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Wizards Don't Believe In Gods In The Same Way That Most People Don't Find It Necessary To Believe In, Say, Tables. They Know They're There, They Know They're There For A Purpose, They'd Probably Agree That They Have A Place In A Well-organised Universe, But They Wouldn't See The Point Of Believing, Of Going Around Saying "o Great Table, Without Whom We Are As Naught." Anyway, Either The Gods Are There Whether You Believe In Them Or Not, Or Exist Only As A Function Of The Belief, So Either Way You Might As Well Ignore The Whole Business And, As It Were, Eat Off Your Knees.

-Terry Pratchett

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Wizards Don't Believe In

Terry Pratchett

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Wizards Don't Believe In Gods In The Same Way That Most People Don't Find It Necessary To Believe In, Say, Tables. They Know They're There, They Know They're There For A Purpose, They'd Probably Agree That They Have A Place In A Well-organised Universe, But They Wouldn't See The Point Of Believing, Of Going Around Saying "o Great Table, Without Whom We Are As Naught." Anyway, Either The Gods Are There Whether You Believe In Them Or Not, Or Exist Only As A Function Of The Belief, So Either Way You Might As Well Ignore The Whole Business And, As It Were, Eat Off Your Knees.

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His Mind Worked Fast, Flying In Emergency Supplies Of Common Sense, As Human Minds Do, To Construct A Huge Anchor In Sanity And Prove That What Happened Hadn't Really Happened And, If It Had Happened, Hadn't Happened Much.

After All, When You Seek Advice From Someone It's Certainly Not Because You Want Them To Give It. You Just Want Them To Be There While You Talk To Yourself.

The Reason That Clichés Become Clichés Is That They Are The Hammers And Screwdrivers In The Toolbox Of Communication.

Interesting Thing, These Fellows Never Seem To Get The Idea Of Perspective-' The Bursar Thought, Or Received The Thought: That's Because Perspective Is A Lie. If I Know A Pond Is Round Then Why Should I Draw It Oval? I Will Draw It Round Because Round Is True. Why Should My Brush Lie To You Just Because My Eye Lies To Me?

Not For The First Time In The History Of The Universe, Someone For Whom Communication Normally Came As Effortlessly As A Dream Was Stuck For Inspiration When Faced With A Few Lines On The Back Of A Card.

Most Of My Schooldays Were The Worst Day Of My Life.

Whut's The Plan, Rob?" Said One Of Them. "okay, Lads, This Is What We'll Do. As Soon As We See Somethin', We'll Attack It. Right?" This Caused A Cheer. "ach, 'tis A Good Plan," Said Daft Wullie.

Everyone Should Occasionally Break The Law In Some Small And Delightful Way. It's Good For The Hygiene Of The Brain.

For The First Time In Her Life Granny Wondered Whether There Might Be Something Important In All These Books People Were Setting Store By These Days, Although She Was Opposed To Books On Strict Moral Grounds, Since She Had Heard That Many Of Them Were Written By Dead People And Therefore It Stood To Reason Reading Them Would Be As Bad As Necromancy. Among The Many Things In The Infinitely Varied Universe With Which Granny Did Not Hold Was Talking To Dead People, Who By All Accounts Had Enough Troubles Of Their Own.

Lots Of People Would Be As Cowardly As Me If They Were Brave Enough.

There Were Two Ways Of Looking At The World, But Only One When You Are Starving.

Whole New Theories Of Money Were Growing Here Like Mushrooms: In The Dark And Based On Bullshit.

Just Because It's Not Nice Doesn't Mean It's Not Miraculous.

If My Father Could Have Sat Up In Bed And Said Goodbye, I'd Have Pressed The Button. I Wouldn't Have Been Able To See For Crying, But I Would Have Considered That A Duty.

And Gears," Said Anathema. "my Bike Didn't Have Gears. I'm Sure My Bike Didn't Have Gears." Crowley Leaned Over To The Angel. "oh Lord, Heal This Bike," He Whispered Sarcastically. "i'm Sorry, I Just Got Carried Away," Hissed Aziraphale.

