Quotes from Louis L'Amour

Need and desire have no connection," I said. "Many people desire things they do not need. Happiness can be measured by what one does not need, but often to see is to want.

do, but he was a man of many experiences, and in the past there had always been a way out. Usually there was, if a man took his time and kept his head.

slightly. "It seems we have to get rid of Ben—and quickly." "Could Dean Cullane have

Folks talk a lot about the maternal feeling in women, but they say nothing about man's need to protect and care for someone; yet the one feeling is as basic as the other.

He had seemed huge and fat. He was all of that, but he was also a man of unbelievable strength. His

is a fair land, Darby, but a raw, rough land that will use up men until it breeds the kind it needs. Well, I will be used, and I hope to have a hand in the breeding, too.

vantage point on the ridge he could see a green, forested valley where

Be friendly with all men and censure none, tell nobody too much of your affairs and remember in all dealings with men, or women, to keep one hand upon the doorlatch Ã¢â'¬Â¦ in your mind, at least.

There was never a place he walked that was not the better for his having passed. For every tree he cut down he planted two.

Hitting his enormous body was useless. I might as well have pounded a huge leather sack filled with wheat. So

Waterways would offer the easiest route across country, but any travel was a hardship. Most who traveled understood why the word "travel" had once been "travail.

I don't have anybody available to send up there to help you out. We're kind of up to our elbows in enemy sympathizers right now in Los Angeles.

Not even a marshrat will trust itself to one hole only, so always have an escape route, and more than one, if it can be.

What man would not want such a woman? Not one to follow only, but to stand beside him during the dark days, to work with him, plan with him, share with him, making their life a whole thing together.

He wastes no time yet is never hurried.

He should have been drowned at birth.

The alleged music preached of the wrongs democracy had perpetrated on the people and how to protest against the causes of their pain, which would be, according to the fascist propagandists, the police, the military, the rich and the current American government. His ballads were to call for youth and the downtrodden to unite and fight against poverty, injustice and social ills — by destroying the American way of life. Radio

Yet when two peoples come together that one which is most efficient will survive, and the other will absorb or vanish Ã¢â'¬Â¦ it is the way of life.

Kill him? Would that be it? No man knew better than he the tricks that Destiny plays on a man, or how often the right man dies at the wrong time and place. A man never wore a gun without inviting trouble, he never stepped into a street and began the gunman's walk without the full knowledge that he might be a shade too slow, that some small thing might disturb him just long enough!

I carved a name on a slab and placed it there. I knew not the day of his birth, but gave that of his death. His name, too, I placed there, although the place a man leaves is in the hearts of those he leaves behind, and in his work, not upon a slab Ã¢â'¬Â¦

Glancing at Keokotah I noted his features were unmarked by surprise. Had he seen or heard a gun before? Later, I learned he had not, but he was a Kickapoo, not to be astonished by such things.

Who is to say? What is love? Perhaps for a time I loved her; perhaps in a way I love her still. Perhaps when a man has held a woman in his arms, there is a little of her with him forever

he had been so right, and she hated him for it.

Vincent Benét's poem The Ballad of William Sycamore.