Muad'dib Quotes

Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.

What do you despise? By this are you truly known.

There is no escape—we pay for the violence of our ancestors.

There should be a science of discontent. People need hard times to develop psychic muscles. -- Muad'Dib

We can say that Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn.

Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague ritual. -Words of Muad'dib by Princess Irulan.

Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It's shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad'Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

The problem of leadership is inevitably: Who will play God?" Muad'Dib

Many have marked the speed with which Muad'Dib learned the necessities of Arrakis. The Bene Gesserit, of course, know the basis of this speed. For the others, we can say that Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad'Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

There was a man so wise, He jumped into A sandy place And burnt out both his eyes! And when he knew his eyes were gone, He offered no complaint. He summoned up a vision And made himself a saint. -Children's Verse from History of Muad'dib

Abandon certainty! That's life's deepest command. That's what life's all about. We're a probe into the unknown, into the uncertain. Why can't you hear Muad'Dib? If certainty is knowing absolutely an absolute future, then that's only death disguised! Such a future becomes now!

My brother comes now," Alia said. "Even an Emperor may tremble before Muad'Dib, for he has the strength of righteousness and heaven smiles upon him.

You who have defeated us say to yourselves that Babylon is fallen and its works have been overturned. I say to you still that man remains on trial, each man in his own dock. Each man is a little war.

Once more the drama begins.' — The Emperor Paul Muad'dib on his ascension to the Lion Throne.

There should be a science of discontent. People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles. --from "Collected Sayings of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

You, Priest in your mufti, you are a chaplain to the self-satisfied. I come not to challenge Muad'Dib but to challenge you! Is your religion real when it costs you nothing and carries no risk? Is your religion real when you fatten upon it? Is your religion real when you commit atrocities in its name? Whence comes your downward degeneration from the original revelation? Answer me, Priest!

I realize that humans cannot bear very much reality. Most lives are a flight from selfhood. Most prefer the truths of the stable. You stick your heads into the stanchions and munch contentedly until you die. Others use you for their purposes. Not once do you live outside the stable to lift your head and be your own creature. Muad'Dib came to tell you about that. Without understanding his message, you cannot revere him!

There is no measuring Muad'Dib's motives by ordinary standards. In the moment of his triumph, he saw the death prepared for him, yet he accepted the treachery. Can you say he did this out of a sense of justice? Whose justice, then? Remember, we speak now of the Muad'Dib who ordered battle drums made from his enemies' skins, the Muad'Dib who denied the conventions of his ducal past with a wave of the hand, saying merely: 'I am the Kwisatz Haderach. That is reason enough.

You can’t stop a mental epidemic. It leaps from person to person across parsecs. It’s overwhelmingly contagious. It strikes at the unprotected side, in the place where we lodge the fragments of other such plagues. Who can stop such a thing? Muad’dib hasn’t the antidote. The thing has roots in chaos. Can orders reach there?

There exists no separation between gods and men; one blends softly casual into the other. —Proverbs of Muad’Dib

Even an Emperor may tremble before Muad’Dib, for he has the strength of righteousness and heaven smiles upon him.

They'll call me Muad'Dib, 'The One Who Points the Way'.

It is said of Muad’Dib that once when he saw a weed trying to grow between two rocks, he moved one of the rocks. Later, when the weed was seen to be flourishing, he covered it with the remaining rock. “That was its fate,” he explained.

Prophecy and prescience—How can they be put to the test in the face of the unanswered question? Consider: How much is actual prediction of the “wave form” (as Muad’Dib referred to his vision-image) and how much is the prophet shaping the future to fit the prophecy? What of the harmonics inherent in the act of prophecy? Does the prophet see the future or does he see a line of weakness, a fault or cleavage that he may shatter with words or decisions as a diamond-cutter shatters his gem with a blow of a knife?

Muad'dib rules everywhere," he said. "Arrakis is not my destination," she insisted. "Arrakis is the destination of everyone," he said.

I come only to ask a simple question. Is Muad'Dib's death to be followed by the moral suicide of all men? Is that the inevitable aftermath of a Messiah?

Muad’Dib must always be that inner outrage against the complacently powerful, against the charlatans and the dogmatic fanatics. It is that inner outrage which must have its say because Muad’Dib taught us one thing above all others: that humans can endure only in a fraternity of social justice.

