Discworld

"What kind of man would put a known criminal in charge of a major branch of government? Apart from, say, the average voter."

"There is a saying, “you can’t fool an honest man,” which is much quoted by people who make a profitable living by fooling honest men. Moist never tried it, knowingly anyway. If you did fool an honest man, he tended to complain to the local Watch, and these days they were harder to buy off. Fooling dishonest men was a lot safer and, somehow, more sporting. And, of course, there were so many more of them. You hardly had to aim."

"Always move fast. You never know what’s catching you up."

"Weapons raised the ante far too high. It was much better to rely on a gift for talking his way out of things, confusing the issue and, if that failed, some well-soled shoes and a cry of “Look, what’s that over there!”"

"Moist knew something about golems. They used to be baked out of clay, thousands of years ago, and brought to life by some kind of scroll put inside their heads, and they never wore out and they worked, all the time. You saw them pushing brooms, or doing heavy work in timber yards and foundries. Most of them you never saw at all. They made the hidden wheels go round, down in the dark. And that was more or less the limit of his interest in them. They were, almost by definition, honest."

"“Work, for wages. I realize the concept may be unfamiliar.” Only as a form of hell, Moist thought."

"Steal five dollars and you were a petty thief. Steal thousands of dollars and you were either a government or a hero."

"“It was a joke!” Moist burst out. “Oh, I’m sorry, I hadn’t realized,” said Lord Vetinari, turning back to Moist. “Do tell me if you feel obliged to make another one, will you?”"

"It’s always surprising to be reminded that while you’re watching and thinking about people, all knowing and superior, they’re watching and thinking about you, right back at you."

"Tiffany took a deep breath. This was about words, and she knew about words. “Here is a story to believe,” she said. “Once we were blobs in the sea, and then fishes, and then lizards and rats and then monkeys, and hundreds of things in between. This hand was once a fin, this hand once had claws! In my human mouth I have the pointy teeth of a wolf and the chisel teeth of a rabbit and the grinding teeth of a cow! Our blood is as salty as the sea we used to live in! When we’re frightened, the hair on our skin stands up, just like it did when we had fur. We are history! Everything we’ve ever been on the way to becoming us, we still are. Would you like the rest of the story?” Tell us, said the hiver. “I’m made up of the memories of my parents and my grandparents, all my ancestors. They’re in the way I look, in the colour of my hair. And I’m made up of everyone I’ve ever met who’s changed the way I think. So who is ‘me’?”"

"The only hat worth wearing was the one you made for yourself, not one you bought, not one you were given. Your own hat, for your own head. Your own future, not someone else’s."

"You see, I believe in freedom, Mr. Lipwig. Not many people do, although they will, of course, protest otherwise. And no practical definition of freedom would be completely without the freedom to take the consequences. Indeed, it is the freedom upon which all the others are based."

"But now the golems were freeing themselves. It was the quietest, most socially responsible revolution in history. They were property, and so they saved up and bought themselves."

"“Here you are. Would you like some pickles?” “Pickles gives me the wind something awful.” “In that case—” “Oh, I wasn’t saying no,” said Mistress Weatherwax, taking two large pickled cucumbers. Oh, good, Tiffany thought."

"You couldn’t say: It’s not my fault. You couldn’t say: It’s not my responsibility. You could say: I will deal with this. You didn’t have to want to. But you had to do it."

"“I had a lot of voles last night,” said Mistress Weatherwax over her shoulder. “Yes, but you didn’t actually eat them, did you?” said Tiffany. “It was the owl that actually ate them.” “Technic’ly, yes,” Mistress Weatherwax admitted. “But if you think you’ve been eating voles all night you’d be amazed how much you don’t want to eat anything next morning. Or ever again.”"

"“Ach, ye’ll learn as we go,” said Wullie. “Flying cannae be that difficult. Even ducks can do it, and they have nae brains at a’.”"

"“Why would you need my help?” asked Annagramma sulkily. —We need allies, the hiver thought with Tiffany’s mind. They can help protect us. If necessary, we can sacrifice them. Other creatures will always want to be friends with the powerful, and this one loves power—"

"People didn’t respect Miss Level. They liked her, in an unthinking sort of way, and that was it. Mistress Weatherwax was right, and Tiffany wished she wasn’t. “Why did you and Miss Tick send me to her, then?” she said. “Because she likes people,” said the witch, striding ahead. “She cares about ’em. Even the stupid, mean dribbling ones, the mothers with the runny babies and no sense, the feckless and the silly and the fools who treat her like some kind of a servant. Now that’s what I call magic—seein’ all that, dealin’ with all that, and still goin’ on.”"

"If this was a story, she thought bitterly, I’d trust in my heart and follow my star and all that other stuff and it would all turn out all right, right now, by tinkly Magikkkk. But you’re never in a story when you need to be."

"“Mistress Weatherwax is the head witch, then, is she?” “Oh no!” said Miss Level, looking shocked. “Witches are all equal. We don’t have head witches. That’s quite against the spirit of witchcraft.” “Oh, I see,” said Tiffany. “Besides,” Miss Level added, “Mistress Weatherwax would never allow that sort of thing.”"

"The beef stew tasted, indeed, just like beef stew and not, just to take an example completely and totally at random, stew made out of the last poor girl who’d worked here."

"“Is somethin” wrong?” said Daft Wullie. “Aye!” snapped the kelda. “Rob willnae tak’ a drink o’ Special Sheep Liniment!” Wullie’s little face screwed up in instant grief. “Ach, the Big Man’s deid!” he sobbed. “Oh waily waily waily—” “Will ye hush yer gob, ye big mudlin!” shouted Rob Anybody, standing up. “I am no’ deid! I’m trying to have a moment o’ existential dreed here, right? Crivens, it’s a puir lookout if a man cannae feel the chilly winds o’ Fate lashing aroound his nethers wi’out folks telling him he’s deid, eh?”"

