concept

guilt Quotes

98 of the best book quotes about guilt
01
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“She was at school, but you’d never know it if you didn’t actually look. She didn’t whip her hand through the air trying to get the teacher to call on her or charge through the halls getting to class. She didn’t make unsolicited comments for the teacher’s edification or challenge the kid who took cuts in the milk line. She just sat. Quiet. I told myself I should be glad about it—it was like she wasn’t even there, and isn’t that what I’d always wanted? But still, I felt bad.”
Wendelin Van Draanen
author
Flipped
book
Bryce Loski
Juli Baker
characters
sadness
grief
change
guilt
concepts
02
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“I used to fell a lot of guilt about having depression but then I realized that’s a lot like feeling guilty for having brown hair.”
03
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″‘Go away’, she said to the guilt... Guilt wanted her most when she least wanted it.”
04
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“I can’t think of another type of illness where the sufferer is made to feel guilty and question their self-care when their medications need to be changed.”
05
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“Life passes. Then comes the depression. That feeling that you’ll never be right again. The fear that these outbreaks will become more familiar, or worse, never go away. You’re so tired from fighting that you start to listen to all the little lies your brain tells you. The ones that say you’re a drain on your family. The ones that say that if you were stronger or better this wouldn’t be happening to you.”
06
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“After all, guilt and remorse were worthless emotions, weren’t they? Well, I knew they weren’t; but I had no time for them. Forward motion; that was the key. Run as fast as you can and don’t look back.”
07
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“I know I did wrong. No one can feel it more sensibly than I do…Still, in looking back, calmly, on the events of my life, I feel that the slave woman ought not to be judged by the same standard as others.”
08
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“We were a Family, a happy Family, and we stayed that way until I stopped showing up.”
09
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A terrible, painful sadness clutched at Ellen. More than ever before, she felt that her life—the best part of it, at least, the part that was fresh and fun—was behind her. Recognizing the sensation made her feel guilty, for she read it as proof that she was an unsatisfactory mother, an unsatisfied wife. She hated her life, and hated herself for hating it. She thought of a line from a song Billy played on the stereo: “I’d trade all my tomorrows for a single yesterday.”
10
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“I was ready to join [Edward’s] family. The fear and guilt and anguish I was feeling now had taught me that much… The next time something came at us, I would be ready. An asset, not a liability.”
11
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“Guilt struck Little-Faith on the head with a great club that was in his hand and knocked him flat to the ground, where he lay bleeding profusely and in danger of dying. The thieves just stood by watching him bleed to death, but then heard someone coming on the road. They were afraid it might be Great-Grace who lives in the town of Good-Confidence. They quickly departed and left this good man to fend for himself.”
12
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“I want to confess everything, to hand over the guilt and mistake and anger to someone else.”
13
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“So full of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.”
14
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For a moment he felt good about this. A moment or two later he felt bad about feeling good about it. Then he felt good about feeling bad about feeling good about it and satisfied, drove on into the night.
15
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“I’m well aware that at the back of my mind, thumping quietly like a drumbeat, are the twin horrors of Guilt and Panic.”
16
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“I stand in front of the mirror and study my face.…It is the face of a sad, lonely girl something bad has happened to. I wonder if my face will ever look the same again, or if I’ll always see it in my reflection - Finch, Eleanor, loss, heartache, guilt, death.”
17
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“Maybe, if I wear the glasses long enough, I can be like her. I can see what she saw. I can be both of us at once so no one will have to miss her, most of all me.”
18
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“Guilt management can be just important as time management for mothers.”
19
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“Yet how much really could you owe other people? Was it endless? ”
20
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I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am trusting and suspicious. I am honest and I still play games.
21
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“I am a house gutted by fire where only the guilty sometimes sleep before the punishment that devours them hounds them out in the open.”
22
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“We teach girls shame. ‘Close your legs. Cover yourself.’ We make them feel as though being born female they’re already guilty of something. And so, girls grow up to be women who cannot say they have desire. They grow up to be women who silence themselves. They grow up to be women who cannot say what they truly think. And they grow up — and this is the worst thing we do to girls — they grow up to be women who have turned pretense into an art form.”