The universe is just there; that’s the only way a Fedaykin can view it and remain the master of his senses. The universe neither threatens nor promises. It holds things beyond our sway: the fall of a meteor, the eruption of a spiceblow, growing old and dying. These are the realities of this universe and they must be faced regardless of how you feel about them. You cannot fend off such realities with words. They will come at you in their own wordless way and then, then you will understand what is meant by “life and death.” Understanding this, you will be filled with joy. —MUAD’DIB TO HIS FEDAYKIN

How do we approach the study of Muad’Dib’s father? A man of surpassing warmth and surprising coldness was the Duke Leto Atreides. Yet, many facts open the way to this Duke: his abiding love for his Bene Gesserit lady; the dreams he held for his son; the devotion with which men served him. You see him there—a man snared by Destiny, a lonely figure with his light dimmed behind the glory of his son. Still, one must ask: What is the son but an extension of the father?

The flesh surrenders itself, he thought. Eternity takes back its own. Our bodies stirred these waters briefly, danced with a certain intoxication before the love of life and self, dealt with a few strange ideas, then submitted to the instruments of Time. What can we say of this? I occurred. I am not... yet, I occurred.

Yes. They’ll call me…Muad’Dib, ‘The One Who Points the Way.’ Yes…that’s what they’ll call me.” And

She didn’t like the fact that people of both sietch and graben referred to Muad’Dib as Him.

Leto spoke the truth: Muad’Dib had changed all that. Stilgar felt lost.

Dios creó Arrakis para probar a los fieles. De La sabiduría de Muad’Dib, por la princesa Irulan

Muad’Dib: “If a child, an untrained person, an ignorant person, or an insane person incites trouble, it is the fault of authority for not predicting and preventing that trouble.” O.C.

You know the myth of the Great Spice Hoard? Yes, I know about that story, too. A majordomo brought it to me one day to amuse me. The story says there is a hoard of melange, a gigantic hoard, big as a great mountain. The hoard is concealed in the depths of a distant planet. It is not Arrakis, that planet. It is not Dune. The spice was hidden there long ago, even before the First Empire and the Spacing Guild. The story says Paul-Muad’Dib went there and lives yet beside the hoard, kept alive by it, waiting. The majordomo did not understand why the story disturbed me.

I will tell you a thing about your new name,” Stilgar said. “The choice pleases us. Muad’Dib is wise in the ways of the desert. Muad’Dib creates his own water. Muad’Dib hides from the sun and travels in the cool night. Muad’Dib is fruitful and multiplies over the land. Muad’Dib we call ‘instructor-of-boys.’ That is a powerful base on which to build your life, Paul-Muad’Dib, who is Usul among us. We welcome you.” Stilgar

And again he remembered the vision of fanatic legions following the green and black banner of the Atreides, pillaging and burning across the universe in the name of their prophet Muad’Dib. That must not happen, he told himself.

How do you call among you the little mouse, the mouse that jumps?” Paul asked, remembering the pop-hop of motion at Tuono Basin. He illustrated with one hand. A chuckle sounded through the troop. “We call that one muad’dib,” Stilgar said. Jessica

Is that the name you wish, Muad’Dib?” Stilgar asked. “I am an Atreides,” Paul whispered, and then louder: “It’s not right that I give up entirely the name my father gave me. Could I be known among you as Paul-Muad’Dib?” “You are Paul-Muad’Dib,” Stilgar said. And

we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad

For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson. —

Many forces sought control of the Atreides twins and, when the death of Leto was announced, this movement of plot and counterplot was amplified. Note the relative motivations: the Sisterhood feared Alia, an adult Abomination, but still wanted those genetic characteristics carried by the Atreides. The Church hierarchy of Auquaf and Hajj saw only the power implicit in control of Muad'Dib's heir. CHOAM wanted a doorway to the wealth of Dune. Farad'n and his Sardaukar sought a return to glory for House Corrino. The Spacing Guild feared the equation Arrakis=melange; without the spice they could not navigate. Jessica wished to repair what her disobedience to the Bene Gesserit had created. Few thought to ask the twins what their plans might be, until it was too late. -The Book of Kreos

The spirit of Muad’Dib is more than words, more than the letter of the Law which arises in his name. Muad’Dib must always be that inner outrage against the complacently powerful, against the charlatans and the dogmatic fanatics. It is that inner outrage which must have its say because Muad’Dib taught us one thing above all others: that humans can endure only in a fraternity of social justice.

