh, return, return! What folly is it for two souls to burn With hell’s own fire! What is this quest of woe? What is the end? Consider and discern!’ Banish the thought! My working reason still Is the rebellious vassal to my will, Because I will it. That is God’s own mind. I cast all thought and prudence to the wind: On, to the quest! The cursed parrot hill Mocks on, on, on! The thought is left behind.”