For having expressed an opinion, however far-fetched, we straightway become its slave, ready to die defending it, and even ready to believe it. And many continue to be martyrs to causes which have ceased to exist, their crowns rusting upon their heads as tin wreaths rust upon forgotten tombs.

In the spider-web of facts, many a truth is strangled.

Reading the epitaphs, our only salvation lies in resurrecting the dead and burying the living.

Praises for our past triumphs are as feathers to a dead bird.

History is the transformation of tumultuous conquerors into silent footnotes.

Having read the inscriptions upon the tombstones of the great and little cemeteries, Wang Peng advised the Emperor to kill all the living and resurrect the dead.

There are those whose sole claim to profundity is the discovery of exceptions to the rules.