“For it is owing to their wonder that men both now begin and at first began to philosophize; they wondered originally at the obvious difficulties, then advanced little by little and stated difficulties about the greater matters . . . they were pursuing science in order to know, and not for any utilitarian end.”
“I know all the twenty-six letters like that through to Z is for Zebra. I know them all well. So not I know everything anyone knows from beginning to end. From the start to the close. Because Z is as far as the alphabet goes.”
“Rowan knew, as Annad did not, that without the bukshah there would be not rich, creamy milk to drink, no cheese, curd, and butter to eat. There would be no tick gray wood for cloth.There would be no help to plow the fields or carry in the harvest. There would be no broad backs to bear the burden on the long journeys down to the coast to trade with the clever, silent Maris fold. The life of Rind dependen on the bukshah. Without them, the village, too, would die.”
“In his small house at the other side of the wood, Mr. Tickle was asleep.
You didn’t know that there was such a thing as a Tickle, did you?
Well, there is!”
“I believe in Zorba because he’s the only being I have in my power, the only one I know. All the rest are ghosts. I see with these eyes, I hear with these ears, I digest with these guts. All the rest are ghosts, I tell you.”
“Jennifer groaned. ‘How do you know? How can you tell when you’re in love?’ That was something that Anastasia had thought about a great deal. She had stood in the corner drugstore, reading a questionnaire called “is it really love?′ in Cosmopolitan until the pharmacist, Mr. Belden had said, ‘Pay for ir or close it up, girlie.”
″ And even when he climbed to the top of the tallest tree. Wilbur climbed to the top of the tallest tree to hide. He looked ridiculous and he knew it. Even the birds laughed at him.”
“Then, you’ve got a lot to learn about freight cars, Thomas. They are silly things and must be kept in their place. After pushing them about here for a few weeks, you’ll know almost as much about them as Edward. Then you’ll be a Really Useful Engine.”
“It can be hard even if you’re really big. But you can know a little bit anyway. For example, all plants, animals and human have to die in the end. It’s important to make room on the earth for the new ones that are born and starting to grow.”
“Nothing ever went wrong at the back of the north wind and the only thing one ever missed was someone he loved who had not yet got there. But if one at the back of the north wind wanted to know how things were going with any one he loved, he had only to go to a certain tree, and climb up and sit down in the branches.”
“There is a reality in blessing, which I take baptism to be, primarily. It doesn’t enhance sacredness, but it acknowledges it, and there is a power in that. I have felt it pass through me, so to speak. The sensation is of really knowing a creature, I mean really feeling its mysterious life and your own mysterious life at the same time.”
“Mom, it’s not like you have to know someone well to hate their guts. You don’t sit around and have a long conversation and then decide whether or not to hate their guts. You just do. And she does.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever know what to do when I’m a grown-up. It seems like you and Momma know a lot of things that I can never learn. It seems real scary. I don’t think I could ever be as good a parent as you guys.”
“I guess I should have told Momma that I really appreciated her helping me get my friend back but I didn’t have to. I was pretty sure she already knew.”
“But by now every word, every gesture was foreseeable, as all else in that war which had lasted so many years, its every skirmish and duel conducted according to rules so that it was always known beforehand who would win or lose, be heroic or cowardly, be gutted or merely unhorsed and thumped.”
“The cat sat on the mat. Lots of cat do that, everybody knows. And nothing strange comes of it. But once a cat sat on a mat and something strange did come of it.”
“Susan Blue
Oh, Susan Blue,
How do you do?
Please may I go for a walk with you?
Where shall we go?
Oh, I know--
Down in the meadow where the cowslips grow!”
“You may be sure there are mummies there, and very likely magic writings in their hands. I wish we could get a magic writing. Then we could do anything, and we could know all the secrets.”
“There was no reason for Emira to be unfamiliar with this word. And there was no reason for Alix to be impressed. Alix completely knew these things, but only when she reminded herself to stop thinking them in the first place.”
“Here I am noble; I am boyar; the common people know me, and I am master. But a stranger in a strange land, he is no one; men know him not—and to know not is to care not for.”