Tag Archives: everything

An absolutist, monarchical government could regularly violate the “rights” of its citizens. The despot decided what privileges each individual would enjoy—and everything according to one’s station. Moreover, if whatever you say or do is automatically scrutinized for possible subversion, what chance is there for a free society? The only recourse, it would seem—short of a revolution—is to operate in the shadows.

Terry Melanson, Perfectibilists: The 18th Century Bavarian Order of the Illuminati [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library]

Hermetic quote Melanson Perfectibilists absolutist monarchical government regularly violate rights citizens despot decided privileges individual enjoy only recourse short revolution operate shadows

Oh no! I’m all right. One must speak sometimes, one can’t spend one’s life grinning like a Cheshire cat, and pretending one thinks everything perfect.

Florence Farr, The Dancing Faun

hermetic quote Farr The Dancing Faun one must speak sometimes can't spend life grinning pretending everything perfect

Then suddenly everything changed. That is, everything was just the same as before—I was crawling along the corridor in just the same way—but the pain and fatigue, passing beyond the level of endurance, seemed to switch something off inside me. Or else just the opposite—they switched something on.

Victor Pelevin, Omon Ra [Amazon, Bookshop, Publisher, Local Library]

Hermetic quote Pelevin Omon Ra everything changed same as before but pain fatigue passing beyond endurance switch something off inside or switched something on

The supreme spirit which pervades, embraces, and penetrates everything, being the very essence, soul, and life of all things in the universe, from the atom up to the whole solar system, is beyond all mental conception.

Franz Hartmann, With The Adepts [Bookshop, Amazon, Publisher]

Hermetic quote Hartmann With the Adepts supreme spirit pervades embraces penetrates everything essence soul life universe

Magic was just something people liked to believe in, something they thought they could feel or sense, something that made everything more than just mechanical certainty. Something that made them more than flesh and bone.

C Robert Cargill, Sea of Rust

Hermetic quote Cargill Sea of Rust more than flesh and bone

From the very existence of these books he learned one primary truth: that everything in the world was enveloped in great skeins of mystery into which one could bravely probe but which one could never fully untangle.

Jeremy P Bushnell, The Weirdness: A Novel

Hermetic quote Bushnell Weirdness books

Then the plot was incredibly loose. It was of no particular time and no particular place, and to any cultured listener it seemed to have little bits of everything and everybody put in at odd moments.

Charles Williams, Descent Into Hell

Hermetic quote Williams Descent plot

Jackie: That’s a cut, Zoey. It’s not an existential crisis.
Zoey: Everything happens for a reason.
Jackie: Sometimes that reason is bad plumbing.

Abe Sylvia, Nurse Jackie, s05e06

Hermetic quote Sylvia Jackie cut

The benefits of a virtual entertainment dreamworld needn’t be explained here – everything is accessible at my fingertips aside from freedom… aside from a way to log out

Harmon Cooper, The Feedback Loop

Hermetic quote Cooper Feedback benefits