If we continue...to consume the world until there's no more to consume, then there's going to come a day, sure as hell, when our children or their children or their children's children are going to look back on us - on you and me - and say to themselves, "My God, what kind of monsters were these people?"
Daniel QuinnIf the world was made for us, then it BELONGS to us and we can do what we damn well please with it.
Daniel QuinnThe premise of the Taker story is 'the world belongs to man'. โฆ The premise of the Leaver story is 'man belongs to the world'.
Daniel QuinnDon't wait. Where do you expect to get by waiting? Doing is what teaches you. Doing is what leads to inspiration. Doing is what generates ideas. Nothing else, and nothing less.
Daniel QuinnYou're captives of a civilizational system that more or less compels you to go on destroying the world in order to live. โฆ You are captivesโand you have made a captive of the world itself. That's what's at stake, isn't it?โyour captivity and the captivity of the world.
Daniel QuinnThere's nothing fundamentally wrong with people. Given a story to enact that puts them in accord with the world, they will live in accord with the world. But given a story to enact that puts them at odds with the world, as yours does, they will live at odds with the world. Given a story to enact in which they are the lords of the world, they will ACT like lords of the world. And, given a story to enact in which the world is a foe to be conquered, they will conquer it like a foe, and one day, inevitably, their foe will lie bleeding to death at their feet, as the world is now.
Daniel Quinn