52 Orson Scott Card Quotes on Suffering

Orson Scott Card quotes on suffering

30. I've lived too long with pain. I won't know who I am without it.

41. His accent made him exotic and interesting; his broken arm made him a martyr; his sadism made him a natural focus for all those who loved pain in others.

123. That's right. I want all the secrets opened up. I want all the files unlocked. I don't want anything hidden You don't know what you're asking. You don't know how much pain it will cause if all the secrets come out Take a look at my family. How can the truth cause anymore pain than the secrets have already caused?

155. Who is more cursed, the one who dies, unknowing until the very moment of his death or the one who watched his destruction as it approached, step by step, for days and weeks and years?

190. She thinks she's the only one in the would to ever suffer. I say that without rancor. I have simply observed that she's so full of pain, she's incapable of taking anyone else's pain seriously.

207. Do I think you actually care? It's a good thing I have no soul. That's the only thing that stops you from devouring it If I ever had your soul in my mouth I would spit it out.

208. If only we were wiser or better people perhaps the gods would explain the mad, unbearable things they do

230. No matter what they say they all intend to live Except the suicides? They intended to live, too. Suicide is a desperate attempt to get rid of unbearable agony.

240. That's life. It hurts, it's dirty, and it feels very very good.

273. All those months when bean refused to see Ender, hid from him, it was because he couldn't bear to face the fact that Ender was what bean only wished to be - the kind of person on whom you could put all your hopes, who could carry all your fears, and he would not let you down, would not betray you. I want to be the kind of boy you are, thought bean. But I don't want to go through what you've been through to get there

307. If I have to choose between an omnipotent God who leaves the world in this condition, and a God who has only a little bit of power but really cares and tries to make things better, I'll take you every time. Go on playing God, Hyrum. You're not bad at it. Sometimes you kind of get it right.

322. If she had the power to make him cry because of his love for her, then there was only one possible solution for him: cease loving her. This was the last time she would ever be able to do this to him.

445. He isn't insane, he's simply as trapped in his life as I am in mine. That makes us friends

453. Again, as so many times before, [he] felt tears come to his eyes. But he fought them off - he was getting better at that, hiding his true feelings. Though of course sitting up here... Certainly made it plain that he wasn't happy about something

471. There are many things that men and women do not say, because to say them would only bring unhappiness

516. We've seen the worst that men can do, pa, and been the worst that men can be. But that don't mean that someday we wont see the best, too. And if we can never be perfect after this, well, we can still be pretty good, can't we?

529. ...All of a sudden they both felt their arms pretty near wrenched right out of their sockets and then they were dragged around, grabbed by the collars, and smacked together so hard their noses bled and they saw stars.

557. Don't hurt each other any more, children How could I hurt her? She'd have to love me before I could do that

585. He would have had a bad five minutes there, but by now it would be over. He wouldn't have this dull ache in his heart, the sharp yearning in his throat, the words trying to escape

597. His eyes cannot be closed except by his own weeping and his own trust

606. And if it tortures you to know that another man was with her in her life, console yourself with this: he only knew her but the once

609. Poor beauty. May I not pity her, of all people? She loved him, but she had only learned one way to show her love - through cruelty and abuse

624. [He] didn't like dreams because they were even worse than his real life.

631. Damn her for forcing him to discover things like this about himself

651. If I don't do anything that also ruins lives Beginning with your own Maybe Because you need children. Don't you? I don't know if I could ever do that again. Now that I know what it does to you when you lose one. Is it worse than losing a parent? Yes Worse than losing yourself? I've never lost myself

653. Is there really some balance in the universe? Some scale of justice that will bring her here and find some way to set things to rights?

671. Only when she stopped being dead, only these few weeks with [him] in the house did she understand how dead she had been. Lost in her guilt, her shame, her pain, her losses. Now that she had learned again to love and hope, now that she was no longer as ashamed or guilty, of course it was the very joy that was killing her again.