Muad’dib’s Jihad was less than an eye-blink in this larger movement. The Bene Gesserit swimming in this tide, that corporate entity trading in genes, was trapped in the torrent as he was. Visions of a falling moon must be measured against other legends, other visions in a universe where even the seemingly eternal stars waned, flickered, died . . . What mattered a single moon in such a universe? Far

Atrocity is recognized as such by victim and perpetrator alike, by all who learn about it at whatever remove. Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating upon itself—a barbarous form of incest. Whoever commits atrocity also commits those future atrocities thus bred. —THE APOCRYPHA OF MUAD’DIB

Paul swallowed. He felt that he played a part already played over countless times in his mind…yet…there were differences. He could see himself perched on a dizzying summit, having experienced much and possessed of a profound store of knowledge, but all around him was abyss. And again he remembered the vision of fanatic legions following the green and black banner of the Atreides, pillaging and burning across the universe in the name of their prophet Muad’Dib. That must not happen, he told himself.

The convoluted wording of legalisms grew up around the necessity to hide from ourselves the violence we intend toward each other. Between depriving a man of one hour from his life and depriving him of his life there exists only a difference of degree. You have done violence to him, consumed his energy. Elaborate euphemisms may conceal your intent to kill, but behind any use of power over another the ultimate assumption remains: “I feed on your energy.” —ADDENDA TO ORDERS IN COUNCIL THE EMPEROR PAUL MUAD’DIB

Mnozí si povšimli, jak rychle zvládl Muad’Dib základní požadavky pro život na Arrakisu. Ti, kdož jsou z Bene Gesseritu, samozřejmě vědí, v čem má tato rychlost své kořeny. Pro ostatní můžeme uvést, že Muad’Dib se učil tak rychle proto, že jeho první výcvik byl zaměřen na to, jak se učit. A vůbec první lekcí byla víra, že je schopen se učit. Je až zarážející, kolik lidí nevěří, že jsou schopni se učit, a kolik jiných věří, že učení je obtížné. Muad’Dib věděl, že každá zkušenost přináší ponaučení. Princezna Irulán: Lidskost Muad’Diba

Many have remarked the speed with which Muad’Dib learned the necessities of Arrakis. The Bene Gesserit, of course, know the basis of this speed. For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson. —FROM “THE HUMANITY OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

For the others, we can say that Muad'Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.

It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib

Suspicions have a way of becoming “facts,” even if they have no basis in truth. —PRINCESS IRULAN, The Book of Muad’Dib

we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

Many have remarked the speed with which Muad’Dib learned the necessities of Arrakis. The Bene Gesserit, of course, know the basis of this speed. For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

He nodded. “Yes. They’ll call me…Muad’Dib, ‘The One Who Points the Way.’ Yes…that’s what they’ll call me.” And he closed his eyes, thinking: Now, my father, I can mourn you. And he felt the tears coursing down his cheeks.

Debería existir una ciencia del descontento. La gente necesita tiempos difíciles y de opresión para desarrollar sus músculos físicos. · —De Frases escogidas de Muad’Dib, por la princesa Irulan

el precio que pagamos era el precio que los hombres han pagado siempre por obtener un paraíso en sus vidas: nos ablandamos, perdimos nuestro temple. · —De Conversaciones con Muad’Dib, por la princesa Irulan

El universo está simplemente allí; esa es la única forma en que un Fedaykin puede imaginarlo y permanecer dueño de sus sentidos. El universo ni amenaza ni promete. Contiene cosas más allá de nuestro dominio: la caída de un meteoro, la erupción de una masa de especia, cosas que crecen y mueren. Esas son las realidades de este universo y deben afrontarse independientemente de lo que uno sienta por ellas. Uno no puede apartarlas de su lado. Se precipitarán contra uno a su silenciosa manera y entonces, solo entonces, uno comprenderá lo que significan «vida y muerte». Y al comprenderlo, uno se sentirá colmado de alegría. Muad'Dib a sus Fedaykin

Existe un límite a la fuerza que hasta los más poderosos pueden aplicar sin destruirse a sí mismos. Calcular dicho límite es el auténtico arte de gobernar. El mal uso del poder es un pecado fatal. La ley no puede ser un instrumento de venganza, nunca un rehén y tampoco un refugio contra los mártires que ha creado. Uno no puede amenazar a un individuo y librarse de las consecuencias. Muad’Dib sobre la ley, Comentarios de Stilgar

The Bene Gesserit, of course, know the basis of this speed. For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult. Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

Do we not live in the shadow of the most dangerous creation the universe has ever seen?" "Dangerous creation…" "Their own mother refuses to live on the same planet with them!

