76 posts
Latest Posts by readingmien - Page 3
gosh but like we spent hundreds of years looking up at the stars and wondering “is there anybody out there” and hoping and guessing and imagining
because we as a species were so lonely and we wanted friends so bad, we wanted to meet other species and we wanted to talk to them and we wanted to learn from them and to stop being the only people in the universe
and we started realizing that things were maybe not going so good for us– we got scared that we were going to blow each other up, we got scared that we were going to break our planet permanently, we got scared that in a hundred years we were all going to be dead and gone and even if there were other people out there, we’d never get to meet them
and then
we built robots?
and we gave them names and we gave them brains made out of silicon and we pretended they were people and we told them hey you wanna go exploring, and of course they did, because we had made them in our own image
and maybe in a hundred years we won’t be around any more, maybe yeah the planet will be a mess and we’ll all be dead, and if other people come from the stars we won’t be around to meet them and say hi! how are you! we’re people, too! you’re not alone any more!, maybe we’ll be gone
but we built robots, who have beat-up hulls and metal brains, and who have names; and if the other people come and say, who were these people? what were they like?
the robots can say, when they made us, they called us discovery; they called us curiosity; they called us explorer; they called us spirit. they must have thought that was important.
and they told us to tell you hello.
Dru took a deep breath. “Okay,” she said. “Just us now. Just Blackthorns.” Everyone went still.
The Blackthorn family by @cassandraclare
bell hooks spoke about her disdain for the phrase “i’ve fallen in love” and calls for its change to “i’ve chosen love”, “i am loving”, “i am love” and my heart has softened since i read those words.
PARADOX
It is as right and as wrong as hurting someone who hurt you.
It is as beautiful and as hideous as a face created to hide your own.
It is as simple and as complex as admitting you were wrong.
That maybe you don't need to hold it in.
That maybe you can tell someone.
That maybe pain is something people do understand the way they understand hunger, thirst and desperation.
That what people don't understand is that other people understand pain, too.
- Elf Monarch
(Hi, I'm Indian, so I'm trilingual. I've added two soundtracks to go with the piece. One is in Hindi, and I love this song. The other is English, since I'm guessing most of the people on tumblr speak English.)
((I love both the tracks.))
As children, we learn more than we ever do in our lives. If we ever were to look down upon children as intellectual inferiors, our childhood has been wasted, and we are far better off being born as adults.
- Elf Monarch
It is foolish to assume man has only one personality, and the sooner one realizes this, the better.
- Elf Monarch
@justcallmeparadox It was very cool to have met you
Dear friends of Tumblr,
Today at my school we had an assembly about internet predators and when I had said that most of my true friends are over the internet and they gave me a lecture about how “I don’t know who I’m talking to” blah blah. So please, if you aren’t a predator in any way, please reblog so i can prove a point.
THE INFERNAL DEVICES - SORTING CEREMONY
“I think when we make choices—for each choice is individual of the choices we have made before—we must examine not only our reasons for making them but what result they will have, and whether good people will be hurt by our decisions.”
“Do not let any of them tell you who you are. You are the flame that cannot be put out. You are the star that cannot be lost. You are who you have always been, and that is enough and more than enough. Anyone who looks at you and sees darkness is blind.”
“You know—you know it isn’t just tinkering for me. You know I want to create something that will make the world better, that will make things better for the Nephilim. Just as you do, in directing the Institute.”
“I promise to charm the dickens out of him. I shall charm him with such force that when I am done, he will be left lying limply on the ground, trying to remember his own name.’
“It is only that I fear— I fear that if I applied for it, Mrs. Branwell would think I am ungrateful for all that she has done for me. She saved my life and raised me up. She gave me safety and a home. I would not repay her for all that by abandoning her service.”
“But the way you hated yourself … I understood that. Jem always wanted to give me a chance, as Charlotte did. But I do not want the gifts of generous hearts. I want to be seen as I am.”
“I will give my ridiculous sister my salary for the rest of my life if she desires it, but I will not admit to wrongdoing—not for myself, not for any of us. Yes, I put an arrow through his eye. Its eye. And I would do it again.”
“One must always be careful of books and what is inside them, for words have the power to change us.”
“We are not going to tell Charlotte of our conversation with the Consul. But neither are we going to spy on her. Gabriel, you are my brother, and I love you. I would do anything to protect you. But I will not sell out your soul and mine.”
“Never before have I sent away anyone who told me they had nowhere else to go, and I will not start now. I will ask of you only one thing. To allow someone to live in the Institute, in the very heart of the Enclave, is to place my trust in their good intentions. Do not make me regret that I have trusted you.”