Cake Is Not The Issue Here.

People Aren't Just People, They Are People Surrounded By Circumstances.

Nanny Ogg Never Did Any Housework Herself, But She Was The Cause Of Housework In Other People.

Lords And Ladies

The Oldest Fan Letter I've Had Is From Someone Aged Eighty-five.

No More Words. We Know Them All, All The Words That Should Not Be Said. But You Have Made My World More Perfect.

My Idea Of A Good Novel Was One You Made Enough Money Out Of To Buy A Greenhouse.

He Was The Sort Of Person Who Stood On Mountaintops During Thunderstorms In Wet Copper Armour Shouting 'all The Gods Are Bastards.'

I Was A Very Keen Reader Of Science Fiction, And During The Time I Was Going To Libraries, It Was Good, Written By People Who Knew Their Science.

Always Face What You Fear. Have Just Enough Money, Never Too Much, And Some String. Even If It’s Not Your Fault, It’s Your Responsibility. Witches Deal With Things. Never Stand Between Two Mirrors. Never Cackle. Do What You Must Do. Never Lie, But You Don’t Always Have To Be Honest. Never Wish. Especially Don’t Wish Upon A Star, Which Is Astronomically Stupid. Open Your Eyes, And Then Open Your Eyes Again.

Everybody Thinks The Government Should Be Doing More About Everything But Just Think How Many Of The Bonuses Which Are Quite Rightly Being Dragged Off Certain People, Just Think To What Good Causes They Could Be Put - Wouldn't That Be A Lovely Thought'?

It Takes A Special Kind Of Person To Fight Back.

But I Think You Have A Right To Know What It Is You’re Not Being Told.

It's Not Lying When You Do It To Officers!

Getting An Education Was A Bit Like A Communicable Sexual Disease. It Made You Unsuitable For A Lot Of Jobs And Then You Had The Urge To Pass It On.

Building A Temple Didn't Mean You Believed In Gods, It Just Meant You Believed In Architecture.

I Don't Read An Awful Lot Of Fiction And When I Do, It Tends To Be Lightweight Stuff.

My Name Is Immaterial,' She Said. That's A Pretty Name,' Said Rincewind.

Albert Grunted. "do You Know What Happens To Lads Who Ask Too Many Questions?" Mort Thought For A Moment. "no," He Said Eventually, "what?" There Was Silence. Then Albert Straightened Up And Said, "damned If I Know. Probably They Get Answers, And Serve 'em Right.

Five Exclamation Marks: The Sure Sign Of An Insane Mind.

Exclamation Points

Exclamation Marks

And What Do You Really Do? Asked Tiffany. The Thin Witch Hesitatied For A Moment, And Then: We Look To ... The Edges, Said Mistress Weatherwax. There's A Lot Of Edges, More Than People Know. Between Life And Death, This World And The Next, Night And Day, Right And Wrong ... An' They Need Watchin'. We Watch 'em, We Guard The Sum Of Things. And We Never Ask For Any Reward. That's Important.

Some People Are Heroes. And Some People Jot Down Notes.

Ye Know Full Well That The Meaning Of Life Is To Find Your Gift. To Find Your Gift Is Happiness. Never Tae Find It Is Misery.

Meaning Of Life

Have A Bit More Patience With Newbies. Of Course Some Of Them Act Dumb - They're Often Students, For Heaven's Sake.

I Have, Before Now, Waited For A Pen To Perform A Macro.

Over The Centuries, Mankind Has Tried Many Ways Of Combating The Forces Of Evil... Prayer, Fasting, Good Works And So On. Up Until Doom, No One Seemed To Have Thought About The Double-barrel Shotgun. Eat Leaden Death, Demon...

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They Say That The Eyes Of Some Paintings Can Follow You Around The Room, A Fact That I Doubt, But I Am Wondering Whether Some Music Can Follow You For Ever.

