I've always thought tests are a gift. And great tests are a great gift. To fail the test is a misfortune. But to refuse the test is to refuse the gift, and something worse, more irrevocable, than misfortune.

Children might or might not be a blessing, but to create them and then fail them was surely damnation.

I don't confuse greatness with perfection. To be great anyhow is the higher achievement.

What you are is a question only you can answer.

How could you be a Great Man if history brought you no Great Events, or brought you to them at the wrong time, too young, too old?

A true Vor, Miles told himself severely, does not bury his face in his liegewoman's breasts and cry--even if he is at a convenient height for it.

I do think, half of what we call madness is just some poor slob dealing with pain by a strategy that annoys the people around him.