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diff --git a/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/children-of-dune b/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/children-of-dune new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a543071 --- /dev/null +++ b/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/children-of-dune @@ -0,0 +1,614 @@ +Muad'Dib's teachings have become the playground of scholastics, of the +superstitious and the corrupt. He taught a balanced way of life, a philosophy +with which a human can meet problems arising from an ever-changing universe. +He said humankind is still evolving, in a process which will never end. +He said this evolution moves on changing principles which are known only +to eternity. How can corrupted reasoning play with such an essence? + + -- Words of the Mentat Duncan Idaho +% + CHALLENGE: "Have you seen The Preacher?" + RESPONSE: "I have seen a sandworm." + CHALLENGE: "What about that sandworm?" + RESPONSE: "It gives us the air we breathe." + CHALLENGE: "Then why do we destroy its land?" + RESPONSE: "Because Shai-Hulud [sandworm deified] orders it." + + -- Riddles of Arrakis by Harq al-Ada +% + The sietch at the desert's rim + Was Liet's, was Kynes's, + Was Stilgar's, was Muad'Dib's + And, once more, was Stilgar's. + The Naibs one by one sleep in the sand, + But the sietch endures. + + -- from a Fremen song +% +melange (me'-lange also ma,lanj) n-s, origin uncertain (thought to derive from +ancient Terran Franzh): a. mixture of spices; b. spice of Arrakis (Dune) with +geriatric properties first noted by Yanshuph Ashkoko, royal chemist in reign of +Shakkad the Wise; Arrakeen melange, found only in deepest desert sands of +Arrakis, linked to prophetic visions of Paul Muad'Dib (Atreides), first Fremen +Mahdi; also employed by Spacing Guild Navigators and the Bene Gesserit. + + -- Dictionary Royal fifth edition +% +The Fremen must return to his original faith, to his genius in forming human +communities; he must return to the past, where that lesson of survival was +learned in the struggle with Arrakis. The only business of the Fremen should be +that of opening his soul to the inner teachings. The worlds of the Imperium, +the Landsraad and the CHOAM Confederacy have no message to give him. +They will only rob him of his soul. + + -- The Preacher at Arrakeen +% +I give you the desert chameleon, whose ability to blend itself into the +background tells you all you need to know about the roots of ecology +and the foundations of a personal identity. + + -- Book of Diatribes from the Hayt Chronicle +% +The Universe is God's. It is one thing, a wholeness against which all +separations may be identified. Transient life, even that self-aware and +reasoning life which we call sentient, holds only fragile trusteeship on any +portion of the wholeness. + + -- Commentaries from the C.E.T. (Commission of Ecumenical Translators) +% +And I beheld another beast coming up out of the sand; and he had two horns like +a lamb, but his mouth was fanged and fiery as the dragon and his body shimmered +and burned with great heat while it did hiss like the serpent. + + -- Revised Orange Catholic Bible +% +It is commonly reported, my dear Georad, that there exists great natural +virtue in the melange experience. Perhaps this is true. There remain within +me, however, profound doubts that every use of melange always brings virtue. +Me seems that certain persons have corrupted the use of melange in defiance +of God. In the words of the Ecumenon, they have disfigured the soul. +They skim the surface of melange and believe thereby to attain grace. +They deride their fellows, do great harm to godliness, and they distort +the meaning of this abundant gift maliciously, surely a mutilation beyond +the power of man to restore. To be truly at one with the virtue of the spice, +uncorrupted in all ways, full of goodly honor, a man must permit his deeds and +his words to agree. When your actions describe a system of evil consequences, +you should be judged by those consequences and not by your explanations. +It is thus that we should judge Muad'Dib. + + -- The Pedant Heresy +% +Either we abandon the long-honored Theory of Relativity, or we cease to +believe that we can engage in continued accurate prediction of the future. +Indeed, knowing the future raises a host of questions which cannot be answered +under conventional assumptions unless one first projects an Observer outside of +Time and, second, nullifies all movement. If you accept the Theory of Relativity, +it can be shown that Time and the Observer must stand still in relationship to +each or inaccuracies will intervene. This would