“Polish comes from the cities; wisdom from the desert.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Does the prophet see the future or does he see a line of weakness, a fault or cleavage that he may shatter with words or decisions as a diamond-cutter shatters his gem with a blow of a knife? —”
―
Frank Herbert
“Isn’t it odd how we misunderstand the hidden unity of kindness and cruelty?” Jessica”
―
Frank Herbert
“The old woman was a witch shadow—hair like matted spiderwebs, hooded ’round darkness of features, eyes like glittering jewels.”
―
Frank Herbert
“His thoughts were too vague to be described, but they comprehended mysterious elements.”
―
Frank Herbert
“No more terrible disaster could befall your people than for them to fall into the hands of a Hero”
―
Frank Herbert
“Paul felt that he had been infected with terrible purpose. He did not know yet what the terrible purpose was.”
―
Frank Herbert
“All men beneath your position covet your station,”
―
Frank Herbert
“learned rapidly because his first training was in how to leam. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Whirling silence settled around Jessica. Every fiber of her body accepted the fact that something profound had happened to it. She felt that she was a conscious mote, smaller than any subatomic particle, yet capable of motion and of sensing her surroundings. Like an abrupt revelation—the curtains whipped away—she realized she had become aware of a psychokinesthetic extension of herself. She was the mote, yet not the mote.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Paul took a place in the line behind Chani. He had put down the black feeling at being caught by the girl. In his mind now was the memory called up by his mother’s barked reminder: “My son’s been tested with the gom jabbar!” He found that his hand tingled with remembered pain.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Science is made up of so many things that appear obvious after they are explained.”
―
Frank Herbert
“Highly organized research is guaranteed to produce nothing new.”
―
Frank Herbert
“The mind can go either direction under stress—toward positive or toward negative:”
―
Frank Herbert
“Arrakis is a one-crop planet,” his father said. “One crop. It supports a ruling class that lives as ruling classes have lived in all times while, beneath them, a semihuman mass of semislaves exists on the leavings. It’s the masses and the leavings that occupy our attention. These are far more valuable than has ever been suspected.”
―
Frank Herbert
