The Alchemist (novel)

"The desert, with its endless monotony, put him to dreaming"

"Then you’ll die in the midst of trying to realize your Personal Legend. That’s a lot better than dying like millions of other people, who never even knew what their Personal Legends were."

"It was the language of enthusiasm, of things accomplished with love and purpose, and as part of a search for something believed in and desired."

"Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own."

"[the King]: The book describes people’s inability to choose their own Personal Legends. And it ends up saying that everyone believes the world’s greatest lie. What’s the world’s greatest lie? the boy asked, completely surprised. It’s this: that at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie."

"So the boy decided that he would never again believe in dreams. He remembered that he had a number of things he had to take care of"