“If there is a life after this one,“ he said, "let me meet you in it, James Carstairs.” “There will be other lives.” Jem held his hand out, and for a moment they clasped hands, as they had done during their parabatai ritual, reaching across twin rings of fire, to interlace their fingers with each other. “The world is a wheel,” he said. “When we rise or fall, we do it together.” Will tightened his grip on Jem’s hand. “Well, then,” he said, through a tight throat, “since you say there will be another life for me, let us both pray do not make as colossal a mess of it as I have this one.” Jem smiled at him, that smile that had always, even on Will’s blackest days, eased his mind. “I think there is hope for you yet, Will Herondale.”
— Will Herondale and Jem Carstairs (Clockwork Princess)
“While I am enjoying this exchange of pleasantries,“ Gabriel said, seeing that Henry was about to respond, "there do remain a few - central - questions about this invention.” Henry looked at him blankly. “Such as what?” “I believe, Henry, that he is inquiring whether this…doorway-” Charlotte began. “We’ve called it a Portal,” said Henry. The capitalization of the word was very clear in his tone. “Whether it works,” Charlotte finished. “Have you tried it?” Henry looked stricken. “Well, no. There hasn’t been time. But I assure you, our calculations are faultless.” Everyone but Henry and Magnus looked at the Portal with refreshed alarm. “Henry…,” Charlotte began. “Well, I think Henry and Magnus should go first,” Gabriel said. “They invented the blasted thing.” Everyone turned on him. “It’s like he’s replaced Will,” said Ggideon, eyebrows up. “They say all the same sort of things.”
— Gabriel Lightwood, Henry Branwell, Charlotte Fairchild and Gideon Lightwood (Clockwork Princess)
You must know… surely, you must know it was all for you. You are too generous to trifle with me. I believe you spoke with my aunt last night, and it has taught me to hope as I’d scarcely allowed myself before. If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes have not changed, but one word from you will silence me forever. If, however, your feelings have changed, I will have to tell you. You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.
Pride & Prejudice (2005) dir. Joe Wright
reblog to save a life, i didn’t know this
King Arthur’s Round Table
The Round Table represents everything that separated Arthur from Uther. People repeatedly point out how Arthur isn't so different from Uther as he'd like to think, because he, too, shunned magic. But that is because of upbringing, and inputted thoughts.
Arthur believed in equality.
The first time he met Percival, he told him to call him Arthur instead of the expected address (my lord, sire, my king). When he first found the Round Table, Merlin was an inseparable part of it, even though he was his servant. This is because he remembered and agreed with what Gwaine said, "Nobility is defined by what you do, not by who you are." He married the servant girl, daughter of a condemned blacksmith, for goodness' sake, because she was wiser than most nobles.
Why he refused to accept sorcerers and magicians is because he did not see them as equal. Every single sorcerer he had met had betrayed him in one way or another, were dangerous people he needed to be careful around. Nimueh, the witch-hunter, Kara, Dragoon the Great, Mordred and his beloved Merlin. His mother and father both died of sorcery. He lost his half-sister to magic. They were criminals. Why would he allow sorcerers equal status if he wouldn't grant that to petty criminals or those acquitted of treason?
No, Arthur was fair to the very end.
He promised Dolma that he would remember there is no evil in sorcery, only in the hearts of men, and he forgave Merlin.
The sword in the stone episode is practically the essence of the whole show. It is Arthur and Merlin, both, that stand before all the people, but everyone's eyes are on Arthur, as usual. Merlin used his magic under their very noses and not a soul noticed his eyes glow gold. The scene where Arthur pulls out the sword? If that isn't a symbol of Arthur and Merlin's entire time together, then I don't know what is. Arthur is fully aware of his strengths as a warrior, but doubts his kingly qualities, and even though his love interest Gwen is there, he needs Merlin to reassure him. Merlin tells him of the legend of the sword and takes him to the sword. Mind you, he is fully aware it is by magic that the sword is stuck in the stone, and that it is stuck fast, but also that using magic he could easily get Arthur to pull it out with his thumb alone. Nonetheless, Merlin stands back and first lets Arthur try. He lets him try anyway. Despite. Because he knows it is impossible for someone to pull it out without magic, and yet he is so sure Arthur is the greatest king to ever exist that he momentarily forgets that a major part of the legend is his own brainchild. But Arthur cannot, and yet he does not fail. Because he's got a Merlin. When Arthur is struck with panic and dread when he realizes for a moment how impossible the idea is, Merlin is there, as always, telling him what he needs to hear, a part of his heart and brain in a whole different person. Merlin tells him, "Have faith." This may or may not be the first time he's said it out loud, but the idea was always there. Merlin has no great warrior-like skills that Arthur knows of, and yet he is dragged along on every great and perilous journey and quest, because he has faith in himself when Merlin is around. And they always somehow get back home with two hands, two feet, and their own teeth. He has faith in Merlin. And the most important part, Arthur does manage to pull the sword out. He knew it was impossible, and he knew he did it. He knew it was magic, but he doesn't complain, because it would be foolish to refuse magic, because one, it was then that they needed it the most, and two, because magic has always been at the heart of Camelot.