23
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“Why am I not dead? I should be dead. It would best for everyone if I were dead.”
24
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“Thou art the man, Thou the accursed polluter of this land.”
25
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“My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt.”
26
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“I descended from the top of Olympus, and, a God in a human shape, I surveyed the earth. ’Twere an endless task to enumerate how great an amount of guilt was everywhere discovered.”
27
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“Guilt, of course, is feeling bad about one’s actions, but shame is feeling bad about oneself.”
28
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“They felt they had you fenced off so that you could not do what you did. Now they’re mad because deep down in them they believe that they made you do it. When people feel that way, you can’t reason with ‘em.”
29
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“She found herself looking at Lane as if he were a stranger, or a poster advertising a brand of linoleum, across the aisle of a subway car. Again she felt the trickle of disloyalty and guilt, which seemed to be the order of the day, and reacted to it by reaching over to cover Lane’s hand with her own. She withdrew her hand almost immediately and used it to pick her cigarette out of the ashtray. ”
30
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“Overcome your guilt. Care, but not too much. Take responsibility, but don’t blame yourself. Protect, save, help- but know when to give up. They’re precarious ledges to walk. How do I do it?”
31
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“And you told me you wanted children. That more than anything, you wanted to be a mother.”
32
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“It’s no fun picking on you Louis; you’re so guilty, it’s like throwing darts at a glob of jello, there’s no satisfying hits, just quivering, the darts just blop in and vanish.”
33
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“Negrophobes exist. It is not hatred of the Negro, however, that motivates them; they lack the courage for that, or they have lost it. Hate is not inborn; it has to be constantly cultivated, to be brought into being, in conflict with more or less recognized guilt complexes. ”
34
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“The tyrannous and bloody act is done, The most arch deed of piteous massacre That ever yet this land was guilty of.”
35
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“O, would to God that the inclusive verge Of golden metal that must round my brow Were red-hot steel to sear me to the brains!”
36
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“God is the only being who is good, and the standards are set by Him. Because God hates sin, He has to punish those guilty of sin. Maybe that’s not an appealing standard. But to put it bluntly, when you get your own universe, you can make your own standards.”
37
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“I knew that Phoebe was convinced that her mother was kidnapped because it was impossible for Phoebe to imagine that her mother could leave for any other reason. I wanted to call Phoebe and say that maybe her mother had gone looking for something, maybe her mother was unhappy, maybe there was nothing Phoebe could do about it.”
38
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“Part of me felt guilty. Was it selfish that I wanted to live, even though my parents were gone?”
39
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“It was obvious to everyone that Mafatu was useless upon the sea. He would never earn his proper place in the tribe. Stout Heart- how bitter the name must taste upon his father’s lips!”
40
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″‘Maybe. Maybe there’s more we all could have done,’ he says, ‘but we just have to let the guilt remind us to do better next time.’ I frown and pull back. That is a lesson that members of Abnegation learn—guilt as a tool, rather than a weapon against the self.”
41
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“I press my forehead to the wall and scream. After a few seconds I clamp my hand over my mouth to muffle the sound and scream again, a scream that turns into a sob. The gun clatters to the ground. I still see Will. He smiles in my memory. A curled lip. Straight teeth. Light in his eyes. Laughing, teasing, more alive in memory than I am in reality. It was him or me. I chose me. But I feel dead too. ”
Will
Tris Prior
characters
death
guilt
concepts
42
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“Guilt is a hunter. My conscience mocked me, picking fights like a petulant child. It’s all your fault, the voice whispered.”
43
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“Everything was filthy. Especially my conscience.”
44
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“Survival had its price: guilt.”
45
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“This feeble and most sensitive of spirits could do neither, yet continually did one thing or another, which intertwined, in the same inextricable knot, the agony of heaven-defying guilt and vain repentance.”
46
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“Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him; for, believe me, Hester, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so, than to hide a guilty heart through life.”
