Home > Author > M.P. Shiel
1 " The habit is now confirmed in me of spending the greater part of the day in sleep, while by night I wander far and wide through the city under the sedative influence of a tincture which has become necessary to my life "
― M.P. Shiel , Xélucha and Others
2 " Drink wine with me, and be less Tartarean. "
― M.P. Shiel , The Pale Ape and Other Pulses
3 " Man is folly itself. Let this one fact only be considered: those same Greeks believed that they alone of the nations possessed the thing they called philosophia — the love of the subtleties of wisdom; and even while they were thus believing, the Vedic Hymns had been sung; the Brahmin had codified the intricate activities of the Attributes Sut, Raj, and Tum; and the Boodh had denied that Brahma, Vishnu, and Mahadeva were emanations of the Spirit of God. Such is the inborn vanity and shallowness of man. "
― M.P. Shiel , Shapes in the Fire
4 " ...the special quality of works of Art being to produce the momentary conviction that anything else whatever could not possibly be so good. "
― M.P. Shiel , The Purple Cloud
5 " It was while I was seated in an easy-chair in the street the following evening, smoking, watching the combustion of this structure, that something was suddenly born in me, something out of Hell, and I smiled a smile that never man smiled. And I said: 'I will burn: I will return to London... "
6 " However, the human female can be pretty queer and wayward; and her heart is like spittle on the palm that the Tartar slaps — no telling which way it will pitch. "
7 " You don’t know that my books do good?’‘No, I don’t know. I know that men are already getting past “novels” without novelty, and that, as soon as women cease to be children, the last “novel” will be written. Yours are entertaining, I believe — "
8 " ...Sir Bennett Beaumont! Is he the sort of man you’d send to represent you? (Cries of: “Yes!”) What is he?—ask yourselves the question: a fossilized Tory, a man who’s about as much idea of progress as a mummy—people actually say he’s got a collection of mummies in his grand fashionable mansion at Aylesham, and it’s only what we should expect of him. (Cheers, and cries of: “Oh, oh!”) And what has he ever done for East Norfolk? Gentlemen, you may say as you like about Jews—Jews this, and Jews that—and every man has a right to his opinion in this land of glorious Saxon liberty—but no one can deny that it’s Jews who know how to make the money. (Cheers and hisses.) They know how to make it for themselves (hisses)—and, yes, they know how to make it for the nation! (Loud triumph of cheers.) That’s the point—that touches the spot! (Cries of: “Oh, oh!”) Righteousness, it is said, exalteth a nation: well, so do Jews— "
― M.P. Shiel , The Lord of the Sea
9 " Between chaos and our shoes wobbles, I tell you, the thinnest film! "
― M.P. Shiel , Vaila
10 " Truly, then, you must be a creature of unusually weak intellect. I see that now. Matter does not exist, then, there is no such thing, really--it is an appearance, a spectrum--every writer not imbecile from Plato to Fichte has, voluntarily or involuntarily, proved that for good. To create it is to produce an impression of its reality upon the senses of others; to destroy it is to wipe a wet rag across a scribbled slate.""Perhaps. I do not care. Since no one can do it.""No one? You are mere embryo--""Who then?""Anyone, whose power of Will is equivalent to the gravitating force of a star of the First Magnitude.""Ha! ha! ha! By heaven, you choose to be facetious. Are there then wills of such equivalence?"There have been three, the founders of religions. There was a fourth: a cobbler from Herculaneum [Winckelmann], whose mere volition induced the cataclysm of Vesuvius in '79 in direct opposition to the gravity of Sirius. There are more fames than you have ever sung, you know. "
― M.P. Shiel , Xelucha
11 " Truly, then, you must be a creature of unusually weak intellect. I see that now. Matter does not exist, then, there is no such thing, really--it is an appearance, a spectrum--every writer not imbecile from Plato to Fichte has, voluntarily or involuntarily, proved that for good. To create it is to produce an impression of its reality upon the senses of others; to destroy it is to wipe a wet rag across a scribbled slate.""Perhaps. I do not care. Since no one can do it.""No one? You are mere embryo--""Who then?""Anyone, whose power of Will is equivalent to the gravitating force of a star of the First Magnitude.""Ha! ha! ha! By heaven, you choose to be facetious. Are there then wills of such equivalence?""There have been three, the founders of religions. There was a fourth: a cobbler from Herculaneum [Winckelmann], whose mere volition induced the cataclysm of Vesuvius in '79 in direct opposition to the gravity of Sirius. There are more fames than you have ever sung, you know. "
12 " Of ignorant people I am accustomed to consider the mere scientist the most ignorant! "
