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Book IV: “The Candle in the Wind,” Chapters 7–14
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The Once and Future King

 T. H. White
 

Important Quotations Explained

 
1. Power is of the individual mind, but the mind's power is not enough. Power of the body decides everything in the end, and only Might is Right.
 
 
2. Why can't you harness Might so that it works for Right?… The Might is there, in the bad half of people, and you can't neglect it.
 
 
3. It is why Sir Thomas Malory called his very long book the Death of Arthur. . . . It is the tragedy … of sin coming home to roost. . . . [W]e have to take note of the parentage of Arthur's son Mordred, and to remember … that the king had slept with his own sister. He did not know he was doing so … but it seems, in tragedy, that innocence is not enough.
 
 
4. [H]e had a contradictory nature which was far from holy. . . . For one thing, he liked to hurt people.
 
 
5. It was in the nature of [Arthur's] bold mind to hope, in these circumstances, that he would not find [Lancelot and Guenever] together. . . . [H]e was hoping to weather the trouble by refusing to become conscious of it.
 
 
 
 
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Book IV: “The Candle in the Wind,” Chapters 7–14
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