# H. Beam Piper

- Quotes: 23
- Author page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper

## Books

- [The Complete Paratime](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime.md) — 23 quotes

## Recently added quotes

> Alexandrian-Roman: off to a fine start with the pooling of Greek theory and Roman engineering talent, and then, a thousand years ago, two half-forgotten religions had been rummaged out of the dustbin and fanatics had begun massacring one another.

p. 250 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/alexandrian-roman-off-to-a-fine.md)

> Politics is nothing but common action to secure more favorable living conditions.

p. 81 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/politics-is-nothing.md)

> We define people as criminals when they suffer from psychological aberrations of an antisocial character, usually paranoid—excessive egoism, disregard for the rights of others, inability to recognize the social necessity for mutual cooperation and confidence.

p. 173 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/we-define-people.md)

> He had always suspected that beauty was the real feminine religion, from the willingness of its devotees to submit to martyrdom for it.

p. 178 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/he-had-always.md)

> Nobody will admit his own mental inferiority, even to himself.

p. 91 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/nobody-will-admit.md)

> Before the epidemic ended, it had almost de-populated this planet. Since the survivors knew nothing about germs, they blamed it on the anger of the gods—the old story of recourse to supernaturalism in the absence of a known explanation—and a fanatically anti-scientific cult got control.

p. 143 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/before-the-epidemic.md)

> You show me ten men who cherish some religious doctrine or political ideology, and I’ll show you nine men whose minds are utterly impervious to any factual evidence which contradicts their beliefs, and who regard the producer of such evidence as a criminal who ought to be suppressed. For instance, on the Fourth Level Europo-American Sector, where I was just working, there is a political sect, the Communists, who, in the territory under their control, forbid the teaching of certain well-established facts of genetics and heredity, because those facts do not fit the world picture demanded by their political doctrines. And on the same sector, a religious sect recently tried, in some sections successfully, to outlaw of the teaching of evolution by natural selection.

p. 82 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/you-show-me-ten.md)

> There were dead infantry all along the road, mostly killed from behind. Another case of cowardice carrying its own penalty; infantry who stood against cavalry had a chance, often a good one, but infantry who turned tail and ran had none. He didn’t pity them a bit.

p. 350 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/there-were-dead.md)

> They are people who believe in only one god, and then they believe that the god they worship is the only true one, and all others are false, and finally they believe that the only true god must be worshiped in only one way, and that those who worship otherwise are vile monsters who should be killed.

p. 384 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/they-are-people.md)

> I’ve always wondered whether the theory of the divine right of kings was invented by the kings, to establish their authority over the people, or by the priests, to establish their authority over the kings. It works about as well one way as the other.

p. 245 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/ive-always-wondered.md)

> “What gods did your people worship?”
>
> “Oh, my people had many gods. There was Conformity, and Authority, and Expense Account, and Opinion. And there was Status, whose symbols were many, and who rode in the great chariot Cadillac, which was almost a god itself. And there was Atom-bomb, the dread destroyer, who would some day come to end the world. None were very good gods, and I worshiped none of them.

p. 278 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/what-gods-did.md)

> A planet could take pretty good care of itself, he thought, if people would only leave it alone.

p. 209 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/h-beam-piper/the-complete-paratime/a-planet-could.md)