Quotes by Patrick O'Brian

Patrick O'Brian

… it has always seemed to me that books are the supreme decorations of a room

Book

Decoration

Rooms

…I have had such a sickening of men in masses, and of causes, that I would not cross this room to reform parliament or prevent the union or to bring about the millennium. I speak only for myself, mind – it is my own truth alone – but man as part of a movement or a crowd is indifferent to me. He is inhuman. And I have nothing to do with nations, or nationalism. The only feelings I have – for what they are – are for men as individuals; my loyalties, such as they may be, are to private persons alone.

Feelings

Loyalty

Men

…looking angrily at the wombat: and a moment later, ‘Come now, Stephen, this is coming it pretty high: your brute is eating my hat.’ ‘So he is, too,’ said Dr. Maturin. ‘But do not be perturbed, Jack; it will do him no harm, at all. His digestive processes–

Drs

Hats

Moments

After all a book can be represented as a conversation with one’s demon.

Book

Conversation

Demon

Although wealth may not bring happiness, the immediate prospect of it provides a wonderfully close imitation.

Imitation

May

Wealth

And she hates being managed – that is not the word I want. What is it, Maturin?’ ‘Manipulated.’ ‘Exactly. She is a dutiful girl – a great sense of duty: I think it rather stupid, but there it is – but still she finds the way her mother has been arranging and pushing and managing and angling in all this perfectly odious. You two must have had hogsheads of that grocer’s claret forced down your throats. Perfectly odious: and she is obstinate – strong, if you like – under that bread-and-butter way of hers. It will take a great deal to move her; much more than the excitement of a ball.

Girl

Mother

Strong

Authority is a solvent of humanity: look at any husband, any father of a family,and note the absorption of the person by the persona, the individual by the role. Then multiply the family, and the authority, by some hundreds and see the effect upon a sea-captain, to say nothing of an absolute monarch.Surely man in general is born to be oppressed or solitary, if he is to be fully human; unless it so happens that he is immune to the poison.

Father

Husband

Men

But the tale or narrative set in the past may have its particular time-free value; and the candid reader will not misunderstand me, will not suppose that I intend any preposterous comparison, when I observe that Homer was farther removed in time from Troy than I am from the Napoleonic wars; yet he spoke to the Greeks for 2,000 years and more.

Past

War

Years

Compulsion is the death of friendship.

Compulsion

For a moment Jack felt the strongest inclination to snatch up his little gilt chair and beat the white-faced man down with it.

Littles

Men

White

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Air

Amazement

Anticipation

Aspect

Authority

Belief

Blue

Bones

Book

Born

Cake

Captains

Compulsion

Conversation

Country

Decoration

Demon

Depth

Differences

Doctors

Doe

Doors

Drs

Drug

Drunk

Ears

Eggs

Enquiry

Exercise

Existence

Eye

Fall

Father

Feelings

Fellowship

Figures

Girl

Gold

Hands

Hats

Heart

Holiday

Home

Horse

House

Husband

Ideas

Imitation

Important

Injured

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Quotes by Patrick O'Brian

Patrick O'Brian

… it has always seemed to me that books are the supreme decorations of a room

…looking angrily at the wombat: and a moment later, ‘Come now, Stephen, this is coming it pretty high: your brute is eating my hat.’ ‘So he is, too,’ said Dr. Maturin. ‘But do not be perturbed, Jack; it will do him no harm, at all. His digestive processes–

After all a book can be represented as a conversation with one’s demon.

Although wealth may not bring happiness, the immediate prospect of it provides a wonderfully close imitation.

Compulsion is the death of friendship.

For a moment Jack felt the strongest inclination to snatch up his little gilt chair and beat the white-faced man down with it.

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Topics by Patrick O’Brian

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The Future Blueprint

The Home Therapist: Anti Anxiety

The Autobiography

The Behaviour Diary

The Dating Diary

The Relationship Therapist

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