Northern Exposure (TV Series)

The Body in Question (1991)

John Corbett: Chris Stevens

Photos 

Quotes 

• [last lines] 

  Chris Stevens : It's time for us to say "Au revoir" to Pierre. Where'd he come from? Where is he going? I guess we could all ask the same questions of ourselves. I'm gonna let a fellow Frenchman here have the last words. "When from a long distant past nothing persists... after the people are dead, after things are broken and scattered, still alone... more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long, long time like souls, ready to remind us, waiting... hoping for their moment amid the ruins of all the rest... and bear unfaltering in the tiny and... almost impalpable drop of their essence... the vast structure of recollection."

• Chris Stevens : Maurice, I applaud the amount of imagination you've put into this thing-- Build a Hyatt, they will come--I think we all agree on that, right? But, Maurice, tonight I'm troubled.

  Maurice J. Minnifield : Chris, we're not gonna do anything to destroy the beauty of Cicely. That's why we're putting all the parking underground.

  Chris Stevens : I understand that, Maurice. It's not the leveling of a sleepy, little town into a commercial eyesore that bothers me.

  Maurice J. Minnifield : Then what is it?

  Chris Stevens : The metaphysical implications. Unleashing Pierre changes history, and that's heavy-duty trampling on the karma of the collective unconscious. Are we ready to accept responsibility for that?

  Maurice J. Minnifield : You wanna find your coordinates, son? You're losing me here.

  Chris Stevens : Maurice, thousands of the old French Guard died at Waterloo. Thousands of British and Prussians died stopping them. You take Napoleon out of that loop, and what's left? Haven't we stripped the meaning of those deaths? Made a mockery of the bloodshed? Our lives are fragile things, built on creaky foundations. You chip away at the edifice of history, and... well, you weaken one of the few spiritual timbers we have left. Did George Washington really chop down that cherry tree? Did Davy Crockett kill a bear when he was only three? It's pretty unlikely. It makes our lives a little easier, though, doesn't it? I mean, it's nice to think that. I'm just saying that... revealing Pierre's secret might trigger a maelstrom of self-doubt, releasing untold psychic devastation. A metaphysical tsunami, if you will.

• Chris Stevens : Joel, I think that you're confusing the truth with facts.

  Dr. Joel Fleischman : No, the facts change, Chris. The truth is constant.

  Chris Stevens : Oh, on the contrary, my friend: The truth changes.

  Dr. Joel Fleischman : Oh, yeah? Give me an example.

  Chris Stevens : The truth about Custer. Hero or villain? Civilizer or agent of genocide? The truth slips and turns. The facts remain the same.

  Dr. Joel Fleischman : Yeah? What about light? Particle or wave? I mean, it exhibits qualities of both. When the truth is finally known, the facts will be made to accommodate the truth.

  Ruth-Anne : [to Ed]  Now they're getting into paradox. Dicey stuff.

• Chris Stevens : Well, Joel, let's distinguish paradox from contradiction. Can something be more than one thing at the same time? Father, Son and Holy Ghost? We digress. I offer the poet's vision of the ancient urn: Truth is beauty, beauty truth.

  Dr. Joel Fleischman : We can serve and volley semantics all night, Chris. The point is, if...

  Maurice J. Minnifield : Gentlemen. Gentlemen, that's quite enough. Let's, uh, get on with the business at hand, shall we?