"Sometimes what is legal isn’t what is right, and sometimes it needs a witch to tell the difference. And sometimes a copper too, if you have the right kind of copper. Clever people know this. Stupid people don’t. And the trouble is, stupid people can be oh so very clever."

"Everything that exists, yearns to live. That's what the cycle of life is all about. That's the engine that drives the great biological pumps of evolution. Everything tries to inch its way up the tree, clawing or tentacling or sliming its way up to the next niche until it gets to the very top—which, on the whole, never seems to have been worth all that effort. (p. 81)"

"The senior wizards know that the proper purpose of magic is to form a social pyramid with the wizards on top of it, eating big dinners. (p. 189)"

"Ridcully was simple-minded. This doesn't mean stupid. It just means that he could only think properly about things if he cut away all the complicated bits around the edges. (p. 297)"

"“The cook has told me that you are a very religious woman, always on your knees, and that is fine by me, absolutely fine, but didn’t it ever occur to you to take a mop and bucket down there with you? People don’t need prayers, Miss Spruce; they need you to do the job in front of you, Miss Spruce. And I have had enough of you, Miss Spruce, and especially of your lovely white coat. I think Roland was very impressed by your wonderful white coat, but I am not, Miss Spruce, because you never do anything that will get it dirty.” The nurse raised a hand. “I could slap you!” “No,” said Tiffany firmly. “You couldn’t.” The hand stayed where it was. “I have never been so insulted before in my life!” screamed the enraged nurse. “Really?” said Tiffany. “I’m genuinely surprised.”"

"I suppose there's not some kind of magic you don't know about?"

"Was that justice? Was that a proper reward for being a firm believer in reincarnation for almost 130 years? You come back as a corpse?"

"Intellectually, Ridcully maintained his position for two reasons. One was that he never, ever, changed his mind about anything. The other was that it took him several minutes to understand any new idea put to him, and this is a very valuable trait in a leader, because anything anyone is still trying to explain to you after two minutes is probably important and anything they give up after a mere minute or so is almost certainly something they shouldn't have been bothering you with in the first place. (p. 38)"

"If you do not yet know who the Nac Mac Feegles are: 1) Be grateful for your uneventful life; and 2) Be prepared to beat a retreat if you hear anyone as high as your ankles shout “Crivens!” They are, strictly speaking, one of the faerie folk, but it is probably not a good idea to tell them this if you are looking forward to a future in which you still have your teeth."

"His hands had closed automatically into fists because he had always been a man who thought with them. Soon he would try to use them; she knew it, because it was easier to punch than think."

"It's not old Windle. Old Windle was a lot older!"

"Something wonderful, if you took the long view, was about to happen."

"In the hall of the house of Death is a clock with a pendulum like a blade but with no hands, because in the house of Death there is no time but the present. (There was, of course, a present before the present now, but that was also the present. It was just an older one.) (p. 14)"

"Wizards don't believe in gods in the same way that most people don't find it necessary to believe in, say, tables. They know they're there, they know they're there for a purpose, they'd probably agree that they have a place in a well-organized universe, but they wouldn't see the point of believing, of going around saying, "O great table, without whom we are as naught." Anyway, either the gods are there whether you believe or not, or exist only as a function of the belief, so either way you might as well ignore the whole business and, as it were, eat off your knees. (p. 28)"

"Oh. Hallo, Modo."

"First Sight means that you can see what really is there, and Second Thoughts mean thinking about what you are thinking. And in Tiffany’s case, there were sometimes Third Thoughts and Fourth Thoughts, although these were quite difficult to manage and sometimes led her to walk into doors."

"When the brain stops thinking, the fist steps in."

"The Archchancellor was the first one to recover."

"Each man thought: one of the others is bound to say something soon, some protest, and then I'll murmur agreement, not actually say anything, I'm not as stupid as that, but definitely murmur very firmly, so that the others will be in no doubt that I thoroughly disapprove, because at a time like this it behooves all decent men to nearly stand up and be almost heard… But no one said anything. The cowards, each man thought."

"One said, That is the point. The word is him. Becoming a personality is inefficient. We don't want it to spread. Supposing gravity developed a personality? Supposing it decided to like people?"

"'No one knows how to do officering, Fred. That's why they're officers. If they'd knew anything, they'd be sergeants.'"

"In a general sort of way everyone knew they were going to die, even the common people. No one knew where you were before you were born, but when you were born, it wasn't long before you found you'd arrived with your return ticket already punched. (pp. 11-12)"

"Everyone wants magic to exist, Tiffany thought to herself, and what can I say? No, it doesn’t? Or: Yes, it does, but it’s not what you think? Everyone wants to believe that we can change the world by snapping our fingers."

