Quotes from Frank Herbert

It was such a totally unexpected statement from the mouth of a child that the Baron stared at her, speechless in spite of his anger. Is it a midget? he asked himself.

I don't think it's quite that simple. Some people never observe anything. Life just happens to them. They get Dy on little more than a kind of dumb persistence, and they resist with anger and resentment anything that might lift them out of that false serenity.

Somos uma sonda perscrutando o desconhecido, investigando a incerteza.

Hydraulic despotism: central control of an essential energy such as water, electricity, fuel, medicines, melange. . . Obey the central controlling power or the energy is shut off and you die!

when one has lived with prophecy for so long, the moment of revelation is a shock.

A human can override any nerve in the body.

Key log: a truly ancient concept from the days before suspensors when lumbermen sent their fallen timber rushing down rivers to central mill sites. Sometimes the logs jammed up in the river and an expert was brought in to find the one log, the key log, which would free the jam when removed.

Cool your sorrow—we've the diversions for it; three things there are that ease the heart—water, green grass, and the beauty of woman.

Abandonem a certeza! Esse é o comando mais profundo que a vida nos dá. É o que constitui a vida, no final das contas.

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.

Oamenii se nasc predispuÈ™i la una dintre cele mai tenace È™i debilitante afecÈ›iuni mentale: autoam?girea. Cea mai bun? ca È™i cea mai rea dintre lumile posibile îÈ™i cap?t? din aceast? stare de lucruri coloritul lor tragic. În m?sura în care putem noi s? determin?m, nu exist? imunitate natural?. VigilenÈ›a se impune în fiece clip?.

I must have a child," she said. He shook his head from side to side. "I must have my way!" she snapped. "If need be, I'll find another fatherfor my child. I'll cuckold you and dare you to expose me." "Cuckold me all you wish," he said, "but no child." "How can you stop me?" With a smile of utmost kindness, he said: "I'd have you garroted, if it came to that.

Behind any use of power over another the ultimate assumption remains: 'I feed on your energy.

This is their weakness, Duncan. Radicals always see matters in terms which are too simple—black and white, good and evil, them and us. By addressing complex matters in that way, they rip open a passage for chaos. The art of government as you call it, is the mastery of chaos.

A world is supported by four things. …" She held up four big-knuckled fingers. "… the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous and the valor of the brave. But all of these are as nothing. …" She closed her fingers into a fist. "… without a ruler who knows the art of ruling. Make that the science of your tradition!

There's nothing so passionate as a vested interest disguised as an intellectual conviction.

What has mood to do with it? You fight when the necessity arises—no matter the mood!

Blast and damn that Duncan Idaho!

Belief structure creates a filter through which chaos is sifted into order.

Give as few orders as possible," his father had told him…once…long ago. "Once you've given orders on a subject, you must always give orders on that subject." The Fremen

You have no body shield," Idaho said. "Do you wish mine?" He glanced at the distant cliff. "Not likely there'll be any more lasgun activity about." "Keep your shield, Duncan. Your right arm is shield enough for me.

Power attracts the corruptible.

I can say God, but that is not my God. That is only a noise and no more potent than any other noise.

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'Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.