Michael Moorcock Quotes

Here information and philosophies were exchanged, together with all manner of goods. This was a court whose energies were not devoted to maintaining itself unchanged for eternity, but to every kind of new idea and lively, humane discussion, which welcomed fresh thought not as a threat to its existence but as a very necessity to its continued well-being, whose wealth was devoted to experiment in the arts and sciences, to supporting those who were needy, to aiding thinkers and scholars. The Bright Empire’s brightness would come no longer from the glow of putrefaction but from the light of reason and good will.

Everything may exist for a short while—even justice. But the true state of the universe is anarchy. It is the mortal’s tragedy that he can never accept this.

I at least had some knowledge of the warping, mutating power of the Lords of Disorder, the supernatural entities who on John Daker’s Earth would be called Arch-Demons, the Dukes of Hell. I knew that they made use of our most treasured virtues and most honoured emotions. That they were capable of almost any illusion. And that all that was keeping them from pouring forth from their stronghold to engulf so many other Realms of the multiverse was their caution, their unreadiness or unwillingness to war against the rival power of Law. But if we humans invited them to our realms, they would come.

We fight for our beliefs, Queen Medhbh," said Amergin, "just as much as we fight for our lives. We must continue to conduct our affairs according to those beliefs. If we do not then we have no justification for living. Let us question these people fairly and listen to their answers before we judge them innocent or guilty.

Yesterday’s underdog is tomorrow’s tyrant.

I have learned from my experiences that hatred and racial antagonism can be manufactured by the politicians of any one country against any other, so I was no longer the patriot I had been.

Once rich, moreover, I should again travel easily about Europe, for while in the public eye a poor radical is dangerous rogue, a rich radical is merely an eccentric gentleman!

Regret is useless since it can achieve nothing.

Chaos has her moods and whims, that's all. As I told you, she cannot remain stable. It is in her nature to be forever changing."
"While it is in the nature of Law," Alisaard explained, "to be forever fixed. The Balance is there to ensure that neither Law nor Chaos ever gain complete ascendancy, for the one offers sterility while the other offers only sensation.

It is almost impossible to have a baseless snobbish opinion of the General Theory of Relativity.

My own self-deception at least promised some kind of pleasure. Theirs offered nothing but terror and guilt.

There could be an end to all this, when the Lords of the Higher Worlds and all the machinery of cosmic mystery shall be no more. And perhaps that is why they fear mortals so much. The secret of their destruction, I suspect, lies in us, though we have yet to realize our own power."
"And do you have a hint of what that power may be, Eternal Champion?" said Alisaard.
I smiled. "I think it is simply the power to conceive of a multiverse which has no need of the supernatural, which, indeed, could abolish it if so desired!

Listening to the conversation, his faith in the stupidity of human nature was fully restored.

It is many years since I have wielded a weapon larger than a pen, borne anything weightier than a difficult problem in philosophy.

Here, I thought, I had found the human race in its final stages of decadence—perverse, insouciant, without ambition. And I could not blame them. After all, they had no future.