Anthony Burgess Quotes

Now I just don't know who to tell to go to hell Who put the old devil in the distorted angel?

I turned my back on the devil, turned my back on the angel too.

I did spend a lot of time as a child very confused about whether I had a devil in me, or whether I was in a state of grace. I mean, these ideas are so potent to anybody with half an imagination.

Whether or not the devil is really good or evil is something that we don't really know.

Oh, I am an angel, though sometimes I wish I was more of a devil.

The quiet conscience is an invention of the devil.

In the desert, an old monk had once advised a traveler, the voices of God and the Devil are scarcely distinguishable.

I wanted to write a book about people who have the best intentions and think - really, truly think - that they're doing the right thing. And then they realize that when those ideals come knocking at their windowsill, a lot of times they will suddenly disavow those ideals.

I'm a religious, spiritual person, but if there is good in the world, there must be evil, too.

There's nothing simple when you're in this 'Good Place.'

I agree with myself on 80 percent of things, but when I look at myself in the mirror in the morning, I still have inner debates about the right thing to do.

I can't forget the scene in 'My Night at Maud's' when the very pious engineer in the business suit decides to sit on Maud's bed while she is lying under the covers with only a T-shirt on, determined to seduce him.

Man and woman become a devil to each other when they do not separate their spiritual paths, for the nature of created beings is always the nature of differentiation.

Music is the language spoken by angels.

If it was a sin for you to choose me . . . then I would go to the Devil himself and bless him for tempting ye to it.

Some devil with a pitchfork keep talkin' like he know me. I stood before an angel as he told me bout the glory.

And if there were a devil it would not be one who decided against God, but one who, in eternity, came to no decision.

But there are victories far worse than defeats; and to overcome an angel too gentle to put out all his strength, and ride away in triumph on the back of a devil, is one of the poorest.

There are two kinds of people in this world, son. Those who save lives, and those who take lives." "And what of those who protect and defend? Those who save lives by taking lives?" "That's like trying to stop a storm by blowing harder. Ridiculous. You can't protect by killing.

The angels had guitars before they had wings.

I could never work out whether we were to view religion as a life-insurance policy or a life sentence. I can understand a wrathful God who'd just as soon dangle us all from a hook. And I can understand a tender, unprejudiced Jesus. But I could never quite feature the two of them living in the same house. You wind up walking on eggshells, never knowing which... is at home at the moment.

Occasionally, there are battles in the sky. One likes to imagine the angels are always triumphant. One does not like to think of the ancient and terrible scales balancing the infernal and divine as wobbling back and forth. Tilting freely, to and fro. One does not like to think that sometimes it is the angel that falls.

I asked a thief to steal me a peach: He turned up his eyes. I asked a lithe lady to lie her down: Holy and meek, she cries. As soon as I went An angel came. He winked at the thief And smiled at the dame- And without one word spoke Had a peach from the tree, And 'twixt earnest and joke Enjoyed the lady.

Hard to say what's right when all I wanna do is wrong.

Where dance is, there is the devil.