Quotes from Frank Herbert

You understand? One uses power by grasping it lightly. To grasp too strongly is to be taken over by power, and thus to become its victim.

The oracle cannot chance upon what it cannot understand.

we can say that Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad

Is it defeatist or treacherous for a doctor to diagnose a disease correctly?

And Paul saw how futile were any efforts of his to change any smallest bit of this. He had thought to oppose the jihad within himself, but the jihad would be. His legions would rage out from Arrakis even without him. They needed only the legend he already had become.

The problem with leadership is that leaders are human beings. And when they make mistakes, their mistakes are amplified by the numbers who follow without question.

Hubo un tiempo en que los hombres dedicaban su pensamiento a las máquinas, con la esperanza de que ellas les harían libres. Pero esto solo permitió que otros hombres con máquinas les esclavizaran.

Reason is valuable," he said, "only when it performs against the wordless physical background of the universe." Her

The thing about computers—it's like training a dog. You have to be smarter than the dog. If you make a computer smarter than you are, that has to be accident, synergy, or divine intervention.

Probablemente no haya en nuestra vida un instante más terrible que aquel en que uno descubre que su padre es un hombre... hecho de carne humana.

Your own emperor bestowed Arrakis on House Atreides. I am House Atreides." The

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. —THE OPEN-ENDED PROOF FROM THE PANOPLIA PROPHETICA

No conoceré el miedo. El miedo mata la mente. El miedo es la pequeña muerte que conduce a la destrucción total. Afrontaré mi miedo. Permitiré que pase sobre mí y a través de mí. Y cuando haya pasado, giraré mi ojo interior para escrutar su camino. Allá donde haya pasado el miedo ya no habrá nada. Solo estaré yo».

To exist is to stand out, away from the background

If some crazy bastard tossed you into a lake when you couldn't swim, and you learned to swim like that"—Bickel snapped his fingers—"and you found then you could just keep on going, wouldn't you swim like hell to get away from the crazy bastard?

She didn't like the fact that people of both sietch and graben referred to Muad'Dib as Him.

What is justice? Two forces collide. Each may have the right in his own sphere. And here's where an Emperor commands orderly solutions. Those collisions he cannot prevent—he solves." "How?" "In the simplest way: he decides." "Keeping his friends and destroying his enemies.

I have another kind of sight. I see another kind of terrain: the available paths. The

You cannot go on forever stealing what you need without regard to those who come after. The physical qualities of a planet are written into its economic and political record. We have the record in front of us and our course is obvious.

Can you take him, Gurney?" "M'Lord jests!

He's taking the change well? She asked. Except for getting a bit overtired. He's excited, but what 15-year-old wouldn't be under these circumstances?

They displayed a sophistication in warfare as good as anything he had ever encountered, and he had been trained by the best fighters in the universe then seasoned in battles where only the superior few survived.

Experts and specialists lead you quickly into chaos. They are a source of useless nit-picking, the ferocious quibble over a comma.

The omnipresent enemy was the outside —that total absence of the things to support life that emptiness called space. It was evil and they feared it—constantly. A rod and staff might comfort in the presence of space, but what you dreamed about was washed air and a womblike enclosed cell where you could divest yourself of the damnable suit. This was the true source of comfort no matter if it came from the Devil himself.