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If you do not believe in a personal God, the question: 'What is the purpose of life?' is unaskable and unanswerable.

J. R. R. Tolkien

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J. R. R. Tolkien
Age: 81 †
Born: 1892
Born: January 3
Died: 1973
Died: September 2
Author
Essayist
Historian
Illustrator
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Literary Critic
Military Officer
Poet
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John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
John R. R. Tolkien
J-R-R Tolkien
Tolkien
J.R.R. Tolkien
J. R. R. Tolkien
God
Personal
Question
Purpose
Believe
Life
Unanswerable

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But you speak of Master Gandalf, as if he was in a story that had come to an end.' 'Yes, we do,' said Pippin sadly. 'The story seems to be going on, but I am afraid Gandalf has fallen out of it.
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Farewell! wherever you fare, till your eyries receive you at the journey’s end!
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Sleep! I feel the need of it, as never I thought any dwarf could , riding is tiring work. Yet my axe is restless in my hand. Give me a row of orc-necks and room to swing and all weariness will fall from me!
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Indeed in nothing is the power of the Dark Lord more clearly shown than in the estrangement that divides all those who still oppose him.
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It was at this point that Bilbo stopped. Going on from there was the bravest thing he ever did. The tremendous things that happened afterward were as nothing compared to it. He fought the real battle in the tunnel alone, before he ever saw the vast danger that lay in wait.
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In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
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After some time he felt for his pipe. It was not broken, and that was something. Then he felt for his pouch, and there was some tobacco in it, and that was something more. Then he felt for matches and he could not find any at all, and that shattered his hopes completely.
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Well, here at last, dear friends, on the shores of the Sea comes the end of our fellowship in Middle-earth. Go in peace! I will not say: do not weep for not all tears are an evil.
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And what do you wish?' he said at last. 'That what should be shall be,' she answered.
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Here ends the SILMARILLION. If it has passed from the high and the beautiful to darkness and ruin, that was of old the fate of Arda Marred and if any change shall come and the Marring be amended, Manwë and Varda may know but they have not revealed it, and it is not declared in the dooms of Mandos.
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Not idly do the leaves of Lorien fall
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There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Ilúvatar and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made.
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I have never had much confidence in my own work, and even now when I am assured (still much to my grateful surprise) that it has value for other people, I feel diffident, reluctant as it were to expose my world of imagination to possibly contemptuous eyes and ears.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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I sit beside the fire and think of people long ago, and of people who will see a world that I shall never know.
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All have their worth and each contributes to the worth of the others.
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Saruman, I said, standing away from him, only one hand at a time can weild the One, and you know that well, so do not trouble to say we!
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Seek for the Sword that was broken In Imladris it dwells There shall be counsels taken Stronger than Morgul-spells. There shall be shown a token That Doom is near at hand, For Isuldur's Bane shall waken, And the halfling forth shall stand.
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The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there shoreless seas and stars uncounted beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords.
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It is mine, I tell you. My own. My precious. Yes, my precious.
J. R. R. Tolkien
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My own dear mother was a martyr indeed, and it is not to everybody that God grants so easy a way to his great gifts as he did to Hilary and myself, giving us a mother who killed herself with labour and trouble to ensure us keeping the faith.
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