And so Gollum found them hours later, when he returned, crawling and creeping down the path out of the gloom ahead. Sam sat propped against the stone, his head dropping sideways and his breathing heavy. In his lap lay Frodo's head, drowned in sleep; upon his white forehead lay one of Sam's brown hands, and the other lay softly upon his master's breast. Peace was in both their faces.
Gollum looked at them. A strange expression passed over his lean hungry face. The gleam faded from his eyes, and they went dim and grey, old and tired. A spasm of pain seemed to twist him, and he turned away, peering back up towards the pass, shaking his head, as if engaged in some interior debate. Then he came back, and slowly putting out a trembling hand, very cautiously he touched Frodo's knee--but almost the touch was a caress. For a fleeting moment, could one of the sleepers have seen him, they would have thought that they beheld an old weary hobbit, shrunken by the years that had carried him far beyond his time, beyond friends and kin, and the fields and streams of youth, an old starved pitiable thing.


J.R.R. Tolkien

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Death is their fate, the gift of Ilъvatar, which as Time wears even the Powers shall envy.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
There's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I would venture to say that approaching the Christian Story from this direction, it has long been my...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I am a Christian…so that I do not expect ‘history’ to be anything but a ‘long defeat’ — ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
As the hound follows the hare, never ceasing in its running, ever drawing nearer in the chase, with ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Faithfulness in Christian marriage entails that: great mortification. For a Christian man there is n...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Is there any pleasure on earth as great as the circle of Christian friends by a good fire?
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I am a Christian and of course what I write will be from that essential viewpoint.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Fantasy remains a human right: we make in our measure and in our derivative mode, because we are mad...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The Resurrection was the greatest ‘eucatastrophe’ possible in the greatest Fairy Story — and p...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
He found himself wondering at times, especially in the autumn, about the wild lands, and strange vis...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Now it is a strange thing, but things that are good to have and days that are good to spend are soon...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Never laugh at live dragons, Bilbo you fool!
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
In one thing you have not changed, dear friend," said Aragorn: "you still speak in riddles."
"W...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
And what would you do, if an uninvited dwarf came and hung his things up in your hall without a word...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I don’t like anything here at all.” said Frodo, “step or stone, breath or bone. Earth, air and...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Where there's life there's hope.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Touching your cap to the squire may be damn bad for the squire, but it's damn good for you.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Come, Mr. Frodo!' he cried. 'I can't carry it for you, but I can carry you.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Farewell," they cried, "Wherever you fare till your eyries receive you at the journey's end!" That i...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The way is shut. It was made by those who are Dead, and the Dead keep it, until the time comes. The ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and dange...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Where now are the horse and the rider? Where is the horn that was blowing?
Where is the helm an...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
PIPPIN: I didn't think it would end this way.

GANDALF: End? No, the journey doesn't end h...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Frodo gave a cry, and there was, fallen upon his knees at the chasm's edge. But Gollum, dancing like...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Now is the hour come, Riders of the Mark, sons of Eorl! Foes and fires are before you, and your home...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
There are some things that it is better to begin than to refuse, even though the end may be dark.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
All my own perception of beauty both in majesty and simplicity is founded upon Our Lady.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
In this hour, I do not believe that any darkness will endure.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The way is shut.
Then they halted and looked at him and saw that he lived still; but he did not...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I don’t know,’ said Frodo. ‘It came to me then, as if I was making it up; but I may have heard...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
He drew a deep breath. 'Well, I'm back,' he said.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Fear nothing! Have peace until the morning! Heed no nightly noises!
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Over the field rang his clear voice calling: ‘Death! Ride, ride to ruin and the world’s ending!
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
his old life lay behind in the mists, dark adventure lay in front.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Why, Sam,” he said, “to hear you somehow makes me as merry as if the
story was already writ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Cold be hand and heart and bone,
and cold be sleep under stone:
never more to wake on ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Yet at the last Beren was slain by the Wolf that came from the gates of Angband, and he died in the ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew:
Of wind I sang, a wind ther...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
It was Sam's first view of a battle of Men against Men, and he did not like it much. He was glad tha...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The Dark Lord has Nine. But we have One, mightier than they: the White Rider. He has passed through ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Some who have read the book, or at any rate have reviewed it, have found it boring, absurd, or conte...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The consolation of fairy-stories, the joy of the happy ending: or more correctly of the good catastr...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
If I am to understand that you are enquiring whether I am of Jewish origin, I can only reply that I ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a smal...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
And Iluvatar spoke to Ulmo, and said: 'Seest thou not how here in this little realm in the Deeps of ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
A divine 'punishment’ is also a divine 'gift’, if accepted, since its object is ultimate blessin...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Somehow the killing of the giant spider, all alone by himself in the dark without the help of the wi...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Already he was a very different hobbit from the one that had run out without a pocket-handkerchief f...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Truly songs and tales fall utterly short of the reality, O Smaug the Chiefest and greatest of Calami...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Roads go ever ever on,
Over rock and under tree,
By caves where never sun has shone,
...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Why O why did I ever leave my hobbit-hole?" said poor Mr. Baggins, bumping up and down on Bombur's b...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
No dragon can resist the fascination of riddling talk and of wasting time trying to understand it.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
evil labours with vast power and perpetual success - in vain: preparing always only the soil for une...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I heard of that bloodthirsty old murderer Josef Stalin inviting all nations to join a happy family o...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The greater part of the truth is always hidden, in regions out of the reach of cynicism.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
For myself, I find I become less cynical rather than more--remembering my own sins and follies; and ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Et Eärello Endorenna utúlien. Sinome maruvan ar Hildinyar tenn’ Ambar-metta!
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I wish life was not so short,' he thought. 'Languages take such a time, and so do all the things one...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Fare well we call to hearth and hall
Though wind may blow and rain may fall
We must away e...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
till suddenly his hand met what felt like a tiny ring of cold metal lying on the floor of the tunnel...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I threw down my enemy, and he fell from the high place and broke the mountain-side where he smote it...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
You do not understand' said Pippin. 'You must go - and therefore we must too. Merry and I are coming...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
What a pity that Bilbo did not stab that vile creature, when he had a chance!'
Pity? It was Pit...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
You renounce your friendship even in the hour of our need ' he said. 'Yet you were glad indeed to re...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
I was talking aloud to myself. A habit of the old: they choose the wisest person present to speak to
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
We have come from God, and inevitably the myths woven by us, though they contain error, will also re...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Living by faith includes the call to something greater than cowardly self-preservation.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
The others cast themselves down upon the fragrant grass, but Frodo stood awhile still lost in wonder...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
This is the ending. Now not day only shall be beloved, but night too shall be beautiful and blessed ...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
How shall a man judge what to do in such times?'
'As he ever has judged,' said Aragorn. 'Good a...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
Do not go to the elves for council for they will say both yes and no.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
For if joyful is the fountain that rises in the sun, its springs are in the wells of sorrow unfathom...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
We all long for Eden, and we are constantly glimpsing it: our whole nature at its best and least cor...
J.R.R. TOLKIEN
...in doubt a man of worth will trust to his own wisdom.
J.R.R. TOLKIEN