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diff --git a/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/dune-messiah b/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/dune-messiah new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ce51993 --- /dev/null +++ b/fortune-mod/.local/share/fortune/dune-messiah @@ -0,0 +1,222 @@ +Such a rich store of myths enfolds Paul Muad'dib, the Mentat Emperor, and his +sister, Alia, it is difficult to see the real persons behind these veils. +But there were, after all, a man born Paul Atreides and a woman born Alia. +Their flesh was subject to space and time. And even though their oracular +powers placed them beyond the usual limits of time and space, they came from +human stock. They experienced real events which left real traces upon a real +universe. To understand them, it must be seen that their catastrophe was the +catastrophe of all mankind. This work is dedicated, then, not to Muad'dib or +his sister, but to their heirs -- to all of us. + + -- Dedication in the Muad'dib Concordance + as copied from The Tabla Memorium of the Mahdi Spirit Cult +% +There exists no separation between gods and men: +one blends softly casual into the other. + + -- Proverbs of Muad'dib +% +Every civilization must contend with an unconscious force which can block, +betray or countermand almost any conscious intention of the collectivity. + + -- Tleilaxu Theorem (unproven) +% +The advent of the Field Process shield and the lasgun with their explosive +interaction, deadly to attacker and attacked, placed the current +determinatives, on weapons technology. We need not go into the special role of +atomics. The fact that any Family in my Empire could so deploy its atomics as +to destroy the planetary bases of fifty or more other Families causes some +nervousness, true. But all of us possess precautionary plans for devastating +retaliation. Guild and Landsraad contain the keys which hold this force in +check, No, my concern goes to the development of humans as special weapons. +Here is a virtually unlimited field which a few powers are developing. + + -- Muad'dib: Lecture to the War College from The Stilgar Chronicle +% +Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is +when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague +ritual. + + -- Words of Muad'dib by Princess Irulan. +% +"Once more the drama begins." + + -- The Emperor Paul Muad'dib on his ascension to the Lion Throne +% +Truth suffers from too much analysis. + + -- Ancient Fremen Saying +% +The Fremen see her as the Earth Figure, a demigoddess whose special charge is +to protect the tribes through her powers of violence. She is Reverend Mother to +their Reverend Mothers. To pilgrims who seek her out with demands that she +restore virility or make the barren fruitful, she is a form of antimentat. +She feeds on that proof that the "analytic" has limits. She represents ultimate +tension. She is the virgin-harlot -- witty, vulgar, cruel, as destructive in +her whims as a coriolis storm. + + -- St. Alia of the Knife as taken from The Irulan Report +% +The most dangerous game in the universe is to govern from an oracular base. +We do not consider ourselves wise enough or brave enough to play that game. +The measures detailed here for regulation in lesser matters are as near as +we dare venture to the brink of government. For our purposes, we borrow a +definition from the Bene Gesserit and we consider the various worlds as gene +pools, sources of teachings and teachers, sources of the possible. Our goal +is not to rule, but to tap these gene pools, to learn, and to free ourselves +from all restraints imposed by dependency and government. + + -- "The Orgy as a Tool of Statecraft," Chapter Three of The Steersman's Guild +% + Here lies a toppled god -- + His fall was not a small one. + We did but build his pedestal, + A narrow and a tall one. + + -- Tleilaxu Epigram +% +I think what a joy it is to be alive, and I wonder if I'll ever leap inward +to the root of this flesh and know myself as once I was. The root is there. +Whether any act of mine can find it, that remains tangled in the future. +But all things a man can do are mine. Any act of mine may do it. + + -- The Ghola Speaks Alia's Commentary +% +"You do not beg the sun for mercy." + + -- Maud'dib's Travail from The Stilgar Commentary +% +"I've had a bellyful of the god and priest business! You think I don't see my +own mythos? Consult your data once more, Hayt. I've insinuated my rites into +the most elementary human acts. The people eat in the name of Muad'dib! They +make love in my name, are born in my name -- cross the street in my name. +A roof beam cannot be raised in the lowliest hovel of far Gangishree +without invoking the blessing of Muad'dib!" + + -- Book of Diatribes from The Hayt Chronicle +% + Oh, worm of many teeth, + Canst thou deny what has no cure? + The