Torturous advances won over generations can be lost by a single stroke of a myopic president's pen or a vainglorious general's sword.

Teachers're always using that "in your own words." I hate that. Authors knit their sentences tight. It's their job. Why make us unpick them, just to put it back together more shonkily? How're you s'posed to say Kapellmeister if you can't say Kapellmeister?

why human beings despise what is beautiful and good, and seek to destroy the things they need the most

Perpetual encagement endows any mirage of salvation with credibility.

Science devises ever bloodier means of war until humanity's powers of destruction overcome our powers of creation and our civilisation drives itself to extinction.

The better organized the state, the duller its humanity.

Taro taught me that people respect spirit, but even cowards don't respect cowards.