She continued weeping until the heat of her tear water, the sheer velocity of its flow, finally obscured the already vague circumstances of its origins.
—Tom Robbins
Religion is not merely the opium of the masses, it’s the cyanide.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Religion
Human folly does not impede the turning of the stars.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Stars
There is a certain Buddhistic calm that comes from having … money in the bank.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Money
Unhappiness is the ultimate form of self-indulgence.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Happiness, Unhappiness
True stability results when presumed order and presumed disorder are balanced. A truly stable system expects the unexpected, is prepared to be disrupted, waits to be transformed.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Disorder
Gods and men create one another, destroy one another, though by different means.
—Tom Robbins
Using words to describe magic is like using a screwdriver to cut roast beef.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Magic
Humanity has advanced, when it has advanced, not because it has been sober, responsible, and cautious, but because it has been playful, rebellious, and immature.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Humanity, Humankind
There’s a tendency today to absolve individuals of moral responsibility and treat them as victims of social circumstance. You buy that; you pay with your soul. What limits people is lack of character. What limits people is that they don’t have the nerve to star in their own fucking movie, let alone direct it.
—Tom Robbins
Philosophers have argued for centuries about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, but materialists have always known it depends on whether they are jitterbugging or dancing cheek to cheek.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Angels, Dancing
The bottom line is that (a) people are never perfect, but love can be, (b) that is the one and only way that the mediocre and vile can be transformed, and (c) doing that makes it that. We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Love
In order to be respected, authority has got to be respectable.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Authority
Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing in government and business.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Business, Government, Magic
There are many things worth living for, a few things worth dying for, and nothing worth killing for.
—Tom Robbins
The party in Alobar’s head, which agitation and anxiety were throwing, now was crashed by a notion: existence can be rearranged.
—Tom Robbins
To be or not to be isn’t the question. The question is how to prolong being.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Health
Logic only gives man what he needs…Magic gives him what he wants.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Magic
Often, moreover, it is that aspect of our being that society finds eccentric, ridiculous, or disagreeable, that holds our sweet waters, our secret well of happiness, the key to our equanimity in malevolent climes.
—Tom Robbins
Love is the ultimate outlaw. It just won’t adhere to any rules. The most any of us can do is sign on as its accomplice.
—Tom Robbins
Topics: Love
We pay just as dearly for our triumphs as we do for our defeats. Go ahead and fail. But fail with wit, fail with grace, fail with style. A mediocre failure is as insufferable as a mediocre success. Embrace failure! Seek it out. Learn to love it. That may be the only way any of us will ever be free.
—Tom Robbins
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