Had I been wrong, this would still have been the honorable thing to do — David Brin

"It was silly to suppose that trials only hardened men, automatically making them wise. He knew many who were stupid, arrogant, and mean, in spite of having suffered."

"She closed her eyes. And while her intellect wouldn’t let her realize her deepest fear, that all this might soon be gone forever, nevertheless she stood there for a time and worshipped the only way a person like her could worship—in silence and solitude, under the temple of the sky."

"Ideologies are too seductive anyway. It does a man good to see things from a different point of view."

"The lesson they took home with them was simple; it takes a full belly before a man or woman gives a tinker’s damn about anything as large as a planet."

"Nation states are archaic leftovers from when each man feared the tribe over the hill, an attitude we can’t afford anymore."

"Apparently, the Fates were not so unsubtle as to deal him another blow just yet. He knew they didn’t operate that way. They always let you hope for a while longer, then strung it out before they really let you have it."