Yevgeny Zamyatin — We [809]

All this was so incredible, so unexpected, that I stood calmly (yes, calmly!) and looked. It was the same as with a scale: you overload one side, and then, no matter how much more you add, the arrow won’t move. — Yevgeny Zamyatin, We, 809

Note

Captures psychological shock through an unexpected, precise analogy to a physical scale.