47
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“And then it was not a toy lion, but a real lion, The Real Lion, just as she had seen him on the mountain beyond the world’s end. And a smell of all sweet-smelling things there are filled the room. But there was some trouble in Jill’s mind, though she could not think what it was... The Lion told her to repeat the signs, and she found that she had forgotten them all. At that, a great horror came over her.”
48
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“All the running, the hiding, the lies, the killing, for what? The endless circle of revenge: answering pain by inflicting pain. Why did I do it?”
49
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“This is the first time I ever felt really actually in danger of hell.”
50
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If you’re looking for the guilty, you need only look into a mirror.
51
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“I didn’t say you threw it. I just said ‘Run.’ You should’ve run.”
52
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“Beg forgiveness, indeed! After fourteen years! I see no purpose to it. The dead are dead; those who remain behind cannot forget. But then, just as I am about to close my heart against Ann, I recollect my part in the madness that came to our village in 1692. And I know I am as guilty as Ann or any of the girls in that circle of accusers.”
53
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″‘I am glad you have come,’ Jesus said. Daniel could say nothing at all. For a moment he was afraid. Only when the man turned away and his eyes no longer held his own, could he breathe freely again.”
54
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″ The guilt on him, the hand of God pressing down on him. ”
55
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“He was trying to convince himself that he wasn’t guilty.”
56
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“She gathers her papers and moves away as STEVE, arms still outstretched, turns toward the camera. His image is in black and white, and the grain is nearly broken. It looks like one of the pictures they use for psychological testing, or some strange beast, a monster.”
57
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“I was mighty down-hearted; so I made up my mind I wouldn’t ever go anear that house again, because I reckoned I was to blame, somehow.”
58
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“I knowed very well why [the words] wouldn’t come. It was because my heart warn’t right; it was because I warn’t square; it was because I was playing double. I was letting on to give up sin, but away inside of me I was holding on to the biggest one of all.”
59
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“That night I lay in bed and thought about dying and going to be with my mother in paradise. I would meet her saying, ‘Mother, forgive. Please forgive,’ and she would kiss my skin till it grew chapped and tell me I was not to blame. She would tell me this for the first ten thousand years.”
60
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“It was you who did it, Lily. You didn’t mean it, but it was you.”
61
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“I shed my guilt when I accepted my decision on its own terms, without endlessly prosecuting old grievances, without weighing his sins against mine. Without thinking of my father at all. I learned to accept my decision for my own sake, because of me, not because of him. Because I needed it, not because he deserved it.”
62
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“Guilt is the fear of one’s own wretchedness. It has nothing to do with other people.”
63
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“Why mundanes always insist on taking responsibility for things that aren’t their fault is a mystery to me. You didn’t force that cocktail down his idiotic throat.”
64
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“In defense of her wounded pride he would have torn the offender to pieces with his own hands. And here that offender was he himself.”
65
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“And when he couldn’t sleep, he retired to his study and the laudanum bottle that had become his constant companion. Sometimes I’d find him asleep in his chair, the dogs at his feet, the brown bottle close at hand […] he’d grown thinner, whittled down by grief and opium. And I could only stand by, helpless and mute, the cause of it all.”
66
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“STEVE I thought you you’re supposed to be innocent until you’re proven guilty? O’BRIEN That’s true, but in reality it depends on how the jury sees the case.”
67
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“My scream implodes inside me. Mother looks back, sees the dagger lying there, grabs it. The thing howls in outrage. She’s going to fight it. She’s going to be alright. […] In one swift motion, she raises the dagger and plunges it into herself.”
68
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“If you don’t testify, you’ll just make the tie between you and King stronger in the mind of the jury. I think you have to testify. And the way you spend the rest of your youth might well depend on how much the jury believes you.”
69
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“I don’t care if you come home at all. It was the last thing I’d said to her. Before I ran away. Before she came after me. Before I saw her die in a vision. […] And then the scream I’ve been holding back comes pouring out of me… ”
70
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“Jason: Anything you or the children want in exile, let me know; I’ll gladly furnish it … Medea: The presents of the wicked are pure poison.”
