Now he was considering acting in accordance with his beliefs. Something else he had heard the Khembalis say at the Quiblers, this time Drepung: If you don’t act on it, it wasn’t a true feeling. — 18: 268-270
“You know, this city and the Federal government are synonymous. They stand for each other, like when people call the administration ‘the White House.’ What is that, metonymy?” “Metonymy or synecdoche, I can never remember which.” “No one can.” Phil walked inside, stopped short at the sight of the stained inner walls. “Damn it. They are going to let this city sink back into the swamp it came out of.” “That’s synecdoche I think. Or the pathetic fallacy.” “Pathetic for sure, but how is it patriotic? How do they sell that?” “Please Phil, you’re gonna wake him up. They have it both ways, you know. They use code phrases that mean something different to the Christian right than to anyone else.” “Like the beast will be slain or whatnot?” “Yes, and sometimes even more subtle than that.” “Ha ha. Clerics, everywhere you look. Ours are as bad as the foreign ones. Make people hate their government at the same time you’re scaring them with terrorists, what kind of program is that?” Phil drifted through the subdued crowd toward the left wall, into which was incised the Gettysburg Address. The final lines were obscured by the flood’s high-water mark, a sight which made him scowl. “They had better clean this up.” “Oh they will. He was a Republican, after all.” “Abraham Lincoln was no Republican.” “Hello?” — 51: 772-786
The taste of blood. Frank gestured at his cell phone, put his cold hand back under his thigh, rocked forward and back, forward and back. Warm up, warm up. Don’t bleed inside. “There’s too many . . . different things going on at once. I go from thing to thing, you know. Hour to hour. I see people, I do different things with them, and I’m not . . . I don’t feel like the same person with these different people. I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t know what to do. If anyone were watching they’d think I had some kind of mental disorder. I don’t make any sense.” “But no one is watching.” “Except what if they are?” Rudra shook his head. “No one can see inside you. So no matter what they see, they don’t know. Everyone only judges themself.” “That’s not good!” Frank said. “I need someone more generous than that!” “Ha ha. You are funny.” “I’m serious!” “A good thing to know, then. You are the judge. A place to start.” Frank shuddered, rubbed his face. Cold hands, cold face; and dead behind the nose. “I don’t see how I can. I’m so different in these different situations. It’s like living multiple lives. I mean I just act the parts. People believe me. But I don’t know what I feel. I don’t know what I mean.” “Of course. This is always true. To some you are like this, to others like that. Sometimes a spirit comes down. Voices take over inside you. People take away what they see, they think that is all there is. And sometimes you want to fool them in just that way. But want to or not, you fool them. And they fool you! And on it goes—everyone in their own life, everyone fooling all the others—No! It is easy to live multiple lives! What is hard is to be a whole person.” — 540: 8280-8297