seem to say that it is +impossible to engage in accurate prediction of the future. How, then, do we +explain the continued seeking after this visionary goal by respected scientists? +How, then, do we explain Muad'Dib? + + -- Lectures on Prescience by Harq al-Ada +% +I hear the wind blowing across the desert and I see the moons of a winter night +rising tike great ships in the void. To them I make my vow: I will be resolute +and make an art of government; I will balance my inherited past and become a +perfect storehouse of my relic memories. And I will be known for kindliness +more than for knowledge. My face will shine down the corridors of time for as +long as humans exist. + + -- Leto's Vow, After Harq al-Ada +% +These are illusions of popular history which a successful religion must +promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is +the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumphs; a +good deed is its own reward; any bad human can be reformed; religious talismans +protect one from demon possession; only females understand the ancient +mysteries; the rich are doomed to unhappiness . . . + + -- From the Instruction Manual: Missionaria Protectiva +% +A sophisticated human can become primitive. What this really means is that the +human's way of life changes. Old values change, become linked to the landscape +with its plants and animals. This new existence requires a working knowledge of +those multiplex and cross-linked events usually referred to as nature. +It requires a measure of respect for the inertial power within such natural +systems. When a human gains this working knowledge and respect, that is called +"being primitive." The converse, of course, is equally true: the primitive can +become sophisticated, but not without accepting dreadful psychological damage. + + -- The Leto Commentary, After Harq al-Ada +% +This was Muad'Dib's achievement: He saw the subliminal reservoir of each +individual as an unconscious bank of memories going back to the primal cell of +our common genesis. Each of us, he said, can measure out his distance from that +common origin. Seeing this and telling of it, he made the audacious leap of +decision. Muad'Dib set himself the task of integrating genetic memory into +ongoing evaluation. Thus did he break through Time's veils, making a single +thing of the future and the past. That was Muad'Dib's creation embodied in his +son and his daughter. + + -- Testament of Arrakis by Harq al-Ada +% +And he saw a vision of armor. The armor was not his own skin; it was stronger +than plasteel. Nothing penetrated his armor -- not knife or poison or sand, not +the dust of the desert or its desiccating heat. In his right hand he carried +the power to make the Coriolis storm, to shake the earth and erode it into +nothing. His eyes were fixed upon the Golden Path and in his left hand he +carried the scepter of absolute mastery. And beyond the Golden Path, his eyes +looked into eternity which he knew to be the food of his soul and of his +everlasting flesh. + + -- Heighia, My Brother's Dream from The Book of Ghanima +% +Atrocity is recognized as such by victim and perpetrator alike, by all who +learn about it at whatever remove. Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating +argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms +the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating upon itself -- a +barbarous form of incest. Whoever commits atrocity also commits those future +atrocities thus bred. + + -- The Apocrypha of Muad'Dib +% +I will not argue with the Fremen claims that they are divinely inspired to +transmit a religious revelation, it is their concurrent claim to ideological +revelation which inspires me to shower them with derision. Of course, they make +the dual claim in the hope that it will strengthen their mandarinate and help +them to endure in a universe which finds them increasingly oppressive. +It is in the name of all those oppressed people that I warn the Fremen: +short-term expediency always fails in the long term. + + -- The Preacher at Arrakeen +% +The life of a single human, as the life of a family or an entire people, +persists as memory. My people must come to see this as part of their maturing +process. They are people as organism, and in this persistent memory they store +more and more experiences in a subliminal reservoir. Humankind hopes to call +upon this material if it is needed for a changing universe. But much that is +stored can be lost in that chance play of accident which we call "fate." +Much may not be integrated into evolutionary relationships, and thus may not +be evaluated and keyed into activity by those ongoing environmental