71
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“The charred black spot where Amy’s car had landed sat directly below. It was as if my own jeep had turned against me, breaking down there on purpose to remind me that I was a jerk. Not that I needed reminding.”
72
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“We’d had three assemblies last year alone, and every time I waited for a giant spotlight to come out of the auditorium ceiling and shine on my seat.”
73
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“Mostly, I was feeling guilty at the thought of it. I’d been hiding in sleazy motels, and she’d had no one to talk to.”
74
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“I should have been there for her. She was so totally alone. She should have been there for me. I was so totally alone. We should never have been separated.”
75
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“The single mothers who are coming to this country, and the children who follow them, are changing the face of immigration to the United States.”
76
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“People come here to prosper. You have nothing here. What have you accomplished?”
77
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“Where were my instincts? Isn’t the female of the species hardwired to recognize her own offspring?”
78
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“Your pain and anger will pass, but the guilt would remain with you for always.”
79
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“My poor Mum didn’t have any teeth. She’d gone into hospital and they’d taken them all out, every last one. It was because of us kids.”
80
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“He didn’t feel like a hero anymore--he just felt sorry for this poor, hideous girl, and guilty at being the one who had trapped her here.”
81
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“I killed Grike, he thought. All right, so he was dead already, technically, but he was still a person. He had hopes and plans and dreams, and I put a stop to them all.”
82
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″‘It’s me, brother. Your main man, Roberto. And yes, I’m cold. Very cold. It’s no fun bein’ dead.′ ‘I’m sorry, Rob. You know I didn’t mean to hurt you.’ ‘Understood, my man. But when’re you comin’ to keep me company?‘”
83
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“He’d seriously thought about leaving alone, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. They needed him. They needed someone to grumble at.”
84
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“I’ll find the evidence and before long Duke will get out. You’ll take his place. I’m coming your way, Carter.”
85
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“I want to pull Finny out of my mind like a splinter so that I can adore Jamie the way he deserves to be adored. And even more than that, because I am a selfish, bad creature, I want to feel that adoration. I want to be free of this guilt.”
86
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“[...] do not damage yourselves By attending only at the hungry altar Of regret and anger and guilt.”
87
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“Your pain and anger will pass, but the guilt would remain with you for always.”
88
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“Guilt is always preferable to the thing that might give you brownie points for being a good person but ruin your mental health. Choose guilt over resentment, because guilt is a natural part of life, a thing we can work with and absolve ourselves of, while resentment is something that we heap on other people who weren’t asking for it anyway.”
89
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“By the sympathy of your human hearts for sin ye shall scent out all the places—whether in church, bedchamber, street, field, or forest—where crime has been committed, and shall exult to behold the whole earth one stain of guilt, one mighty blood spot.”
90
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“How do you mourn someone you already let slip away? Are you even allowed to?”
91
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“But I need to know more. I need to know what happened to my cousin. Maybe only for the sake of knowing- but maybe because I need to hear that it wasn’t my fault.”
92
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“The guilt that the little boy had started to feel, melted away. At first apologetically, then whole-heartedly, he too started to laugh. The barrier of twenty thousand years vanished in the twinkling of an eye.”
93
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“You can’t blame yourself forever, Andy. And if you had died instead of Rob, would you want him to be hurting like you are now?”
94
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“Is it my fault that Robbie is dead? I wasn’t drivin’. I wasn’t even drinkin.”
95
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“So why do I feel so guilty? I don’t sleep so good at night. I keep seein’ the fire and hearin’ his screams and feelin’ so helpless. He was too young to die like that. It’s not fair. He never had a chance. Was all this done to teach us kids a lesson? Will it stop us from drinkin’ and drivin’? Maybe—a few.”
96
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“There’s some stuff I don’t understand about this accident—like why it happened and why Robbie had to die and why I didn’t die. Mama keeps huggin’ me, sayin’, ‘Praise the Lord’ and stuff like that. But what about Robbie’s mama? What is she saying?”
97
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“I find that resentment, criticism, guilt and fear cause more problems than anything else.”
98
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“Man’s guilt in history and in the tides of his own blood has been complicated by technology, the daily seeping falsehearted death.”

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