"Have you never thought how danger must surround power as shadow does light? This sorcery is not a game we play for pleasure or for praise. Think of this: that every word, every act of our Art is said and is done either for good, or for evil. Before you speak or do you must know the price that is to pay!"

"It was the first and only fight of his childhood, but it had taught him a valuable lesson about human nature, how people were just another species of animal, and like any animal, from the biggest predators, to the smallest scavengers, most human beings could only be pushed so far before they lashed out."

"The only medicine for suffering, crime, and all other woes of mankind, is wisdom. Teach a man to read and write, and you have put into his hands the great keys of the wisdom box. But it is quite another thing to open the box."

"What matters is not the enclosure of the work within a harmonious figure, but the centrifugal force produced by it -- a plurality of language as a guarantee of a truth that is not merely partial."

"The genocide [in Rwanda] was not a spontaneous eruption of tribal hatred, it was planned by people wanting to keep power. There was a long government-led hat campaign against the Tutsis."

"It was not long before I discovered that withdrawing addicts lost their composure in exactly the same manner that careless millionaires lose their money: gradually, then suddenly."

"Laws and a settled decision procedure to generate them are a good thing. This gives us one important reason for obeying the law. By obeying the law, I can contribute to the respect in which the established decision procedure and the laws are held. By disobeying, I set an example to others that may lead them to disobey too."