Mercy did not exist in the primordial life. It was misunderstood for fear, and such misunderstandings made for death.

There is another way of disqualifying the metaphysicians.... Judge them by their works. What have they done for mankind beyond the spinning of airy fancies and the mistaking of their own shadows for gods?

But especially he loved to run in the dim twilight of the summer midnights, listening to the subdued and sleepy murmurs of the forest, reading signs and sounds as a man may read a book, and seeking for the mysterious something that called -- called, waking or sleeping, at all times, for him to come.

...in his gambling, he had one besetting weakness -- faith in a system; and this made his damnation certain.

He became quicker of movement than the other dogs, swifter of foot, craftier, deadlier, more lithe, more lean with ironlike muscle and sinew, more enduring, more cruel more ferocious, and more intelligent. He had to become all these things, else he would not have held his own nor survived the hostile environment in which he found himself.

A good joke will sell quicker than a good poem, and, measured in sweat and blood, will bring better remuneration.

Where others have hearts, he carries a tumor of rotten principles.