Parting with friends is a sadness. A place is only a place.

Peace for any prolonged period of time is impossible. Humans have a natural thirst for chaos and war is the most readily available form of chaos.

The stakes in conflict do not change. Battle determines who will control the wealth or its equivalent.

For now is my grief heavier than the sands of the seas, she thought. This world has emptied me of all but the oldest purpose: tomorrow's life.

Atrocity is recognized as such by victim and predator alike, by all who learn about it at whatever remove. Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating upon itself - a barbarous form of incest. Whoever commits atrocity also commits those future atrocities thus bred.

The most terrifying things in the universe came from human minds.

Confine yourself to observing and you always miss the point of your life. The object can be stated this way: Live the best life you can. Life is a game whose rules you learn if you leap into it and play it to the hilt. Otherwise, you are caught off balance, continually surprised by the shifting play. Non-players often whine and complain that luck always passes them by. They refuse to see that they can create some of their own luck. Darwi Odrade - Chapterhouse: Dune