Frank Herbert Quotes
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101. “Radicals are only to be feared when you try to suppress them. You must demonstrate that you will use the best of what they offer.”

— Frank Herbert

102. “Many things we do naturally become difficult only when we try to make them intellectual subjects. It is possible to know so much about a subject that you become totally ignorant.”

— Frank Herbert

103. “All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities.”

— Frank Herbert

104. “Balance is what distinguishs a people from a mob.”

— Frank Herbert

105. “I never could bring myself to trust a traitor,” the Baron said. “Not even a traitor I created.”

— Frank Herbert

106. “Control the coinage and the courts – let the rabble have the rest.”

— Frank Herbert

107. “Parting with friends is a sadness. A place is only a place.”

— Frank Herbert

108. “Justice required resort to law and that could be a fickle mistress, subject always to the whims and prejudices of those who administered the laws.”

— Frank Herbert

109. “Good governance never depends upon laws, but upon the personal qualities of those who govern. The machinery of government is always subordinate to the will of those who administer that machinery. The most important element of government, therefore, is the method of choosing leaders.”

— Frank Herbert

110. “Caution is the path to mediocrity. Gliding, passionless mediocrity is all that most people think they can achieve.”

— Frank Herbert

111. “They’re trained to believe, not to know. Belief can be manipulated. Only knowledge is dangerous.”

— Frank Herbert

112. “Small souls who seek power over others first destroy the faith those others might have in themselves.”

— Frank Herbert

113. “Be prepared to appreciate what you meet.”

— Frank Herbert

114. “If you need something to worship, then worship life – all life, every last crawling bit of it! We’re all in this beauty together!”

— Frank Herbert

115. “I give you the chameleon, whose ability to blend itself into the background tells you all you need to know about the roots of ecology and the foundations of a personal identity.”

— Frank Herbert

116. “Intelligence takes chances with limited data in an arena where mistakes are not only possible but also necessary.”

— Frank Herbert

117. “One learns from books and example only that certain things can be done. Actual learning requires that you do those things.”

— Frank Herbert

118. “There is no escape – we pay for the violence of our ancestors.”

— Frank Herbert

119. “Too much knowledge never makes for simple decisions.”

— Frank Herbert

120. “When you imagine mistakes, there can be no self-defense.”

— Frank Herbert

121. “Grief is the price of victory.”

— Frank Herbert

122. “The only past which endures lies wordlessly within you.”

— Frank Herbert

123. “If there is a difference between what is said and what is done, only a fool believes what was said.”

— Frank Herbert

124. “A bad administrator is more concerned with reports than with decisions. He wants the hard record which he can display as an excuse for his errors.”

— Frank Herbert

125. “Beaurocracy destroys initiative.”

— Frank Herbert

126. “Question: Who governs the governors? Answer: Entropy.”

— Frank Herbert

127. “If enough of us believe, a new thing can be made to exist. Belief structure creates a filter through which chaos is sifted into order.”

— Frank Herbert

128. “One uses power by grasping it lightly. To grasp too strongly is to be taken over by power, and thus to become its victim.”

— Frank Herbert

129. “Enemies make you stronger, allies make you weaker.”

— Frank Herbert

130. “It is so shocking to find out how many people do not believe that they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.”

— Frank Herbert

131. “Blood is thicker than water, but politics are thicker than blood.”

— Frank Herbert

132. “No more terrible disaster could befall your people than for them to fall into the hands of a Hero.”

— Frank Herbert

133. “The willow submits to the wind and prospers until one day it is many willows – a wall against the wind.”

— Frank Herbert

134. “When strangers meet, great allowance should be made for differences of custom and training.”

— Frank Herbert

135. “The universe is full of doors.”

— Frank Herbert

136. “There is not secret to balance. You just have to feel the waves.”

— Frank Herbert

137. “Each life creates endless ripples.”

— Frank Herbert

138. “When I need to identify rebels, I look for men with principles.”

— Frank Herbert

139. “A leader is one of the things that distinguishes a mob from a people. He maintains the level of individuals. Too few individuals and a people reverts to a mob.”

— Frank Herbert

140. “Life is a mask through which the universe expresses itself.”

— Frank Herbert

141. “Every judgment teeters on the brink of error. To claim absolute knowledge is to become monstrous. Knowledge is an unending adventure at the edge of uncertainty.”

— Frank Herbert

142. “A ruler must learn to persuade and not to compel.”

— Frank Herbert

143. “Ecology is often confused with environmentalism, while in fact, environmentalism often leaves out the fact that people, too, can be a legitimate part of an ecosystem.”

— Frank Herbert

144. “Good subjects must feel guilty. The guilt begins as a feeling of failure. The good autocrat provides many opportunities for failure in the populace.”

— Frank Herbert

145. “The writing of history is largely a process of diversion. Most historical accounts distract attention from the secret influences behind great events.”

— Frank Herbert

146. “The joy of living, its beauty, is all bound up in the fact that life can surprise you.”

— Frank Herbert

147. “The dice cannot read their own spots.”

— Frank Herbert

148. “Never attempt to reason with people who know they are right!”

— Frank Herbert

149. “Who are the rabble and who are the ruled?”

— Frank Herbert

150. “Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague ritual.”

— Frank Herbert