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Quotes

Once something becomes discernible, or understandable, we no longer need to repeat it. We can destroy it.

—Robert Wilson, 1991

The believer in magic and miracles reflects on how to impose a law on nature—and, in brief, the religious cult is the outcome of this reflection.

—Friedrich Nietzsche, 1878

A miracle entails a degree of irrationality—not because it shocks reason, but because it makes no appeal to it.

—Emmanuel Lévinas, 1952

Men willingly believe what they wish.

—Julius Caesar, c. 50 BC

I shall curse you with book and bell and candle.

—Thomas Malory, c. 1470

Egypt was the mother of magicians.

—Clement of Alexandria, c. 200

The fear of the Lord is true wisdom, and he who hath it not can in no way penetrate the true secrets of magic.

—Abraham the Jew, c. 1400

Appearances often are deceiving.

—Aesop, c. 550 BC

Watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you, because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.

—Roald Dahl, 1990

Everything is a miracle. It is a miracle that one does not dissolve in one’s bath like a lump of sugar.

—Pablo Picasso, 1929

Curses are like young chickens, they always come home to roost.

—Robert Southey, 1809

Nothing worth knowing can be understood with the mind.

—Woody Allen, 1979

Man is always a wizard to man, and the social world is at first magical.

—Jean-Paul Sartre, 1939