This was a Golden Age, a time of high adventure, rich living and hard dying... but nobody thought so. This was a future of fortune and theft, pillage and rapine, culture and vice... but nobody admitted it. This was an age of extremes, a fascinating century of freaks... but nobody loved it.

This was an age of extremes, a fascinating century of freaks... but nobody loved it.

"There's got to be more to life than just living," Foyle said to the robot. "Then find it for yourself, sir. Don't ask the world to stop moving because you have doubts." "Why can't we all move forward together?" "Because you're all different. You're not lemmings. Some must lead, and hope that the rest will follow." "Who leads?" "The men who must... driven men, compelled men." "Freak men." "You're all freaks, sir. But you always have been freaks. Life is a freak. That's its hope and glory."

Tenser, said the Tensor. Tension, apprehension, and dissension have begun.

No matter how we defend ourselves against the outside we're always licked by something from the inside. Ther's no defense against betrayal, and we all betray ourselves.

The damnable frustration of revenge. Revenge is for dreams...never for reality.

I'm not much interested in extrapolating science and technology; I merely use extrapolation as a means of putting people into new quandaries which produce colorful pressures and conflicts.