# The Western Lands

- Author: [William S. Burroughs](https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-s-burroughs.md)
- Quotes: 6
- Book page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-s-burroughs/the-western-lands

## Quotes

> Consider the impasse of a one-God universe. He is all-knowing and all-powerful. He can't go anywhere, since He is already everywhere. He can't do anything, since the act of doing presupposes opposition. His universe is irrevocably thermodynamic, having no friction by definition. So, He has to create friction: War, Fear, Sickness, Death, to keep his dying show on the road.

p. 113

> Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.

> Now what sort of man or woman or monster would stroke a centipede I have ever seen? "And here is my good big centipede!" If such a man exists, I say kill him without more ado. He is a traitor to the human race.

> Cheat your landlord if you can and must, but do not try to shortchange the Muse. It cannot be done. You can't fake quality any more than you can fake a good meal.

> No job too dirty for a fucking scientist.

p. 8

> Remember the Italian steward who put on women's clothes and so filched a seat in a lifeboat? "A cur in human shape, certainly he was born and saved to set a new standard by which to judge infamy and shame.

p. 6