God created Arrakis to train the faithful. —FROM “THE WISDOM OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

I will tell you a thing about your new name,” Stilgar said. “The choice pleases us. Muad’Dib is wise in the ways of the desert. Muad’Dib creates his own water. Muad’Dib hides from the sun and travels in the cool night. Muad’Dib is fruitful and multiplies over the land. Muad’Dib we call ‘instructor-of-boys.’ That is a powerful base on which to build your life, Paul-Muad’Dib, who is Usul among us. We welcome you.

we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.

Do you wrestle with dreams? Do you contend with shadows? Do you move in a kind of sleep? Time has slipped away. Your life is stolen. You tarried with trifles, Victim of your folly. —DIRGE FOR JAMIS ON THE FUNERAL PLAIN, FROM “SONGS OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

There is probably no more terrible instant of enlightenment than the one in which you discover your father is a man—with human flesh. —FROM “COLLECTED SAYINGS OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

There is no escape—we pay for the violence of our ancestors. —FROM “COLLECTED SAYINGS OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

The Fremen were supreme in that quality the ancients called “spannungsbogen”—which is the self-imposed delay between desire for a thing and the act of reaching out to grasp that thing. —FROM “THE WISDOM OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

What do you despise? By this are you truly known. —FROM “MANUAL OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

Among the dangerous leaders of human history, my father sometimes mentioned General George S. Patton because of his charismatic qualities—but more often his example was President John F. Kennedy. Around Kennedy, a myth of kingship had formed, and of Camelot. The handsome young president’s followers did not question him and would have gone virtually anywhere he led them. This danger seems obvious to us now in the cases of such men as Adolf Hitler, whose powerful magnetism led his nation into ruination. It is less obvious, however, with men who are not deranged or evil in and of themselves—such as Kennedy, or the fictional Paul Muad’Dib, whose danger lay in the religious myth structure around him and what people did in his name.

Remember, we speak now of the Muad’Dib who ordered battle drums made from his enemies’ skins, the Muad’Dib who denied the conventions of his ducal past with a wave of the hand, saying merely: “I am the Kwisatz Haderach. That is reason enough.

The problem of leadership is inevitably: Who will play God? —MUAD’DIB, FROM THE ORAL HISTORY

I give you Muad’Dib’s words! He said, ‘I’m going to rub your faces in things you try to avoid. I don’t find it strange that all you want to believe is only that which comforts you. How else do humans invent the traps which betray us into mediocrity? How else do we define cowardice?’ That’s what Muad’Dib told you!

Muad’Dib knew that every experience carries its lesson.

There is in all things a pattern that is part of our universe. It has symmetry, elegance, and grace—those qualities you find always in that which the true artist captures. You can find it in the turning of the seasons, in the way sand trails along a ridge, in the branch clusters of the creosote bush or the pattern of its leaves. We try to copy these patterns in our lives and our society, seeking the rhythms, the dances, the forms that comfort. Yet, it is possible to see peril in the finding of ultimate perfection. It is clear that the ultimate pattern contains its own fixity. In such perfection, all things move toward death. —FROM “COLLECTED SAYINGS OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

For the others, we can say that Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn.

Pentru ceilalți, putem spune că Muad'Dib a învățat repede fiindcă prima sa învățătură a fost cum să învețe. Și prima lecție a acestei învățături era încrederea fundamentală că putea să învețe. Este surprinzător cât de mulți oameni nu cred că pot să învețe și mai ales cât de mulți cred că ete greu să învețe.

Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague ritual. —WORDS OF MUAD’DIB BY PRINCESS IRULAN

beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of the life of Muad’Dib, then, take care that you first place him in his time: born in the 57th year of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV. And take the most special care that you locate Muad’Dib in his place: the planet Arrakis. Do not be deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen years there. Arrakis, the planet known as Dune, is forever his place. —FROM “MANUAL OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

And … someday … Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic. —from “The Sayings of Muad’Dib” by the Princess Irulan

Muad’Dib aprendeu rápido porque primeiro lhe ensinaram como aprender. E a primeira lição de todas foi desenvolver a confiança fundamental de que ele era capaz de aprender.