changes +which inflict themselves upon flesh. The species can forget! This is the +special value of the Kwisatz Haderach which the Bene Gesserits never suspected: +the Kwisatz Haderach cannot forget. + + -- The Book of Leto, After Harq al-Ada +% +A Fremen dies when he is too long from the desert; this we call "the water +sickness." + + -- Stilgar, the Commentaries +% + You have loved Caladan + And lamented its lost host -- + But pain discovers + New lovers cannot erase + Those forever ghost. + + -- Refrain from The Habbanya Lament +% +The assumption that humans exist within an essentially impermanent universe, +taken as an operational precept, demands that the intellect become a totally +aware balancing instrument. But the intellect cannot react thus without +involving the entire organism. Such an organism may be recognized by its +burning, driving behavior. And thus it is with a society treated as organism. +But here we encounter an old inertia. Societies move to the goading of ancient, +reactive impulses. They demand permanence. Any attempt to display the universe +of impermanence arouses rejection patterns, fear, anger, and despair. Then how +do we explain the acceptance of prescience? Simply: the giver of prescient +visions, because he speaks of an absolute (permanent) realization, may be +greeted with joy by humankind even while predicting the most dire events. + + -- The Book of Leto, After Harq al-Ada +% +Good government never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of +those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the +will of those who administer that machinery. The most important element of +government, therefore, is the method of choosing leaders. + + -- Law and Governance, The Spacing Guild Manual +% +This is the fallacy of power: ultimately it is effective only in an absolute, +a limited universe. But the basic lesson of our relativistic universe is that +things change. Any power must always meet a greater power. Paul Muad'Dib taught +this lesson to the Sardaukar on the Plains of Arrakeen. His descendants have +yet to learn the lesson for themselves. + + -- The Preacher at Arrakeen +% +When I am weaker than you, I ask you for freedom because that is according to +your principles; when I am stronger than you, I take away your freedom because +that is according to my principles. + + -- Words of an ancient philosopher (Attributed by Harq al-Ada to one Louis +Veuillot) +% +You Bene Gesserit call your activity of the Panoplia Prophetica a "Science of +Religion." Very well. I, a seeker after another kind of scientist, find this an +appropriate definition. You do, indeed, build your own myths, but so do all +societies. You I must warn, however. You are behaving as so many other +misguided scientists have behaved. Your actions reveal that you wish to take +something out of [away from] life. It is time you were reminded of that which +you so often profess: One cannot have a single thing without its opposite. + + -- The Preacher at Arrakeen: A Message to the Sisterhood +% +The universe is just there; that's the only way a Fedaykin can view it and +remain the master of his senses. The universe neither threatens nor promises. +It holds things beyond our sway: the fall of a meteor, the eruption of a +spiceblow, growing old and dying. These are the realities of this universe and +they must be faced regardless of how you feel about them. You cannot fend off +such realities with words. They will come at you in their own wordless way and +then, then you will understand what is meant by "life and death." +Understanding this, you will be filled with joy. + + -- Muad'Dib to his Fedaykin +% +It is said of Muad'Dib that once when he saw a weed trying to grow +between two rocks, he moved one of the rocks. Later, when the weed +was seen to be flourishing, he covered it with the remaining rock. +"That was its fate," he explained. + + -- The Commentaries +% +Governments, if they endure, always tend increasingly toward aristocratic forms. +No government in history has been known to evade this pattern. And as the +aristocracy develops, government tends more and more to act exclusively in +the interests of the ruling class -- whether that class be hereditary royalty, +oligarchs of financial empires, or entrenched bureaucracy. + + -- Politics as Repeat Phenomenon: Bene Gesserit Training Manual +% +In this age when the means of human transport include devices which can span +the deeps of space in transtime, and other devices which can carry men swiftly +over virtually impassable planetary surfaces, it seems odd to think of +attempting long journeys afoot. Yet this remains a primary means of travel on +Arrakis, a