Hannah Jelkes: Just rest for a few moments Nonno.
Nonno: How calmly does the olive branch, Observe the sky begin to blanch, Without a cry, without a prayer, With no betrayal of despair.
Hannah Jelkes: Who wouldn't like to atone for the sins of themselves, and the world, if it could be done in a hammock with ropes, instead of on a Cross, with nails? On a green hilltop, instead of Golgotha, the Place of the Skulls? Isn't that a comparatively comfortable, almost voluptuous Crucifixion to suffer for the sins of the world, Mr. Shannon?
Maxine Faulk: All right, honey, calm down.
Hannah Jelkes: I am perfectly calm, Mrs. Faulk.
Maxine Faulk: Well, I'm not! That's the trouble. The trouble is Shannon. I caught the vibrations between you two.
Hannah Jelkes: Mrs. Faulk, I'm a New England spinster who is pushing 40.
Maxine Faulk: Well, who the hell isn't!
Charlotte Goodall: I hate that little snitch of a bitch that ruined you in Virginia!
T. Lawrence Shannon: You're ruining me in Mexico! Now, get out of here. It's indecent.
Nonno: Oh courage! Could you not as well / Select a second place to dwell / Not only in that golden tree / But in the frightened heart of me?
T. Lawrence Shannon: I want to explain something to you... A man has got just so much in his emotional bank balance. Mine has run out. It's stone dry. I can't draw a check on it. There's nothing left to draw out.
Maxine Faulk: So you appropriated the young chick and the old hens are squawking, huh?
T. Lawrence Shannon: It's very serious. The child is emotionally precocious.
Maxine Faulk: Bully for her.
T. Lawrence Shannon: Also, she is traveling under the wing of a military escort of a butch vocal teacher.
T. Lawrence Shannon: Nothing could be worse for a girl in your unstable condition, to be mixed up with a man in, in my unstable condition because two people in unstable conditons are like two countries facing each other in unstable conditons. The, eh, destructive potential, eh, could blow the whole world to bits!
Maxine Faulk: What the hell are you doing, Shannon?
T. Lawrence Shannon: I just cut loose one of God's creatures at the end of his rope.
Maxine Faulk: What for?
T. Lawrence Shannon: So that one of God's creatures could be free from panic, and scamper home safe and free. A little act of grace, Maxine.
Tourist Teacher #3: My brother in Abilene... has a chain of 23 laundromats. He says all he wants on his tombstone is: he liberated the women of Texas from the bondage of washing.
Hannah Jelkes: Mr. Shannon, cut him loose!
T. Lawrence Shannon: All right. We'll play God tonight, like kids play houses with old broken crates and boxes. We'll cut the damn lizard loose so he can go back to his bushes, cause God won't do it and we are playing God here tonight.
Maxine Faulk: I know what you're up to, honey. You want to make yourself useful so I'll let you and old Gramps stay on here free.
Hannah Jelkes: Oh, I wouldn't do anything so obvious - not with a woman of your practicality.
T. Lawrence Shannon: I'm panicking!
Hannah Jelkes: I know that.
T. Lawrence Shannon: A man can die of panic!
Hannah Jelkes: Not when he enjoys it as much as you do, Dr. Shannon.
T. Lawrence Shannon: There's no need for the shawl. God has played God, and set him free.
Hannah Jelkes: Nothing human disgusts me, Mr. Shannon, unless it's unkind, violent.
Judith Fellowes: Seducer!
T. Lawrence Shannon: What?
Judith Fellowes: Seducer!
T. Lawrence Shannon: Now what's the squawk now?
Maxine Faulk: Even I know the difference between lovin' somebody, and just goin' to bed with them. Even I know that.
Maxine Faulk: When I hired them beach boys, did Fred care? Did he raise hell when I started going night swimming with them? Hell no. He just went night fishing all night long.
T. Lawrence Shannon: Miss Fellowes is a highly moral person. If she ever recognized the truth about herself it would destroy her.
T. Lawrence Shannon: I wonder as we examine our hearts together, in this place set aside for worship, how many of us here can say, I rule my own spirit. For, how weak is man? How often do we - how often - how often do we stray from the straight and narrow? For only when we abide in the Lord are we like cities without walls. Only then can we defend ourselves against Satan and his temptations. We cannot rule ourselves alone.
