Compared with that of Taoists and Far Eastern Buddhists, the Christian attitude toward Nature has been curiously insensitive and often downright domineering and violent. Taking their cue from an unfortunate remark in Genesis, Catholic moralists have regarded animals as mere things which men do right to regard for their own ends. . . .
Aldous HuxleyIsn't it remarkable how everyone who knew [D.H.] Lawrence has felt compelled to write about him? Why, he's had more books written about him than any writer since Byron!
Aldous HuxleyThose who believe that they are exclusively in the right are generally those who achieve something.
Aldous HuxleyActual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the overcompensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against misfortune, none of the picturesqueness of a struggle with temptation, or a fatal overthrow by passion or doubt. Happiness is never grand.
Aldous HuxleyI ate civilization. It poisoned me; I was defiled. And then," he added in a lower tone, "I ate my own wickedness.
Aldous HuxleyThe place is good. How good, one must have circumnavigated the globe to discover. Why not stay? Take root? But roots are chains. I have a terror of losing my freedom. Free, without ties, unpossessed by any possessions, free to do as one will, to go at a moment's notice wherever the fancy may suggest--it is good. But so is this place. Might it not be better? To gain freedom one sacrifices something [...] and all that these things and people signify. One sacrifices something--for a greater gain in knowledge, in understanding, in intensified living? I sometimes wonder.
Aldous Huxley