fact attributed partly to preference and partly to the brutal +treatment which this planet reserves for anything mechanical. In the strictures +of Arrakis, human flesh remains the most durable and reliable resource for the +Hajj. Perhaps it is the implicit awareness of this fact which makes Arrakis the +ultimate mirror of the soul. + + -- Handbook of the Hajj +% +In all major socializing forces you will find an underlying movement to gain +and maintain power through the use of words. From witch doctor to priest to +bureaucrat it is all the same. A governed populace must be conditioned to +accept power-words as actual things, to confuse the symbolized system with the +tangible universe. In the maintenance of such a power structure, certain +symbols are kept out of the reach of common understanding -- symbols such as +those dealing with economic manipulation or those which define the local +interpretation of sanity. Symbol-secrecy of this form leads to the development +of fragmented sub-languages, each being a signal that its users are +accumulating some form of power. With this insight into a power process, our +Imperial Security Force must be ever alert to the formation of sub-languages. + + -- Lecture to the Arrakeen War College by, The Princess Irulan +% +The password was given to me by a man who died in the dungeons of Arrakeen. +You see, that is where I got this ring in the shape of a tortoise. +It was in the suk outside the city where I was hidden by the rebels. +The password? Oh, that has been changed many times since then. +It was "Persistence." And the countersign was "Tortoise." +It got me out of there alive. That's why I bought this ring: a reminder. + + -- Tagir Mohandis: Conversations with a Friend +% +I saw his blood and a piece of his robe which had been ripped by sharp claws. +His sister reports vividly of the tigers, the sureness of their attack. +We have questioned one of the plotters, and others are dead or in custody. +Everything points to a Corrino plot. A Truthsayer has attested to this testimony. + + -- Stilgar's Report to the Landsraad Commission +% +Above all else, the mentat must be a generalist, not a specialist. It is +wise to have decisions of great moment monitored by generalists. Experts and +specialists lead you quickly into chaos. They are a source of useless nit +picking, the ferocious quibble over a comma. The mentat-generalist, on the +other hand, should bring to decision-making a healthy common sense. He must +not cut himself off from the broad sweep of what is happening in his universe. +He must remain capable of saying: "There's no real mystery about this at the +moment. This is what we want now. It may prove wrong later, but we'll correct +that when we come to it." The mentat-generalist must understand that anything +which we can identify as our universe is merely part of larger phenomena. +But the expert looks backward; he looks into the narrow standards of his own +specialty. The generalist looks outward; he looks for living principles, +knowing full well that such principles change, that they develop. It is to the +characteristics of change itself that the mentat-generalist must look. +There can be no permanent catalogue of such change, no handbook or manual. +You must look at it with as few preconceptions as possible, asking yourself: +"Now what is this thing doing?" + + -- The Mentat Handbook +% +The one-eyed view of our universe says you must not look far afield for +problems. Such problems may never arrive. Instead, tend to the wolf within +your fences. The packs ranging outside may not even exist. + + -- The Azhar Book; Shamra I:4 +% +Only in the realm of mathematics can you understand Muad'Dib's precise view of +the future. Thus: first, we postulate any number of point-dimensions in space. +(This is the classic n-fold extended aggregate of n dimensions.) With this +framework, Time as commonly understood becomes an aggregate of one-dimensional +properties. Applying this to the Muad'Dib phenomenon, we find that we either +are confronted by new properties of Time or (by reduction through the infinity +calculus) we are dealing with separate systems which contain n body properties. +For Muad'Dib, we assume the latter. As demonstrated by the reduction, the point +dimensions of the n-fold can only have separate existence within different +frameworks of Time. Separate dimensions of Time are thus demonstrated to +coexist. This being the inescapable case, Muad'Dib's predictions required that +he perceive the n-fold not as extended aggregate but as an operation within a +single framework. In effect, he froze his universe into that one framework +which was his view of Time. + + -- Palimbasha: