Like most modern magics, he thought bitterly, while it probably did something, it didn’t accomplish what it was supposed to.

Tim Powers, The Anubis Gates

Consider also:

  1. “This,” I said, “is contrary to all the doctrines of our science, which teaches that we can see nothing whatever unless it has a shape of some kind.” “The eye of science sees only the outward form,” answered Adalga; “but the eye of wisdom sees the reality itself.”
  2. “It is hard, in fact, not to imagine the Angelic Conversations as a kind of Elizabethan sitcom”
  3. “Humans don’t like robots who can outsmart them, so my creators implanted an override circuit in my brain that automatically reboots me whenever I have an original thought.”
  4. “The religious instinct is deeply implanted in the hearts of men, and may be called the stepping-stone toward true spirituality – but it is not spirituality itself.”
  5. Lovecraft: Disturbing the Universe