When your actions describe a system of evil consequences, you should be judged by those consequences and not by your explanations. It is thus we should judge Muad'Dib.

Muad'Dib gave us a particular kind of knowledge about prophetic insight, about the behaviour which surrounds such insight and its influence upon events whcih are seen to be "on line." (That is, events which are set to occur in a related system which the prophet reveals and interprets.) As has been noted elsewhere, such insight operates as a peculiar trap for the prophet himself. He can become the victim of what he knows — which is a relatively common human failing.

Holding pens. You sell sandtrout and worms off-planet.” “It was Muad’Dib’s suggestion!” “I know. But none of your worms or sandtrout survive for long away from Dune.” “Not yet,” Muriz said. “But someday . . .” “Not in ten thousand years,” Leto said.

When law and duty are one, united by religion, you never become fully conscious, fully aware of yourself. You are always a little less than an individual. -From "Muad'Dib: The Ninety-Nine Wonders of the Universe" by The Princess Irulan

Church and State, scientific reason and faith, the individual and his community, even progress and tradition—all of these can be reconciled in the teachings of Muad’Dib. He taught us that there exist no intransigent opposites except in the beliefs of men. Anyone can rip aside the veil of Time. You can discover the future in the past or in your own imagination. Doing this, you win back your consciousness in your inner being. You know then that the universe is a coherent whole and you are indivisible from it.

He didn't use the Jihad, the Jihad used him. I think he would have stopped it by now if he could. You can't stop a mental epidemic. It leaps from person to person across parsecs. It's overwhelmingly contagious. It strikes at the unprotected side, in the place where we lodge the fragments of other such plagues. Who can stop such a thing? Muad’dib hasn't the antidote. The thing has roots in chaos. Can orders reach there?

The concept of progress acts as a protective mechanism to shield us from the terrors of the future. —FROM “COLLECTED SAYINGS OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

Muad'Dib gave us a particular kind of knowledge about prophetic insight, about the behaviour which surrounds such insight and its influence upon events whcih are seen to be "on line." (That is, events which are set to occur in a related system which the prophet reveals and interprets.) As has been noted elsewhere, such insight operates as a peculiar trap for the prophet himself. He can become the victim of what he knows — which is a relatively common human failing.

Muad'Dib gave us a particular kind of knowledge about prophetic insight, about the behaviour which surrounds such insight and its influence upon events which are seen to be "on line." (That is, events which are set to occur in a related system which the prophet reveals and interprets.) As has been noted elsewhere, such insight operates as a peculiar trap for the prophet himself. He can become the victim of what he knows — which is a relatively common human failing.

How do you call among you the little mouse, the mouse that jumps?” Paul asked, remembering the pop-hop of motion at Tuono Basin. He illustrated with one hand. A chuckle sounded through the troop. “We call that one muad'dib,” Stilgar said.

Muad’Dib learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult

satisfied. I come not to challenge Muad’Dib but to challenge you! Is your religion real when it costs you nothing and carries no risk? Is your religion real when you fatten upon it? Is your religion real when you commit atrocities in its name? Whence comes your downward degeneration from the original revelation? Answer me, Priest!

A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of the life of Muad’Dib, then, take care that you first place him in his time: born in the 57th year of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV. And take the most special care that you locate Muad’Dib in his place: the planet Arrakis. Do not be deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen years there. Arrakis, the planet known as Dune, is forever his place. —FROM “MANUAL OF MUAD’DIB” BY THE PRINCESS IRULAN

Sietch Tabr is mine. I rule here. I am a Naib of the Fremen. Without me there would have been no Muad’Dib. These twins, now . . . through Chani, their mother and my kinswoman, my blood flows in their veins. I am there with Muad’Dib and Chani and all the others. What have we done to our universe?

This is the climax, Paul thought. From here, the future will open, the clouds part onto a kind of glory. And if I die here, they’ll say I sacrificed myself that my spirit might lead them. And if I live, they’ll say nothing can oppose Muad’Dib.

La fuerza que uno puede aplicar sin autodestruirse tiene un límite, hasta para los más poderosos. Juzgar cuál es ese límite constituye el verdadero arte del gobierno. El mal uso del poder es un pecado mortal. La ley no puede ser un instrumento para la venganza, un rehén ni una defensa contra los mártires que ella misma ha creado. No se puede amenazar a un individuo sin atenerse a las consecuencias. —«Muad’Dib sobre la ley», El comentario de Stilgar ·