Lectures at Sietch Tabr +% +We can still remember the golden days before Heisenberg, who showed humans +the walls enclosing our predestined arguments. The lives within me find this +amusing. Knowledge, you see, has no uses without purpose, but purpose is what +builds enclosing walls. + + -- Leto Atreides II, His Voice +% +If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you +believe something is right or wrong, true or false, you believe the assumptions +in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of +holes, but remain most precious to the convinced. + + -- The Open-Ended Proof from, The Panoplia Prophetica +% +Because of the one-pointed Time awareness in which the conventional mind +remains immersed, humans tend to think of everything in a sequential, +word-oriented framework. This mental trap produces very short-term concepts of +effectiveness and consequences, a condition of constant, unplanned response to +crises. + + -- Liet-Kynes, The Arrakis Workbook +% +You will learn the integrated communication methods as you complete the next +step in your mentat education. This is a gestalten function which will overlay +data paths in your awareness, resolving complexities and masses of input from +the mentat index-catalogue techniques which you already have mastered. Your +initial problem will be the breaking tensions arising from the divergent +assembly of minutiae/data on specialized subjects. Be warned. Without mentat +overlay integration, you can be immersed in the Babel Problem, which is the +label we give to the omnipresent dangers of achieving wrong combinations from +accurate information. + + -- The Mentat Handbook +% + O Paul, thou Muad'Dib, + Mahdi of all men, + Thy breath exhaled + Sent forth the hurricane. + + -- Songs of Muad'Dib +% +Many forces sought control of the Atreides twins and, when the death of +Leto was announced, this movement of plot and counterplot was amplified. +Note the relative motivations: the Sisterhood feared Alia, an adult Abomination, +but still wanted those genetic characteristics carried by the Atreides. +The Church hierarchy of Auqaf and Hajj saw only the power implicit in control of +Muad'Dib's heir. CHOAM wanted a doorway to the wealth of Dune. Farad'n and his +Sardaukar sought a return to glory for House Corrino. The Spacing Guild feared +the equation Arrakis = melange; without the spice they could not navigate. +Jessica wished to repair what her disobedience to the Bene Gesserit had created. +few thought to ask the twins what their plans might be, until it was too late. + + -- The Book of Kreos +% +There is no guilt or innocence in you. All of that is past. Guilt belabors the +dead and I am not the Iron Hammer. You multitude of the dead are merely people +who have done certain things, and the memory of those things illuminates my path. + + -- Leto II to His Memory-Lives, After Harq al-Ada +% +Humankind periodically goes through a speedup of its affairs, thereby +experiencing the race between the renewable vitality of the living and the +beckoning vitiation of decadence. In this periodic race, any pause becomes +luxury. Only then can one reflect that all is permitted; all is possible. + + -- The Apocrypha of Muad'Dib +% +Natural selection has been described as an environment selectively screening +for those who will have progeny. Where humans are concerned, though, this is an +extremely limiting viewpoint. Reproduction by sex tends toward experiment and +innovation. It raises many questions, including the ancient one about whether +environment is a selective agent after the variation occurs, or whether +environment plays a pre-selective role in determining the variations which it +screens. Dune did not realty answer those questions: it merely raised new +questions which Leto and the Sisterhood may attempt to answer over the next +five hundred generations. + + -- The Dune Catastrophe, After Harq al-Ada +% + One small bird has called thee + From a beak streaked crimson. + It cried once over Sietch Tabr + And thou went forth unto Funeral Plain. + + -- Lament for Leto II +% +Peace demands solutions, but we never reach living solutions; we only work +toward them. A fixed solution is, by definition, a dead solution. The trouble +with peace is that it tends to punish mistakes instead of rewarding brilliance. + + -- The Words of My Father: an account of Muad'Dib reconstructed by Harq al-Ada +% +This rocky shrine to the skull of a ruler grants no prayers. It has become +the grave of lamentations. Only the wind hears the voice of this place. +The cries of night creatures and the passing wonder of two moons, all say his +day has ended. No more supplicants come. The visitors have