Knowing That You Are Going To Die Is, I Suspect, The Beginning Of Wisdom.

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I Don't Hold With Paddlin' With The Occult," Said Granny Firmly. "once You Start Paddlin' With The Occult You Start Believing In Spirits, And When You Start Believing In Spirits You Start Believing In Demons, And Then Before You Know Where You Are You're Believing In Gods. And Then You're In Trouble." "but All Them Things Exist," Said Nanny Ogg. "that's No Call To Go Around Believing In Them. It Only Encourages 'em.

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Cats Gravitate To Kitchens Like Rocks Gravitate To Gravity.

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Wikipedia, Eh? Must Be Accurate Then.

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Perhaps The Magic Would Last, Perhaps It Wouldn't. But Then Again, What Does?

Sergeant Colon Of The Ankh-morpork City Guard Was On Duty. He Was Guarding The Brass Bridge, The Main Link Between Ankh And Morpork. From Theft. When It Came To Crime Prevention, Sergeant Colon Found It Safest To Think Big.

And We Don't Often Get Any Wading Birds In The River Ankh, Mainly Because The Pollution Would Eat Their Legs Away And Anyway, It's Easier For Them To Walk On The Surface.

Ponder Just Let It Happen. It's Because Their Minds Are So Often Involved With Deep And Problematic Matters, He Told Himself, That Their Mouths Are Allowed To Wander Around Making A Nuisance Of Themselves.

Magrat Had Used A Lot Of Powder To Make Her Face Pale And Interesting. It Combined With The Lavishly Applied Mascara To Give The Guard The Impression That He Was Looking At Two Flies That Had Crashed Into A Sugar Bowl.

Animals Never Spend Time Dividing Experience Into Little Bits And Speculating About All The Bits They've Missed. The Whole Panoply Of The Universe Has Been Neatly Expressed To Them As Things To (a) Mate With, (b) Eat, (c) Run Away From, And (d) Rocks.

I Think What Drove Me Away From Being A Reporter Was An Inability To Accept That The World Came In Neat Stories. Every Story You Have To Report Is Just Part Of Something Bigger. The News Isn't What Happened Last Night - It's Some Cumulative Thing That's Happened Over Centuries. I Found It Hard To Think Of One Event And Drag It Out Of A Bubbling Pot And Present It As The Story That Explains It All.

I Think That Sick People In Ankh-morpork Generally Go To A Vet. It's Generally A Better Bet. There's More Pressure On A Vet To Get It Right. People Say "it Was God's Will" When Granny Dies, But They Get Angry When They Lose A Cow.

In Fact, The Mere Act Of Opening The Box Will Determine The State Of The Cat, Although In This Case There Were Three Determinate States The Cat Could Be In: These Being Alive, Dead, And Bloody Furious.

Lords And Ladies

In Fact, Very Few People On The Face Of The Planet Know That The Very Shape Of The M25 Forms The Sigil *odegra* In The Language Of The Black Priesthood Of Ancient Mu, And Means 'hail The Great Beast, Devourer Of Worlds'.

Did I Do Anything Last Night That Suggested I Was Sane?

He'd Been Wrong, There Was A Light At The End Of The Tunnel, And It Was A Flamethrower.

Smaller-than-medium-jock-but-bigger-than-wee-jock-jock

But There Was More To It Than That. As The Amazing Maurice Said, It Was Just A Story About People And Rats. And The Difficult Part Of It Was Deciding Who The People Were, And Who Were The Rats.

If You Have Enough Book Space, I Don't Want To Talk To You.

Humans Can Think Inhuman Thoughts.

If You Really Want To Upset A Witch, Do Her A Favor Which She Has No Means Of Repaying. The Unfulfilled Obligation Will Nag At Her Like A Hangnail.

And What Are You Doing On It, I Would Like To Know? Running Away From Home, Yesno? If You Were A Boy I'd Say Are You Going To Seek Your Fortune?" "can't Girls Seek Their Fortune?" "i Think They're Supposed To Seek A Boy With A Fortune.