"Petulia spent a lot of time trying to find out what other people thought so that she could think the same way. It would be impossible to have an argument with her. Tiffany had to stop herself from saying ‘The sky is green’ just to see how long it would take for Petulia to agree. But she liked her. You couldn’t not like her. She was restful company."

"Admittedly—and it took some admitting—he was a lot less of a twit than he had been. On the other hand, there had been such a lot of twit to begin with."

"Feegles from the other clans had all turned up for the celebration, because if there’s one thing a Feegle likes more than a party, it’s a bigger party, and if there’s anything better than a bigger party, it’s a bigger party with someone else paying for the drink."

"He hadn’t been a husband for very long, but upon marriage men get a whole lot of extra senses bolted into their brain, and one is there to tell a man that he’s suddenly neck deep in real trouble."

"Tiffany accidentally heard them discussing it after she had gone to bed that night. It’s quite easy to accidentally overhear people talking downstairs if you hold an upturned glass to the floorboards and accidentally put your ear to it."

"Over the last year or so Tiffany’s mother had been quite surprised, and a little worried, at Tiffany’s sudden thirst for education, which people in the village thought was a good thing in moderation but if taken unwisely could lead to restlessness."

"Black Meg, the senior nanny, who patiently allowed Tiffany to milk her and then, carefully and deliberately, put a hoof in the milk bucket. That’s a goat’s idea of getting to know you. A goat is a worrying thing if you’re used to sheep, because a goat is a sheep with brains."

"“Young Toby? He’s been dead for fifteen years. And Mary was the old man’s daughter, she died quite young. Mr. Weavall is very shortsighted, but he sees better in the past.” Tiffany didn’t know what to reply except: “It shouldn’t be like this.” “There isn’t a way things should be. There’s just what happens, and what we do.”"

"Knowing things is magical, if other people don’t know them."

"When a dog attacks a sheep, the other sheep run away to a safe distance and then turn and watch. They don’t gang up on the dog. They’re just happy it’s not them."

"There was an air about her that she was taking notes about the world in order to draw up a list of suggestions for improvements."

"It was hard to look at the assembled ranks of the Nac Mac Feegle and remember that they were, technically, fairies. It was like watching penguins swimming underwater and having to remember that they were birds."

"“You looked at her diary?” said Miss Level, horrified. “Why?” Really, she thought later, she should have expected the answer. “Cuz it wuz locked,” said Daft Wullie."

"If you’re full of anger, there’s no room left for fear."

"Tomorrow, your job is to change the world into a better place. Today, my job is to see that everyone gets there."

"It’s an unfair world, child. Be glad you have friends."

"If Tiffany hadn’t been a witch, she would have whined about everyone being so unfair! In fact they were being fair. She knew they were being fair. They were not thinking just of her, but of other people, and Tiffany hated herself—well, slightly—because she hadn’t. But it was sneaky of them to choose this moment to be fair. That was unfair."

"Do you know what it feels like to be aware of every star, every blade of grass? Yes. You do. You call it “opening your eyes again.” But you do it for a moment. We have done it for eternity. No sleep, no rest, just endless...endless experience, endless awareness. Of everything. All the time. How we envy you, envy you! Lucky humans, who can close your minds to the endless deeps of space! You have this thing you call...boredom? That is the rarest talent in the universe! We heard a song—it went “Twinkle twinkle little star....” What power! What wondrous power! You can take a billion trillion tons of flaming matter, a furnace of unimaginable strength, and turn it into a little song for children! You build little worlds, little stories, little shells around your minds, and that keeps infinity at bay and allows you to wake up in the morning without screaming!"

"You humans are so good at ignoring things. You are almost blind and almost deaf. You look at a tree and see…just a tree, a stiff weed. You don’t see its history, feel the pumping of the sap, hear every insect in the bark, sense the chemistry of the leaves, notice the hundred shades of green, the tiny movements to follow the sun, the subtle growth of wood…"

"“The old bit of our brains that wants to be head monkey, and attacks when it’s surprised,” said Tiffany. “It reacts. It doesn’t think. Being human is knowing when not to be the monkey or the lizard or any of the other old echoes.”"

"If you don’t know when to be a human being, you don’t know when to be a witch. And if you’re too afraid of goin’ astray, you won’t go anywhere."

"They say that the prospect of being hanged in the morning concentrates a man’s mind wonderfully; unfortunately what the mind inevitably concentrates on is that it is in a body, that, in the morning, is going to be hanged."

"I told him, sir, that fruit baskets is like life—until you’ve got the pineapple off of the top you never know what’s underneath."

"“Come on, Mr Spangler, you don’t want me to get into trouble, do you?” said the hangman, patting him on the shoulder. “Just a few words, and then we can all get on with our lives. Present company excepted, obviously.”"

"I commend my soul to any god that can find it."

"Moist shrugged. “Oh, all right. Of course I accept as natural-born criminal, habitual liar, fraudster, and totally untrustworthy perverted genius.” “Capital! Welcome to government service!” said Lord Vetinari, extending his hand. “I pride myself on being able to pick the right man.”"

"Wishes needed thought. She was never likely to say, out loud, “I wish that I could marry a handsome prince,” but knowing that if you did you’d probably open the door to find a stunned prince, a tied-up priest and a Nac Mac Feegle grinning cheerfully and ready to act as Best Man definitely made you watch what you said."