# The single greatest thing written by anyone, ever **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 3, 2008, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896 "2008-03-03T02:06:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/61 "2008-03-04T07:08:20Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] I like the 23rd Psalm and “Amazing Grace,” “Ode to Joy,” and many other religious works. They just don’t make me believe in God (or stir memories either. I’ve _never_ really believed in God). I appreciate the art, the emotional expression, the longing, the attempts to comfort, things like that. I also like some Hindu and Buddhist art, Homer, Gilgamesh, Ancient statues of Greek and Roman Gods, Indian religious ragas, American Indian folk tales, the list goes on. I’ve never _believed_ in any of it but religious feeling brings out an intensity and seriousness of expression that results in good, well crafted art. [/QUOTE] That was really well said. I agree completely. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 7:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/62 "2008-03-04T07:54:42Z")
[QUOTE=lobotomyboy63] I think it’s fascinating that an atheist likes the writing of the 23rd psalm and can appreciate it as good writing, period. That, and other posts, answers my question. [/QUOTE] I enjoyed The Hobbit, but it didn’t make me believe in dwarves and elves. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 8:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/63 "2008-03-04T08:04:16Z")
[QUOTE=lobotomyboy63] This is why I say that if someone professes to be atheist, I’d have to think they don’t react at all to these things. [/QUOTE] Apparently we need a new thread: “The single most stupid thing written by anyone, ever.” ---
**Author:** ![Lakai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de0a6/32.png) [@Lakai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lakai)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/64 "2008-03-04T08:45:07Z")
[QUOTE=lobotomyboy63] I guess my “never chewed the fat with avowed atheists” colors are showing. I’m genuinely curious and hope I haven’t offended anybody. [/QUOTE] Stick around and you will definitely get a good understanding of atheists around here. Browse through the Great Debates forum and you’ll see. Try to ignore the hostility toward religious people here. Religion hasn’t been as good to others as it has to you. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 9:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/65 "2008-03-04T09:45:40Z")
[QUOTE=lobotomyboy63] I’m just saying that there is a spirituality in people that often lies dormant. It could be that self-avowed atheists even pause at moments like these, finding a few embers that haven’t gone out. This is why I say that if someone professes to be atheist, I’d have to think they don’t react at all to these things. [/QUOTE] I see what you’re saying, but it’s tremendously naive and insular. I don’t think any atheist would deny they can be deeply “spiritually” moved by stuff - works of art, the magnificence of the universe, or the beauty of nature, or the simplicity of a flower, or the birth of their child. It’s just that the definition of “spiritually” differs. To me, it’s an innate sense of wonder and awe, that is within me. To you it’s God. To followers of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, it’s connecting your soul with the Universe. Whatever. It’s a little religiocentric to attribute a common phenomenon with your particular religion - or any religion at all. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/66 "2008-03-04T12:48:24Z")
[QUOTE=panache45] Apparently we need a new thread: “The single most stupid thing written by anyone, ever.” [/QUOTE] Moderator interveneth: **panache45** , personal insuls are NOT permitted in this forum – for that matter, in any forum outside the one called _BBQ Pit._ You know better. For those unclear on the Rules, see [Rules for Posting on the Straight Dope Message Boards](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=384736) and especially Post #10 in that thread. See also [Forum Rules](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=343601) and especially Post #3 in that thread. Aside from being a Rules violation, it’s also a pretty rude way to welcome a newcomer. Please don’t do this again. Since this is a thread about great moments in literature, may I paraphrase: “Let the person who has never said anything stupid [del]cast the first stone[/del] start the thread you suggest.” **lobotomyboy63** , we’re glad to have you here and we hope that this bit of jerk-ish behavior on the part of one of our long-time posters doesn’t chase you away or upset you unduly. Welcome. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelQReilly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@MichaelQReilly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelQReilly)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/67 "2008-03-04T14:56:42Z")
I tried to post this yesterday, but I guess it got lost in the internets. Given the turn this thread has taken, this seems even more appropriate now. I’m an atheist who has often been moved by religious works. The work that moves me the most, however, is _A Free Man’s Worship_ by Bertrand Russell. All of it is sublime. This is one of my favorite parts: > [@](#): > > But the beauty of Tragedy does but make visible a quality which, in more or less obvious shapes, is present always and everywhere in life. In the spectacle of Death, in the endurance of intolerable pain, and in the irrevocableness of a vanished past, there is a sacredness, an overpowering awe, a feeling of the vastness, the depth, the inexhaustible mystery of existence, in which, as by some strange marriage of pain, the sufferer is bound to the world by bonds of sorrow. In these moments of insight, we lose all eagerness of temporary desire, all struggling and striving for petty ends, all care for the little trivial things that, to a superficial view, make up the common life of day by day; we see, surrounding the narrow raft illumined by the flickering light of human comradeship, the dark ocean on whose rolling waves we toss for a brief hour; from the great night without, a chill blast breaks in upon our refuge; all the loneliness of humanity amid hostile forces is concentrated upon the individual soul, which must struggle alone, with what of courage it can command, against the whole weight of a universe that cares nothing for its hopes and fears. Victory, in this struggle with the powers of darkness, is the true baptism into the glorious company of heroes, the true initiation into the overmastering beauty of human existence. From that awful encounter of the soul with the outer world, enunciation, wisdom, and charity are born; and with their birth a new life begins. To take into the inmost shrine of the soul the irresistible forces whose puppets we seem to be–Death and change, the irrevocableness of the past, and the powerlessness of Man before the blind hurry of the universe from vanity to vanity–to feel these things and know them is to conquer them. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [March 4, 2008, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/68 "2008-03-04T17:52:34Z")
Ladies bathed before noon, after their three o’clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum.” - Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/69 "2008-03-05T00:34:42Z")
