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

Give as few orders as possible," his father had told him once long ago. "Once you've given orders on a subject, you must always give orders on that subject.

The gravest error a thinking person can make is to believe that one particular version of history is absolute fact. History is recorded by a series of observers, none of whom is impartial. The facts are distorted by sheer passage of time and thousands of years of humanity's dark ages, deliberate misrepresentations by religious sects, and the inevitable corruption that comes from an accumulation of careless mistakes. The wise person, then, views history as a set of lessons to be learned, choices and ramifications to be considered and discussed, and mistakes that should never again be made.

Argument closes off the doors of the senses. It always masks violence. Continued too long, argument always leads to violence.

You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgement of your existence.

The surest way to keep a secret is to make people believe they already know the answer.

Empires do not suffer emptiness of purpose at the time of their creation. It is when they have become established that aims are lost and replaced by vague ritual.