672. Whoever set up the universe, it really sucks. If you ever get around to making another one, change the rules a little. Lighten up on your creatures. Give us a break now and then

734. Nothing can last. Nothing is, finally, what it once seemed to be. [she] and he had the perfect marriage until there came a stress that exposed it's imperfection. Anyone who thinks he has a perfect marriage, a perfect friendship, a perfect trust of any kind, he only believes this because the stress that will break it has not yet come. He might die with the illusion of happiness, but all he has proven is that sometimes death comes before betrayal. If you live long enough, betrayal will inevitably come

747. I am filled with all the truth that was discarded by men when they chose their lies and died for them. I am in constant pain, and now that I have met a man who does not add to my treasury of falsehood, you are the cruelest of them all.

752. They were gnawed within by the grief of knowing that this greatest gift of all gifts was forever out of their reach.

780. My head hurts. Don't you think we could get more drugs?

792. There is no good thing that does not cost a dear price. That is what Cristoforo learned by looking back upon his life. Happiness is not a life without pain, but rather a life in which the pain is traded for a worthy price. That is what you gave me, lord.

807. What games was god playing with her life?

819. Kyaren, I don't want to leave you Then don't It's because I love you that I want to leave If you love me, you'll stay' he had known it, from the moment she appeared in the door. He couldn't leave her. When the change came, it would come, and then it would be irreversible, and then he would leave because he loved someone else and there was something in him that made it impossible for him to love 2 people at once. But not the one person was Kyaren, and he could not leave her because she wanted him to stay. 'Ill hurt you You could not hurt me worse than leaving me now, for no reason

827. You know that you still love him No Ansset, your love was never slight. You gave without bar, and received without caution, and just because it brought pain doesn't mean that it is gone

841. But she could see that she had wounded him. He had been stupid, but he was smart enough to recognize the fact

852. What a heavy burden to bear Heaviest because there's nothing I can do Then it's not your burden, is it? The opposite is true. The burden is heavier precisely because I can't do anything about it

858. Self-knowledge can be painful, but not half so damaging as self-ignorance

866. We feel pain; what we don't feel is fear. Or rather, we've learned to separate pain and fear

873. Of all the traitors who have ever lived, Lanik Mueller, there must be a special place in hell reserved for you I've been to hell. It's a better place than this

880. I immediately felt so comfortable there. Or if not comfortable, at least willing to bear the discomforts because they fit the awkward places in my heart

884. It would strip the structure of my soul forever. I had never believed I had a soul until then, when it laid bear a hurt more deep than any part of me could bear

907. We haven't the power to change men's hearts. We're not responsible. It isn't our fault. Your hands are clean aren't they? Out here where the sun keeps everything pure. But you're not pure! Because if you could stop the suffering and dying, and didn't stop it, the you are guilty. It is your fault. We kill no one. We do not let them kill us. We have nothing to do with them

980. Death's alright. But not worth going through any extra trouble to get here. You miss everything when you're here... Even the pain. Even the despair.

990. Do you realize what you're saying? You're saying, please take me out of heaven, god, and send me to hell

994. Have you come to take away the pain again?' The man shook his head. The hope had been brief, but the disappointment was no less deep because of that. 'If you can't do that then what good are you to us?

1010. The puppet, wishes to be free You are free. Stay and die, go and live - you have your choice What choice is that! What do you expect, an infinite selection? To have a choice at all is to be free - even when the choice is between two terrible things. Which is the most terrible, Jason? Which do you hate the most? Then choose the other and be glad

1019. They had no use for a god who couldn't save them from everything

1023. I've been wounded and you're using the bloody place to teach me, and if that's what gods are supposed to do, then I wish there were no gods at all

1029. Hypocrites, I said to them. You dare to rob mankind of all it's pain, yet treasure your own agonies. Who watches you?

1070. I've lived too long with pain. I won't know who I am without it. -Ender's Game