Quotes About Illusion

Think about it. Think how it works. We deceive ourselves far more easily than others deceive us. Our false perceptions betray us. Our fears and doubts worm their way into our subconscious and cause us to believe what isn't necessarily true but becomes true through our own fixation on the possibilities.

an event that had the consistency of smoke and lacked anything of substance.

Sometimes things feel real when they aren't. It might all just be nonsense you've persuaded yourself is something more.

It is not true that things are never as bad as they seem or that grass is always greener on the other side of the fence or that there is a silver lining inside every cloud. These are things we wish were true, but which are more often than not false hopes.

Perhaps it was all an elaborate charade of the sort envisioned by Miles, where the dragons were large iguanas and the knights and wizards were all supplied by Central Casting. Perhaps the dream was a sham, an imitation of what the imagination would have it truly be. Even if it were all real – if it were all as described, all as the artist had rendered it to be – still it might be less than the dream. It might be as ordinary in truth as his present life.

Îi l?sase s? le înl?nÈ›uie de el cu propriile mâini, s? se legene în iluzii de m?rire È™i în l?comie, s? devin? sclavi, dependenÈ›i de false speranÈ›e È™i dorinÈ›e nebuneÈ™ti.

Glories, like glow-worms, afar off shine bright, But look'd too near have neither heat nor light.' John Webster (c.1580–1634), English Jacobean dramatist

The theatre can teach us some truth, but it is the truth of the illusory nature of our existence. It can alert us to the dream-like quality of our lives, their brevity, mutability and lack of solid grounds. As such, by reminding us of our mortality, it can foster in us the virtue of humility.

What persuades men and women to mistake each other from time to time for gods and vermin is ideology.

Reality is irrelevant; Perception is everything.

Perception was easily accomplished, required little effort, and it never had to stand the test of reality.

In the end, people believed what they wanted to believe. The truth had very little to do with it.

Safety is only an illusion when evil is on the hunt. I can't stand by and watch. I have to act.

He had sometimes looked into her eyes and whispered to himself how bewitching she was, as if she weren't there hearing him, as if he were all alone looking upon some exceptional specimen rather than his wife.

Wizard's First Rule: people are stupid, they believe what they want to believe.

Zedd leaned forward eagerly, cutting him off. "Can you command the wind?" Richard leaned back a little. "Of course I can," he said, playing along. He held both hands up to the sky. "Come to me, brother wind! Gather about! Blow a gale for me!" He spread his arms dramatically. Kahlan wrapped her cloak around herself expectantly. Zedd looked about. Nothing happened. The two of them seemed a little disappointed.

Safety is only an illusion when evil is on the hunt. I can't stand by and watch. I have to act. It isn't easy to absolve one's self of guilt.

Some are simply blind to the truth and fight for the lies they hear.

Wizards first Rule: People will believe a lie because they want it to be true or because they're afraid it MIGHT be true

Reality could seldom match the imagination, and in the imagination, the pain was real.

We dream of times that are not and blindly flee the only one that is. The fact is that the present usually hurts. —BLAISE PASCAL, Pensées

It's still magic even if you know how it's done.

He'd been wrong, there was a light at the end of the tunnel, and it was a flamethrower.

Seeing, contrary to popular wisdom, isn't believing. It's where belief stops, because it isn't needed any more.