Quotes About Illusion

Power was an illusion of perception, as Jasnah had said. The first step to being in control was to see yourself as capable of being in control.

My name is Stephen Leeds, and I am perfectly sane. My hallucinations, however, are all quite mad.

You see, the great thing about madness is that it's all in your head.

THE BEST WAY TO FOOL SOMEONE, in Vin's estimation, was to give them what they wanted. Or, at the very least, what they expected. As long as they assumed that they were one step ahead, they wouldn't look back to see if there were any steps that they'd completely missed.

Humans can see the world as it is not. It is why your lies can be so strong. You are able to not admit that they are lies.

Brightness," the man said as she stepped up to him, "we aren't what you think we are." "No," Shallan replied. "You aren't what you think yourselves to be.

If there was one thing Kelsier was good at, it was lying to himself.

But he'd found that imaginary things were often the only items of real substance in people's lives.

A boring truth will always have difficulty competing with an exciting lie.

Your hallucination... Yes? Your hallucination has hallucinations. Yes.

Kelsier smiled. Gods, it appeared, could still fall for a classic misdirection con.

Ruin still used Reen's voice—it was familiar, something that had always seemed a part of her. Discovering that it belonged to that thing …it was like finding out that her reflection really belonged to someone else, and that she'd never actually seen herself.

A prisoner could be convinced that they lived in a paradise, if the prison was pretty enough.

Imaginary things were often the only items of real substance in people's lives.

Why did it seem that the more he demonstrated himself to be an idiot, the more convinced people became that he had some kind of hidden depths?

You like lies?" Shallan asked. "Good lies," Pattern said. "That lie. Good lie." "What makes a lie good?" Shallan asked, taking careful notes, recording Pattern's exact words. "True lies." "Pattern, those two are opposites." "Hmmmm . . . Light makes shadow. Truth makes lies. Hmmmm.

But here's the thing. The lies we tell, the dreams we create, they're not real. We can't let them be real. This might be the hardest lesson you have to learn.

How easy it was to ignore a blackened heart if you dressed it in a pressed uniform and a reputation for honesty.

The truth is not a downer," Abraham said in his lightly accented voice. "The lies that you pretend to accept are the true downer.

Wasing not of wasing is", Quentin added.

Without the glowing fruit, the place was as black as the inside of a can of black paint that had also been painted black.

It would be like finding out that you'd drawn lots for dessert at the Factory and been only one number off, only it didn't matter because Pete already snuck in to steal the dessert, so nobody was going to get any anyway - not even Pete, because it turns out there had never been any dessert to begin with.

There are no good men, Bleeder said. Choice is an illusion, lawman. There are those created to be selfish and there are those created to be selfless. This does not make them good or evil, any more than the ravaging lion is evil when compared to the placid rabbit.

Wasing not of wasing is," Quentin added.