gone from the feast. +How bare the pathway down this mountain. + + -- Lines at the Shrine of an Atreides Duke, Anon. +% +There exist obvious higher-order influences in any planetary system. This is +often demonstrated by introducing terraform life onto newly discovered planets. +In all such cases, the life in similar zones develops striking similarities of +adaptive form. This form signifies much more than shape; it connotes a survival +organization and a relationship of such organizations. The human quest for this +interdependent order and our niche within it represents a profound necessity. +The quest can, however, be perverted into a conservative grip on sameness. +This has always proved deadly for the entire system. + + -- The Dune Catastrophe, After Harq al-Ada +% +What you of the CHOAM directorate seem unable to understand is that you seldom +find real loyalties in commerce. When did you last hear of a clerk giving his +life for the company? Perhaps your deficiency rests in the false assumption +that you can order men to think and cooperate. This has been a failure of +everything from religions to general staffs throughout history. General staffs +have a long record of destroying their own nations. As to religions, I +recommend a rereading of Thomas Aquinas. As to you of CHOAM, what nonsense you +believe! Men must want to do things out of their own innermost drives. People, +not commercial organizations or chains of command, are what make great +civilizations work. Every civilization depends upon the quality of the +individuals it produces. If you over-organize humans, over-legalize them, +suppress their urge to greatness -- they cannot work and their civilization +collapses. + + -- A letter to CHOAM, Attributed to The Preacher +% +The future of prescience cannot always be locked into the rules of the past. +The threads of existence tangle according to many unknown laws. Prescient +future insists on its own rules. It will not conform to the ordering of the +Zensunni nor to the ordering of science. Prescience builds a relative +integrity. It demands the work of this instant, always warning that you +cannot weave every thread into the fabric of the past. + + -- Kalima: The Words of Muad'Dib, The Shuloch Commentary +% +Fremen speech implies great concision, a precise sense of expression. It is +immersed in the illusion of absolutes. Its assumptions are a fertile ground for +absolutist religions. Furthermore, Fremen are fond of moralizing. They confront +the terrifying instability of all things with institutionalized statements. +They say: "We know there is no summa of all attainable knowledge; that is the +preserve of God. But whatever men can learn, men can contain." Out of this +knife-edged approach to the universe they carve a fantastic belief in signs and +omens and in their own destiny. This is an origin of their Kralizec legend: the +war at the end of the universe. + + -- Bene Gesserit Private Reports/folio 800881 +% +The spirit of Muad'Dib is more than words, more than the letter of the Law +which arises in his name. Muad'Dib must always be that inner outrage against +the complacently powerful, against the charlatans and the dogmatic fanatics. +It is that inner outrage which must have its say because Muad'Dib taught us +one thing above all others: that humans can endure only in a fraternity of +social justice. + + -- The Fedaykin Compact +% +Limits of survival are set by climate, those long drifts of change which a +generation may fail to notice. And it is the extremes of climate which set the +pattern. Lonely, finite humans may observe climatic provinces, fluctuations of +annual weather and, occasionally may observe such things as "This is a colder +year than I've ever known. " Such things are sensible. But humans are seldom +alerted to the shifting average through a great span of years. And it is +precisely in this alerting that humans learn how to survive on any planet. +They must learn climate. + + -- Arrakis, the Transformation, After Harq al-Ada +% +Thou didst divide the sand by thy strength; Thou breakest the heads of the +dragons in the desert. Yea, I behold thee as a beast coming up from the dunes; +thou hast the two horns of the lamb, but thou speakest as the dragon. + + -- Revised Orange Catholic Bible Arran 11:4 +% +Fremen were the first humans to develop a conscious/unconscious symbology +through which to experience the movements and relationships of their planetary +system. They were the first people anywhere to express climate in terms of a +semi-mathematic language whose written symbols embody (and internalize) the +external relationships. The language itself was part of the system it +described. Its