Quotes from Frank Herbert

I poke nothing at you except words. I do it without fear of offending because I have learned that you have no ears.

As long as my Duke remains unmarried some of the Great Houses can still hope for alliance.

Don't be so sure you know where to draw the line," he said. "We carry our past with us. And, mother mine, there's a thing you don't know and should—we are Harkonnens." Her

If we cannot adjust our differences peaceably, then we are less than human

Gurney's a romantic," the Duke growled. This talk of killing suddenly disturbed him, coming from his son. "I'd sooner you never had to kill…but if the need arises, you do it however you can—tip or edge." He looked up at the skylight, on which the rain was drumming.

And again he remembered the vision of fanatic legions following the green and black banner of the Atreides, pillaging and burning across the universe in the name of their prophet Muad'Dib. That must not happen, he told himself.

I'm like a person whose hands were kept numb, without sensation from the first moment of awareness—until one day the ability to feel is forced into them. The thought hung in her mind, an enclosing awareness. And I say: "Look! I have no hands!" But the people all around me say: "What are hands?

When I set out to lead humanity along my Golden Path I promised a lesson their bones would remember. I know a profound pattern humans deny with words even while their actions affirm it. They say they seek security and quiet, conditions they call peace. Even as they speak, they create seeds of turmoil and violence.

She said the mystery of life isn't a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.

If he could smell the pre-spice mass, that meant the gasses deep under the sand were nearing explosive pressure.

Reason is the first victim of strong emotion

It's a subtle and powerful thing, prescience. The future becomes now. To be sighted in the land of the blind carries its own perils. If you try to interpret what you see for the blind, you tend to forget that the blind possess an inherent movement conditioned by their blindness. They are like a monstrous machine moving along its own path. They have their own momentum, their own fixations. I fear the blind, Stil. I fear them. They can so easily crush anything in their path.

off in strata of porous rock by the leathery half-plant, half-animal little makers—and

The writing of history is largely a process of diversion. Most historical accounts distract attention from the secret influences behind great events.

He doesn't appear much, does he—one frightened old fat man too weak to support his own flesh without the help of suspensors." It

And he thought: I'm a seed. He

If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you believe something is right or wrong, true or false, you believe the assumptions in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of holes, but remain most precious to the convinced.

Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past me I will turn to see fear's path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain." What do you despise?

Life hasn't happened because they didn't take part in it.

the most persistent principles of the universe were accident and error. Even

Yes. They'll call me…Muad'Dib, 'The One Who Points the Way.' Yes…that's what they'll call me." And

The Harkonnens discouraged investigation of the spice, didn't they?

I don't want to be part of history, I just want to be loved...

Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. This is as true of humans in the finite space of a planetary ecosystem as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive. —PARDOT KYNES, FIRST PLANETOLOGIST OF ARRAKIS