The Entombment (detail). By Peter Paul Rubens, 1612

You could attach prices to thoughts. Some cost a lot, some a little. And how does one pay for thoughts? The answer, I think, is: with courage.

- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value

A Mega-Cluster of Galaxies in the Making : Astronomers using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes have put together a detailed map of a rare collision between four galaxy clusters.

Forcing my thoughts into an ordered sequence is a torment for me.

- Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value

People don’t understand the word ruthless. They think it means ‘mean.’ It’s not about being mean. It’s about seeing the bright, clear line that leads from A to B. The line that goes from motive to means. Beginning to end. It’s about seeing that bright, clear line and not caring about anything but the beautiful fact that you can see the solution. Not caring about anything else but the perfection of it.

- Marco, Book #30: The Reunion, pg. 71 (by K.A. Applegate)

Astrid Nondal

A Calm at a Mediterranean Port (details). By Claude Joseph Vernet, 1770

Debby Harry, 1976

“The true epochs in life are those brief periods of stand-still between the ascent and decline of a ruling idea or feeling.”

—Human, All Too Human, “The Wanderer and His Shadow,” §193 (excerpt).

Detail: Night, 1815, by Bertel Thorvaldsen (Danish, 1770-1844)

The most thought-provoking thing in our thought-provoking time is that we are still not thinking.

- Martin Heidegger

“Our dreams are chains of symbolic scenes and images in place of the language of poetic narration. They paraphrase our experiences, expectations or circumstances with such poetic boldness and definiteness that in the morning we are always astonished at ourselves when we recall them.”

—Human, All Too Human, “The Wanderer and His Shadow,” §194 (edited excerpt).

Angels summoning the wolf blood moon.

The Beloit Daily Call, Kansas, June 19, 1919