"“Please,” Tiffany said, “can we get some sleep? My father always says that things will look better in the morning.” There was a pause. “Upon reflection,” Mrs. Proust said, “I think your father will turn out to be wrong.”"

"Every day took an age to go by, which was odd, because days plural went past like a stampede. (p. 13)"

""Seems to me...seems to me...look, death must be going on, right? Death has to happen. That's what bein' alive is all about. You're alive, and then you're dead. It can't just stop happening." (p. 43)"

"And today the sheep on the downs were left by themselves to do whatever it was that they did when they were by themselves, which would presumably be pretty much the same as they did if you were watching them."

"“Do you believe in luck?” said the Duchess. “I believe in not having to believe in luck,” said Tiffany."

"This was one of those points where the Trousers of Time bifurcated themselves, and if you weren't careful you'd go down the wrong leg—(p. 335)"

"Something was very wrong. "Is that you, Brother Doorkeeper?" he ventured."

"“I don’t think he’s been poisoned,” he said. “Why’s that, Archchancellor?” said Ponder. “Because if anyone has poisoned our Librarian,” said Ridcully, “then, although I am not, by nature, a vindictive man, I will see to it that this university hunts down the poisoner by every thaumic, mystic and occult means available and makes the rest of their life not only as horrible as they can imagine it, but as horrible as I can imagine it. And you can depend on it, gentlemen, that I have already started work on it.” (pp. 377-378)"

"“Look, you can’t tell me that’s not magic,” Andy insisted. “No,” said Glenda. “You know what? I think it’s religion.” (p. 395)"

""... a number of offences of murder by means of a blunt instrument, to whit, a dragon, and many further offenses of generalized abetting to be more specifically ascertained later. You have the right to remain silent. You have the right to be summarily thrown into a piranha tank. You have the right to trial by ordeal." (p. 332)"

""I believe you find life such a problem because you think there are the good people and the bad people," said the man [Vetinari]. "You're wrong, of course. There are, always and only, the bad people, but some of them are on opposite sides." (p. 337)"

"What's up, Sarge? Do you want to live forever?"

""What if it's just a thousand-to-one chance?" said Colon agonizedly."

""Down there," he said, "are people who will follow any dragon, worship any god, ignore any iniquity. All out of a kind of humdrum, everyday badness. Not the really high, creative loathesomeness of the great sinners, but a sort of mass-produced darkness of the soul. Sin, you might say, without a trace of originality. They accept evil not because they say yes, but because they don't say no." (p. 337)"

"The singing of the National Anthem was always a ragged affair, the good people of Ankh-Morkpork feeling that it was unpatriotic to sing songs about how patriotic you were, taking the view that someone singing a song about how patriotic they were was either up to something or a Head of State.‡ ‡ i.e., up to something. (p. 363)"

"For I am the crowd and I am the ball I am the triumph and the blame I am the turf, the pies, the All Always and ever, I am the Game. It matters not who won or lost Nothing is the score you made Fame is a petal that curls in the frost But I will remember how you played. (p. 395)"

"Right, you bastards, you're... you're geography— (p. 302)"

"You can't give me my job back," repeated Vimes. "It was never yours to take away. I was never an officer of this city, or an officer of the king, or an officer of the Patrician. I was an officer of the law. It might have been corrupted and bent, but it was law, of a sort. There isn't any law now except: "You'll get burned alive if you don't watch out". Where's the place in there for me?"

"It must be something about high office. The altitude sends people mad. (p. 286)"

"You know, there’s people in this city that would watch a beheading and hold their kiddies up for a better view. (p. 331)"

"It does not matter whether you win or lose so long as you score the most goals. (p. 343)"

"Possibly in the dark hours of a sleepless night some of them might have remembered the subsequent events and formed a pretty good and gut-churning insight, to whit, that one of the things sometimes forgotten about the human spirit is that while it is, in the right conditions, noble and brave and wonderful, it is also, when you get right down to it, only human. (pp. 267-268)"

""When you really need them the most," he said, "million-to-one chances always crop up. Well-known fact." (p. 292)"

"“The orcs?” “Yes. They really are wretched. Of course, people say that about the goblins and while it is true that they religiously save their own snot, and, frankly, just about everything else, at least there is a logic to it.” “Well, a religious logic, at least,” murmured Vetinari. “They tend to be quite stretchable.” (pp. 406-407)"

"He felt the sensation of the dragon rummaging around in his mind, trying to find a clue to understanding. He half-saw, half-sensed the flicker of random images, of dragons, of the mythical age of reptiles and—and here he felt the dragon's genuine astonishment—of some of the less commendable areas of human history, which were most of it. And after the astonishment came the baffled anger. There was practically nothing the dragon could do to people that they had not, sooner or later, tried on one another, often with enthusiasm."