It was like that all the time, in those years: an endless trip, a gaudy voyage. But powers decay. Time leaches the colors from the best of visions. The world becomes grayer. Entropy beats us down. Everything fades. Everything goes. Everything dies.

I hate no one, sir. It seems a waste of emotional energy.

The denizens of Citizens Service Houses are not, as a rule, gifted with a lot of common sense, but they often make up for that by being extremely argumentative and vindictive.

Unacceptable, maybe. But not unthinkable. Nothing's unthinkable once somebody's thought it.

To devote oneself to vigilance when the enemy is an imaginary one is idle, and to congratulate oneself for looking long and well for a foe that is not coming is foolish and sinful. My life has been a waste.

Ignorance can't be pardoned. Only cured.

Living, we fret. Dying, we live. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll be of good cheer.