flesh and breath which lure thee + To the ground of all beginnings + Feed on monsters twisting in a door of fire! + Thou hast no robe in all thy attire + To cover intoxications of divinity + Or hide the burnings of desire! + + -- Wormsong from the Dunebook +% +The audacious nature of Muad'dib's actions may be seen in the fact that He knew +from the beginning whither He was bound, yet not once did He step aside from +that path. He put it clearly when He said: "I tell you that I come now to my +time of testing when it will be shown that I am the Ultimate Servant." +Thus He weaves all into One, that both friend and foe may worship Him. +It is for this reason and this reason only that His Apostles prayed: "Lord, +save us from the other paths which Muad'dib covered with the Waters of His Life." +Those "other paths" may be imagined only with the deepest revulsion. + + -- from The Yiam-el-Din (Book of Judgment) +% +No matter how exotic human civilization becomes, no matter the developments +of life and society nor the complexity of the machine / human interface, there +always come interludes of lonely power when the course of humankind, the very +future of humankind, depends upon the relatively simple actions of single +individuals. + + -- from The Tlielaxu Godbuk +% +Production growth and income growth must not get out of step in my Empire. +That is the substance of my command. There are to be no balance-of-payment +difficulties between the different spheres of influence. And the reason for +this is simply because I command it. I want to emphasize my authority in this +area. I am the supreme energy-eater of this domain, and will remain so, alive +or dead. My Government is the economy. + + -- Order in Council The Emperor Paul Muad'dib +% +The convoluted wording of legalisms grew up around the necessity to hide from +ourselves the violence we intend toward each other. Between depriving a man of +one hour from his life and depriving him of his life there exists only a +difference of degree. You have done violence to him, consumed his energy. +Elaborate euphemisms may conceal your intent to kill, but behind any use of +power over another the ultimate assumption remains: "I feed on your energy." + + -- Addenda to Orders in Council The Emperor Paul Muad'dib +% + He has gone from Alia, + The womb of heaven! + Holy, holy, holy! + Fire-sand leagues + Confront our Lord. + He can see + Without eyes! + A demon upon him! + Holy, holy, holy + Equation: + He solved for + Martyrdom! + + -- The Moon Falls Down Songs of Muad'dib +% +Tibana was an apologist for Socratic Christianity, probably a native of IV +Anbus who lived between the eight and ninth centuries before Corrino, likely in +the second reign of Dalamak. Of his writings, only a portion survives from +which this fragment is taken: "The hearts of all men dwell in the same +wilderness." + + -- from The Dunebuk of Irulan +% +The sequential nature of actual events is not illuminated with lengthy +precision by the powers of prescience except under the most extraordinary +circumstances. The oracle grasps incidents cut out of the historic chain. +Eternity moves. It inflicts itself upon the oracle and the supplicant alike. +Let Muad'dib's subjects doubt his majesty and his oracular visions. +Let them deny his powers. Let them never doubt Eternity. + + -- The Dune Gospels +% +There exists a limit to the force even the most powerful may apply without +destroying themselves. Judging this limit is the true artistry of government. +Misuse of power is the fatal sin. The law cannot be a tool of vengeance, +never a hostage, nor a fortification against the martyrs it has created. +You cannot threaten any individual and escape the consequences. + + -- Muad'dib on Law, The Stilgar Commentary +% + There was a man so wise, + He jumped into + A sandy place + And burnt out both his eyes! + And when he knew his eyes were gone, + He offered no complaint. + He summoned up a vision + And made himself a saint. + + -- Children's Verse from History of Muad'dib +% +We say of Muad'dib that he has gone on a journey +into that land where we walk without footprints. + + -- Preamble to the Qizarate Creed +% + No bitter stench of funeral-still for Muad'dib. + No knell nor solemn rite to free the mind + From avaricious shadows. + He is the fool saint, + The golden stranger living forever + On the edge of reason. + Let your guard fall and he is there! + His crimson peace and sovereign pallor + Strike into our universe on prophetic webs + To the verge, of a quiet glance -- there! + Out of bristling star-jungles: + Mysterious, lethal, an oracle without eyes, + Catspaw of prophecy, whose voice never dies! + Shai-hulud, he awaits thee upon a strand + Where couples walk and fix, eye to eye, + The delicious ennui of love. + He strides through the long cavern of time, + Scattering the fool-self of his dream. + + -- The Ghola's Hymn +% |