Season of the Witch

The search for enlightenment is actually like an addiction: the drug that enslaves us is like the shadow itself.
~Akron, The H.R. Giger Tarot

Living well is the best revenge.
~Gabriel Blackstone (Season of the Witch; pg.83)

One's eyes is what one is, one's mouth what one becomes.
~John Galsworthy

Our brains are becoming lazy. We are losing the skill of remembrance. Our long-term memories are eroding. Instead of exercising our natural ability to remember, the way our ancestors had to do, we rely on modern technology-- the Internet, TV, photocopiers-- to prop up our ability to recollect facts and events. We are failures at remembering.
~Minnaloushe Monk (Season of the Witch; pg. 166)

Man's soul is inextricably bound to his power of recollection...
~Minnaloushe Monk (Season of the Witch; pg.116)

It changed his entire outlook on how he wanted to live his life. He realized that if you don't take risks, you will never know your limit. And if you don't know your limit, you don't know who you are as a human being. As a poet said: one should never be a butterfly collector. Rather be the butterfly itself.
~Morrighan Monk (Season of the Witch; pg. 124)

Don't you sometimes wonder how strong, how fast, how brave you are? ... Well, I suppose it's about taking yourself to a new level. And I'm not just talking about jumping off a tower. It could be a mental thing as well. Whether it's a challenge to the body or the mind, it doesn't matter. The common denominator is turning your back on safety and embracing the void.
~Morrighan Monk (Season of the Witch; pg.128)

You know what G.K. Chesterton said about angels and flying...they fly because they take themselves lightly.
~Morrighan Monk (Season of the Witch; pg.129)

It's an exercise of concentration. If I manage to keep my concentration with all those eyes on me, it strengthens my mind. Toughens the brain. To regain inner stillness when you find yourself in such a vulnerable position requires discipline, believe me.
~Minnaloushe Monk (Season of the Witch; pg. 154)

...I'm never sentimental about information. Not like Isidore who believes that information should be like oxygen. Free-- out there-- belonging to no one and everyone. Uncorrupted by issues such as profit and ownership.
~Gabriel Blackstone (Season of the Witch; pg.156-157)

What is the colour of seduction?
The easy answer is red, but that does not ring true. Red is full on. Seduction is a feather brushing against the inner thigh. Subtle. Teasing. I think the colour of seduction is cappuccino, dark coffee diluted with cream.
~The Diary of "M" (Season of the Witch; pg. 175)

Risk leaves our senses quivering. Danger is erotic. We are most aware when we find ourselves in the shadow of death.
~The Diary of "M" (Season of the Witch; pg. 176)

Love is extreme sport. It exercises the muscle of the mind with the same intensity as climbing a mountain exercises the muscle of the heart. And it's just as dangerous.
~The Diary of "M" (Season of the Witch; pg.192)

Everything that deceives can be said to enchant.
~Plato

But our multitasking ability is a facile skill, allowing us to skim the waves of chaos, not swim through them. We're all born with natural memory. But instead of strengthening that memory throughout our lives--training it the way we do our body in a gym--we allow it to become flabby.
~Adrian Stallworthy (Season of the Witch; pg.288)

Memory, Minnaloushe came to believe, was what set man apart from all other living things in creation. Without memory you have no sense of self. Without memory you cannot remember the road you've traveled--can gain nothing from present life.
~Season of the Witch; pg.337

One of the crueler jokes of creation is being burdened with brains capable of conceptualizing a state of higher conciousness we have little hope of ever achieving. But we can strive, walking with hands outstretched like a blind man trying to orient himself in an alien place. And sometimes our clumsy fingers graze the mind of God.
~Gabriel Blackstone (Season of the Witch; pg.392)

If no one wanted more, evolution would stop in its tracks.
~Gabriel Balckstone (Season of the Witch; pg.393)

At the start of the book, he thinks he is cursed. But by the end he knows it was better to have seen fleetingly than not to have seen at all. It is better to go through life in pain but awake...than anesthetized and unaware.
~Gabriel Blackstone (Season of the Witch; pg.393)

Theirs had not been a great passion-- no delirium, no fevered brows-- rather a thing of quiet beauty. As the years passed he discovered that trust, gratitude, and a love more serene spin their own kind of magic. Most people feel alone, even when together. He and Frankie never did. They had known each other in full. Not a grand passion. But a love story? ... Oh yes, most certainly a love story.
~Gabriel Balckstone (Season of the Witch; pg.395)