The reason that adulation is not displeasing is that, though untrue, it shows one to be of consequence enough, in one way or other, to induce people to lie.
O father, father
Gone from us, lost to us,
The church lies bereft,
Alone,
Desecrated, desolated.
And the heathen shall build
On the ruins
Their world without God.
I see it.
I see it.
Truth may perhaps come to the price of a pearl, that showeth best by day; but it will not rise to the price of a diamond or carbuncle, that showeth best in varied lights. A mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure. Doth any man doubt that, if there were taken out of men's minds vain opinions, flattering hopes, false valuations, imaginations as one would, and the like, but it would leave the minds of a number of men poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and indisposition, and unpleasing to themselves?
The seed of mystery lies in muddy water. How can I perceive this mystery? Water becomes clear through stillness. How can I become still? By flowing with the stream.
Delusions, errors and lies are like huge, gaudy vessels, the rafters of which are rotten and worm-eaten, and those who embark in them are fated to be shipwrecked.
I had the fortune or misfortune to learn how to read fluently starting at the age of three. So I had read maybe 150 books by the time I hit 1st grade. And I already knew that the teachers were lying to me.
And the end of the fight is tombstone white with the name of the late deceased, and the epitaph drear, "A Fool lies here who tried to hustle the East."
Lying very still and thinking very little is the most inexpensive medicine for all the sicknesses of the soul, and when administered with good intentions it grows more and more pleasant with each passing hour.