God is alive. Magic is afoot.
—Leonard Cohen, 1966Quotes
Men willingly believe what they wish.
—Julius Caesar, c. 50 BCThe believer in magic and miracles reflects on how to impose a law on nature—and, in brief, the religious cult is the outcome of this reflection.
—Friedrich Nietzsche, 1878The Mughal’s nature is such that they demand miracles, but if a miracle were to be performed by some upright follower of our religion, they would say that it had been brought about by magic and sorcery. They would strike him down with spears or would stone him to death.
—Fr. Antonio Monserrate, 1590I shall curse you with book and bell and candle.
—Thomas Malory, c. 1470Everything is a miracle. It is a miracle that one does not dissolve in one’s bath like a lump of sugar.
—Pablo Picasso, 1929Man is always a wizard to man, and the social world is at first magical.
—Jean-Paul Sartre, 1939One thing alone not even God can do: to make undone whatever has been done.
—Aristotle, c. 350 BCAny serious attempt to do anything worthwhile is ritualistic.
—Derek Walcott, 1986All things are filled full of signs, and it is a wise man who can learn about one thing from another.
—Plotinus, c. 255The mind is led on, step by step, to defeat its own logic.
—Dai Vernon, 1994Appearances often are deceiving.
—Aesop, c. 550 BCNothing is so easy as to deceive one’s self; for what we wish, that we readily believe.
—Demosthenes, 349 BC