logo

Quotes About Sacrifice

I wanted her to to go on talking and understand without me saying anything. I wanted her to love me enough to leave him, to pack us up and take us away from him, to kill him if need be. (107)
~ Dorothy Allison
If we are not to sacrifice some part of ourselves or our community, we will have to go through the grief, the fear of exposure, and struggle, with only a thin layer of trust that we will emerge whole and unbroken. I know of no other way to do this than to start by saying, I will give up nothing. I will give up no one.
~ Dorothy Allison
Who had Mama been, what had she wanted to be or do before I was born? Once I was born, her hopes had turned, and I had climbed up her life like a flower reaching for the sun.
~ Dorothy Allison
I wanted her to love me enough to leave him, to pack us up and take us away from him, to kill him if need be.
~ Dorothy Allison
Half asleep in the sun, reassured by the familiar smell of frying fat, I'd make promises to God. If only He'd let me be a singer! I knew I'd probably turn to whiskey and rock 'n' roll like they all did, but not for years, I promised. Not for years, Lord. Not till I had glorified His name and bought Mama a yellow Cadillac and a house on Old Henderson Road.
~ Dorothy Allison
My dear, my dear,' said Kate, but to herself. 'I would give you my soul in a blackberry pie; and a knife to cut it with.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
He said, 'You have everything there is of me, save a little I gave to my people. Now you hold that as well.' And last of all, when he had released her and moved to the door, to stand outside where the sky was enclosed with thick hills and dark, heavy forests, he said, because he could not prevent himself, 'When next you stand by the sea, say goodbye for me.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
If they place the sun in my right hand and the moon in my left and ask me to give up my mission, I will not give it up until the truth prevails or I myself perish in the attempt.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Escape into self-destruction by all means; but not until your duty is done.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
All the linear delicacy of the boy he had once been stood exposed now in the still, blindfolded face of her son. The clinging yellow hair, orderly on the white linen, was the same silk that had veiled her rings when she had smoothed his pillow in childhood; the cheekbone under the bandage had once, fresh and firm, been pressed to her own; the beautiful hands, lying loose on the damask, belonged to him and also to another man, whom she had placed before all others, and always would.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
We all die,' said Nostradamus. 'The man you love. The man who loves you. The man you married. But because of you there will be something, I promise you, by which men will know Francis Crawford has been.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Our powder and arrows are going to run out on us some time. And so are our food and water and joie de vivre and good books and everything. Why not walk out now and get made into somebody's favourite slave?
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Whoever is unsupported by the Mystery of Love shall not achieve the grace of salvation. Whoever shall cast love aside shall lose everything.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Five years ago your brother Lymond was found to have been selling his own country for years: he's been kicked from land to land committing every crime on the calendar and now he's back here, God forgive him, with filthier habits and a nastier mind than he set out with.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Here you have a hawk of the lure, not of the fist. He will not come to you. If you would have him, you must lay your heart upon your hawking-glove; and feed it to him.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Jerott's voice was stony. 'I am prepared to go wherever I can be of most help. I meant only that I expect to be too occupied to give the attention I ought to Mile Marthe's safety. I think M. Gaultier should come with us.' 'Then who,' said Lymond agreeably, 'do you suggest looks after the spinet?' 'Onophrion?' 'Jerott,' said Lymond, with the thinnest edge beginning to show in his voice.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
We don't go near the bridge,' said Lymond peacefully. 'Excuse me,' said Fergie Hoddim. 'How can you wreck a fine bridge without going near it?' 'By sending something else near it instead,' Lymond said. 'An ox to Jupiter, a dog to Hecate, a dove to Venus, a sow to Ceres, a fish to Neptune. What, instead of Fergie Hoddim, shall we sacrifice?
~ Dorothy Dunnett
He had not moved. But, her blue eyes on his face, she did not rise. 'Lord, is there nothing in the cup for me? While you were drinking, I was singing to you.' The detachment had gone from his face, but not the strength. He shook his head; and rising, Marthe turned and walked from the room.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
What I desire, thou dost not possess for thyself. How canst thou render it then to another?
~ Dorothy Dunnett
You summon and you throw away. You treat love like a bird for the table … Like a pawn, now in frankincense, now discarded and thrown in the dirt. You don't know what love is, either of you. And God help us and you, if you ever find out.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
I sometimes wonder," said Francis Crawford, "if I only exist to be sacrificed to." Her heart beating strongly, she watched him. "Perhaps," she said. "But if you accept sacrifices, you must respond with acts of reparation.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
Philippa … release me from my promise.' She put her hands over her mouth, and then took them away. 'I can't. I can't.' He had pulled his own hands down, looking still at the stool, his face quite turned away. 'You can. Philippa. Please let me go.'
~ Dorothy Dunnett
You will be told when and from where the fleet is leaving. I am…conscious that you are all giving up money and position in France for this." "We only came in the first place," Danny said, open-eyed, "because you were coming.
~ Dorothy Dunnett
There is a man in him that could support it,' Archie said. 'True enough. But it is maybe a man the world could do without.
~ Dorothy Dunnett