written form carried the shape of what it described. +The intimate local knowledge of what was available to support life was implicit +in this development. One can measure the extent of this language/system +interaction by the fact that Fremen accepted themselves as foraging and +browsing animals. + + -- The Story of Liet-Kynes by Harq al-Ada +% +After the Fremen, all Planetologists see life as expressions of energy and look +for the overriding relationships. In small pieces, bits and parcels which grow +into general understanding, the Fremen racial wisdom is translated into a new +certainty. The thing Fremen have as a people, any people can have. They need +but develop a sense for energy relationships. They need but observe that energy +soaks up the patterns of things and builds with those patterns. + + -- The Arrakeen Catastrophe, After Harq al-Ada +% +Any path which narrows future possibilities may become a lethal trap. Humans +are not threading their way through a maze; they scan a vast horizon filled +with unique opportunities. The narrowing viewpoint of the maze should appeal +only to creatures with their noses buried in sand. Sexually produced uniqueness +and differences are the life-protection of the spices. + + -- The Spacing Guild Handbook +% +By these acts Leto II removed himself from the evolutionary succession. +He did it with a deliberate cutting action, saying: "To be independent is to be +removed." Both twins saw beyond the needs of memory as a measuring process, +that is, a way of determining their distance from their human origins. But it +was left to Leto II to do the audacious thing, recognizing that a real creation +is independent of its creator. He refused to reenact the evolutionary sequence, +saying, "That, too, takes me farther and farther from humanity." He saw the +implications in this: that there can be no truly closed systems in life. + + -- The Holy Metamorphosis, by Harq al-Ada +% +Muad'Dib was disinherited and he spoke for the disinherited of all time. +He cried out against that profound injustice which alienates the individual +from that which he was taught to believe, from that which seemed to come to +him as a right. + + -- The Mahdinate, An Analysis by Harq al-Ada +% +Church and State, scientific reason and faith, the individual and his +community, even progress and tradition -- all of these can be reconciled in the +teachings of Muad'Dib. He taught us that there exist no intransigent opposites +except in the beliefs of men. Anyone can rip aside the veil of Time. You can +discover the future in the past or in your own imagination. Doing this, you win +back your consciousness in your inner being. You know then that the universe is +a coherent whole and you are indivisible from it. + + -- The Preacher at Arrakeen, After Harq al-Ada +% +Muad'Dib gave us a particular kind of knowledge about prophetic insight, about +the behavior which surrounds such insight and its influence upon events which +are seen to be "on line." (That is, events which are set to occur in a related +system which the prophet reveals and interprets.) As has been noted elsewhere, +such insight operates as a peculiar trap for the prophet himself. He can become +the victim of what he knows -- which is a relatively common human failing. The +danger is that those who predict real events may overtook the polarizing effect +brought about by overindulgence in their own truth. They tend to forget that +nothing in a polarized universe can exist without its opposite being present. + + -- The Prescient Vision, by Harq al-Ada +% +The child who refuses to travel in the father's harness, this is the symbol of +man's most unique capability. "I do not have to be what my father was. I do not +have to obey my father's rules or even believe everything he believed. It is my +strength as a human that I can make my own choices of what to believe and what +not to believe, of what to be and what not to be." + + -- Leto Atreides II, The Harq al-Ada Biography +% +The assumption that a whole system can be made to work better through +an assault on its conscious elements betrays a dangerous ignorance. +This has often been the ignorant approach of those who call themselves +scientists and technologists. + + -- The Butlerian Jihad, by Harq al-Ada +% +As with so many other religions, Muad'Dib's Golden Elixir of Life degenerated +into external wizardry. Its mystical signs became mere symbols for deeper +psychological processes, and those processes, of course, ran wild. What they +needed was a living god, and they didn't have one, a situation which Muad'Dib's +son has corrected. + + -- Saying attributed to Lu Tung-pin, (Lu, The Guest of the Cavern) +% |