Superstitions are habits rather than beliefs.
—Marlene Dietrich, 1962Quotes
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, 1990The 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, 1878One thing alone not even God can do: to make undone whatever has been done.
—Aristotle, c. 350 BCThe 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. 1400Appearances often are deceiving.
—Aesop, c. 550 BCMan is always a wizard to man, and the social world is at first magical.
—Jean-Paul Sartre, 1939In the society of men, the truth resides now less in what things are than in what they are not. Our social realities are so ugly if seen in the light of exiled truth, and beauty is almost no longer possible if it is not a lie.
—R.D. Laing, 1967To blow and to swallow at the same time is not easy; I cannot at the same time be here and also there.
—Plautus, c. 200 BCAny serious attempt to do anything worthwhile is ritualistic.
—Derek Walcott, 1986Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing in government and business.
—Tom Robbins, 1976Everything is a miracle. It is a miracle that one does not dissolve in one’s bath like a lump of sugar.
—Pablo Picasso, 1929On no other stage are the scenes shifted with a swiftness so like magic as on the great stage of history when once the hour strikes.
—Edward Bellamy, 1888