"“I think you look on death as your friend,” she murmured. “That is a strange friend for a young man to have.” “The only faithful friend in this world,” he said. “Death is always sure to be at your side.”"

"’Tis colder outside than a well-born maiden’s heart."

"She rarely saw priest—and knowing her heart sinned, was glad of that. Dreary was a church after the woodlands and hills and sounding sea. She still loved God—and was not the earth His work, and a church only man’s?—but she could not bring herself to call on Him very often."

"Better a life like a falling star, bright across the dark, than a deathlessness which can see naught above or beyond itself."

"I was trying to avoid the cliché all too common in science fiction, even today, of a whole population feeling itself oppressed and waiting only for a leader to rise in a body against its overlords. No government for which that was actually the case could last a minute. There must always be a majority who have some stake in things as they are, whether that stake consist of wealth and power or simply of law, order, and predictability. Moreover, most people cannot really imagine any system working which is very different from the one they are used to. Hence they find rationalizations for it. Even slaves often do this."

"Do you think maybe I want power for myself? That’s for fools who want to command other fools."

"Chanthavar said that the Egyptian pyramids, part of the Sphinx, traces of buried cities, a couple of ruined dams in America and Russia, some hydrogen-bomb craters, were still around, otherwise nothing earlier than the Thirty-fifth century. Time went on, relentlessly, and one by one the proud works of man were lost."

"It isn’t possible to have equality. It’s been tried again and again in history, giving everybody a vote, and it’s always failed—always, in a few generations, the worse politicians drove out the better. Because by definition, half the people always have below-average intelligence; and the average is not high."

"I am a peaceful man, captain. I rely more on my cerebral cortex than my guns."

"For the ordinary man, instability—change—means dislocation, war, uncertainty, misery, and death."

"It sounds rather silly, doesn’t it? One little man thinking he can change history all by his lonesome. A lot of trouble has been caused by that delusion."

"People usually take for granted that the way things are is the way things must be."

"Then they died. And other men came after them. Wars flamed up and burned out; the howling peoples dwelt in smashed cities and kindled their fires with books."

"Her rank was higher than his, so high that no one in her family worked productively."

"Winter lay among the Outer Hebrides. Day was a sullen glimmer between two darknesses, often smothered in snow. When it did not fling itself upon the rocks and burst in freezing spume, the North Atlantic rolled in heavy and gnawing. There was no real horizon; leaden waves met leaden sky and misty leaden light hid the seam."

"I do not think the coerced mind ever really learns an art."

"Pioneering is an unlimited chance to become the biggest frog, provided the puddle is small enough."

"Hard to say whether personal immortality would be a good thing or not. Not for the masses, surely! Too many of them as it was. But a select few, like Terangi Maclaren—or was it worth the trouble? Even given boats, chess, music, the No Drama, beautiful women and beautiful spectroscopes, life could get heavy."

"Life was too short for anything but amusement at the human race."

"“Do you know,” said Maclaren, “there is one sin which is punished with unfailing certainty, and must therefore be the deadliest sin in all time. Stupidity.”"

"I’ll give you one thing to mull over, though. If the body’s such a valueless piece of pork, and we’ll all meet each other in the sweet bye and bye, and so on, why’re you busting every gut you own to get back to your wife?"

"Li-Tsung of Krasna would have told him to live at all costs, sacrifice all the others, to save himself for his planet and the Fellowship. But there were limits. You didn’t have to accept Dave’s Calvinism—though its unmerciful God seemed very near this dead star—to swallow the truth that some things were more important than survival. Than even the survival of a cause. Maybe I’m trying to find out what those things are, he thought confusedly."

"You can have more adventure in an hour’s walk through a forest than in a year on a spaceship."

"I’m afraid I’m not a convert or anything. I still see the same blind cosmos governed by the same blind laws. But suddenly it matters. It matters terribly, and means something. What, I haven’t figured out yet. I probably never will. But I have a reason for living, or for dying if need be. Maybe that’s the whole purpose of life: purpose itself. I can’t say. But I expect to enjoy the world a lot more."

"“At least we can put a little sense into life.” “I don’t know whether we do or whether we find what was always there,” he replied. “Nor do I care greatly. To me, the important thing is that the purpose—order, beauty, spirit, whatever you want to call it—does exist.”"

"“Your son was in your own tradition.” “Better, I hope,” said the old man. “There would be little sense to existence, did boys have no chance to be more than their fathers.”"

"On our Earth, we’ve perforce learned all the knavery there is to know."

"It was lonely, not even knowing yourself."

"“You are much too kind,” said Holger, overwhelmed. “Nay.” Alfric waved his hand. “You mortals know not how tedious undying life can become, and how gladly a challenge such as this is greeted. ’Tis I should thank you.”"

"Holger wished he had read the old tales more closely; he had only a dim childhood recollection of them."

"They were not plagued that night, which Hugi said was without doubt because something worse was being prepared. Holger was inclined to share the dwarf’s pessimism."

"As evil waxes, the very men who stand for good will in their fear use ever worse means o’ fighting, and thereby give evil a free beachhead."

"You cannot imagine how wearisome existence grows, alone and immortal."

"And never forget: any planet is a world, as complex and mysterious in its own right, as full of its patterns and contradictions and histories, as Earth ever was."

"Why do people in this age think their own impoverished lives must be the norm of the universe?"

"At most, the gods gave only a little happiness; the rest was merely existence."

"“Destiny,” said John. “The ghastliest word a man can speak.”"

"“I think,” said John, “you’d do well to remember what one of our philosophers wrote. All evil is a good become cancerous."

"“My mother taught me a Spanish saying,” he remarked, “that it takes four men to make a salad: a spendthrift for the oil, a philosopher for the seasonings, a miser for the vinegar, and a madman for the tossing.”"

"Heim ignored the mob scene on the 3V, rested his eyes on the cold serenity of the Milky Way and thought that this, at least, would endure."

"Another irritating thing about Naqsans was their habit of solemnly repeating the obvious. In that respect they were almost as bad as humans."

"He’d seen too often how little of the universe is designed for man to neglect any safety measure."

"The last thing any sane person wants is a jihad."

"There really wasn’t much in a man’s life that mattered. But those few things mattered terribly."

"Life isn’t a fairy tale; the knight who kills the dragon doesn’t necessarily get the princess. So what? Who’d want to live in a cosmos less rich and various than the real one?"

"“Are you that afraid to die?” “No. I simply like to live.”"

"What’s to explain? I’ve scant use for those types whose chief interest is their grubby little personal neuroses. Not in a universe as rich as this."