Alan Branch

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The Souls of Blac...
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Isaac Newton
“Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who set the planets in motion.”
Isaac Newton

Ted Chiang
“The universe began as an enormous breath being held. Who knows why, but whatever the reason, I'm glad it did, because I owe my existence to that fact. All my desires and ruminations are no more and no less than eddy currents generated by the gradual exhalation of our universe. And until this great exhalation is finished, my thoughts live on.”
Ted Chiang, Exhalation

Pema Chödrön
“Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don’t really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It’s just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy. When we think that something is going to bring us pleasure, we don’t know what’s really going to happen. When we think something is going to give us misery, we don’t know. Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all. We try to do what we think is going to help. But we don’t know. We never know if we’re going to fall flat or sit up tall. When there’s a big disappointment, we don’t know if that’s the end of the story. It may be just the beginning of a great adventure.”
Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times

Martin Luther King Jr.
“It may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, "Wait on time.”
Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches

Dante Alighieri
“Thus it was up to God, to Him alone
in His own ways - by one or both, I say -
to give man back his whole life and perfection.

But since a deed done is more prized the more
it manifests within itself the mark
of the loving heart and goodness of the doer,

the Everlasting Love, whose seal is plain
on all the wax of the world was pleased to move
in all His ways to raise you up again.

There was not, nor will be, from the first day
to the last night, an act so glorious
and so magnificent, on either way.

For God, in giving Himself that man might be
able to raise himself, gave even more
than if he had forgiven him in mercy.

All other means would have been short, I say,
of perfect justice, but that God's own Son
humbled Himself to take on mortal clay.

-Paradiso, Canto VII”
Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno - Purgatorio - Paradiso

year in books
Julia Ryan
255 books | 77 friends

Courtne...
143 books | 135 friends

Kaitlyn
855 books | 36 friends

Maria L...
325 books | 50 friends

Cait Ireen
1,386 books | 580 friends

Mariah ...
1,116 books | 34 friends

Katie H...
471 books | 84 friends

Kate Jo...
376 books | 57 friends

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