23rd Psalm issues relocated (under Witness Protection Program). [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=9542247#post9542247](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=9542247#post9542247) ---
**Author:** ![Catamount](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/catamount/32/2840_2.png) [@Catamount](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Catamount)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/70 "2008-03-05T01:42:01Z")
From Oscar Wilde’s **De Profundis** : > [@](#): > > Far off, like a perfect pearl, one can see the City of God. It is so wonderful that it seems as if a child could reach it in a summer’s day. And so a child could. But for me and such as me it is different. One can realise a thing in a single moment, but one loses it in the long hours that follow with leaden feet. It is so difficult to keep ‘heights which the soul is competent to gain.’ We think in eternity but we move slowly through time… ---
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/71 "2008-03-05T01:50:54Z")
[QUOTE=Rick] Pretty much a lot of stuff by Shakespeare. I am fond of this passage from [Henry the Fifth](http://www.chronique.com/Library/Knights/crispen.htm) [/QUOTE] Yes! Yes! I want to join him and fight the French when I read (or see) that passage! My contribution: The Sh’ma Hear O Israel, the Lord our G-D, the Lord is one. I have been an atheist my entire life. But the power in those words, the way it defined my people as a nation and the strength it exudes sometimes makes me wish I were not. I still say it when I take off in a plane 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Sensitive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/58956e/32.png) [@Darth\_Sensitive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Sensitive)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/72 "2008-03-05T02:08:34Z")
I’m looking at my Earthrise poster as I type this: The Book of Genesis ``` 1: In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. ``` 2: And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. 3: And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. 4: And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. 5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. 6: And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. 7: And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. 8: And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day. 9: And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. 10: And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good. ---
**Author:** ![Brynda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Brynda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynda)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/73 "2008-03-05T02:14:44Z")
I have loved this since I read it in college many, many years ago: Love Poem My clumsiest dear, whose hands shipwreck vases, At whose quick touch all glasses chip and ring, Whose palms are bulls in china, burs in linen, And have no cunning with any soft thing [LYRICS DELETED BY MODERATOR] John Frederick Nims ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/74 "2008-03-05T02:18:47Z")
I love, love, love Nims too, Brynda, particularly this poem. That said, he is not, and I suspect this poem is still under copyright. ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/75 "2008-03-05T02:26:53Z")
**Brynda** , best to quote a line or two and provide a link to some website that has authorization to provide the whole poem. No biggie, you’ll know for next time. ---
**Author:** ![Lisa-go-Blind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7c8e57/32.png) [@Lisa-go-Blind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lisa-go-Blind)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/76 "2008-03-05T02:28:45Z")
From [Breathless](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053472/): Patricia Franchini: What is your greatest ambition in life? Parvulesco: To become immortal… and then die. ---
**Author:** ![The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a87d85/32.png) [@The\_King\_of\_Soup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_King_of_Soup)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/77 "2008-03-05T03:08:50Z")
“Look, don’t be lazy, but get up from that bed and let’s go to the countryside dressed as shepherds, just like we arranged: maybe behind some bush we’ll find Senora Dona Dulcinea disenchanted, as pretty as you please. If you’re dying of sorrow over being defeated, blame me for that and say you were toppled because I didn’t tighten Rocinantes’ cinches; besides, your grace must have seen in your books of chivalry that it’s a very common thing for one knight to topple another, and for the one who’s vanquished today to be the victor tomorrow.” ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/78 "2008-03-05T03:57:24Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] We were somewhere outside of Barstow in the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. [/QUOTE] “We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold.” Actually. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/79 "2008-03-05T03:58:56Z")
[QUOTE=Zebra] from A Fan’s Notes by Fredrick Exely I ran until the sweat, having already rendered my jacket heavy as wet rags, formed pools in the sockets of my eyes and I could not see, sweat that there mingled with the tears and blood to run down my hot, steaming cheeks; ran until I thought my head would explode and my chest consume itself in flames; ran until my legs became wobbly, then mush, and I could run no more. When I finally stopped, I was on Seventh Avenue, many blocks north. Seeing they were not behind me, I staggered into the entrance of a closed drug store and lay face down on the pavement, lay with my head resting heavily on my crossed arms. In a moment Would fall asleep. But before I did, all the dread and the dismay and the foreboding I had been experiencing disappeared, were abruptly gone, and I fell quiet. The disappeared because, as I say, I understood the last and most important reason why I fought. The knowledge caused me to weep very quietly, numbly, caused me to weep because in my heart I knew I had always understood this last and most distressing reason, which rendered the grief I had caused myself and others all for naught. I fought because I understood and could not bear to understand, that is was my destiny - unlike that of my father whose fate it was to hear the roar of the crowd - to sit in the stands with most men and acclaim others. It was my fate, my destiny, my end, to be a fan. [/QUOTE] One of my favorite books. ---
**Author:** ![Brynda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Brynda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Brynda)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2008, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896/80 "2008-03-05T04:26:17Z")
[QUOTE=C K Dexter Haven] **Brynda** , best to quote a line or two and provide a link to some website that has authorization to provide the whole poem. No biggie, you’ll know for next time. [/QUOTE] Oops, sorry. Didn’t think it through. Thanks for fixing it for me. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-single-greatest-thing-written-by-anyone-ever/439896.md?page=5)