It's Never A Good Idea To Ask A Man On A Tight-rope How He Keeps His Balance: A) He Would Probably Fall Off And B) He Probably Doesn't Know What The Muscles Are Called In Any Case.

Colon Has Always Thought That Heroes Had Some Special Kind Of Clockwork That Made Them Go Out And Die Famously For God, Country And Apple Pie, Or Whatever Particular Delicacy Their Mother Made. It Had Never Occurred To Him That They Might Do It Because They'd Get Yelled At If They Didn't.

Little Fussy Otto, In His Red-lined Black Opera Cloak With Pockets For All His Gear, His Shiny Black Shoes, His Carefully Cut Widow's Peak And, Not Least, His Ridiculous Accent That Grew Thicker Or Thinner Depending On Who He Was Talking To, Did Not Look Like A Threat. He Looked Funny, A Joke, A Music-hall Vampire. It Had Never Previously Occurred To Vimes That, Just Possibly, The Joke Was On Other People.

Good And Bad Is Tricky," She Said. "i Ain't Too Certain About Where People Stand. P'raps What Matters Is Which Way You Face." (pp. 348-349)

Students, Eh? Love 'em Or Hate 'em, You Can't Hit Them With A Shovel!

Life Is A Trick, And You Get One Chance To Learn It.

Legends Don't Have To Make Sense. They Just Have To Be Beautiful. Or At Least Interesting.

Why Do You Go Away? So That You Can Come Back. So That You Can See The Place You Came From With New Eyes And Extra Colors. And The People There See You Differently, Too. Coming Back To Where You Started Is Not The Same As Never Leaving.

He's Probably Their Battle Poet, Too." "you Mean He Makes Up Heroic Songs About Famous Battles?" "no, No. He Recites Poems That Frighten The Enemy....when A Well-trained Gonnagle Starts To Recite, The Enemy's Ears Explode.

Sham Harga Had Run A Successful Eatery For Many Years By Always Smiling, Never Extending Credit, And Realizing That Most Of His Customers Wanted Meals Properly Balanced Between The Four Food Groups: Sugar, Starch, Grease, And Burnt Crunchy Bits.

You Have To Have Really Wide Reading Habits And Pay Attention To The News And Just Everything That's Going On In The World: You Need To. If You Get This Right, Then The Writing Is A Piece Of Cake.

The Rising Sun Managed To Peek Around The Vast Column Of Smoke That Forever Rose From Ankh-morpork, City Of Cities, Illustrating Almost Up To The Edge Of Space That Smoke Means Progress Or, At Least, People Setting Fire To Things.

...inside Every Old Person Is A Young Person Wondering What Happened.

The Reaper Does Not Listen To The Harvest.

The Trouble With Having An Open Mind, Of Course, Is That People Will Insist On Coming Along And Trying To Put Things In It.

A Good Banana Daiquiri Is Hard To Come By. I've Only Ever Found One Place In This Country That Makes A Proper One, And That's In Leeds.

And That's When I First Learned About Evil. It Is Built In To The Very Nature Of The Universe. Every World Spins In Pain. If There Is Any Kind Of Supreme Being, I Told Myself, It Is Up To All Of Us To Become His Moral Superior.

In The Beginning There Was Nothing, Which Exploded.

Lords And Ladies

When You Stand Between Two Mirrors You're Spread Out Among The Images, Your Whole Soul Is Pulled Out Thin, And Somewhere In The Distant Images A Dark Part Of You Might Get Out And Come Looking For You, If You Aren't Careful.

I Wonder If It's Like This For Mountain Climbers, He Thought. You Climb Bigger And Bigger Mountains And You Know That One Day One Of Them Is Going To Be Just That Bit Too Steep. But You Go On Doing It, Because It’s So-o Good When You Breathe The Air Up There. And You Know You'll Die Falling.

Granny Weatherwax Was Often Angry. She Considered It One Of Her Strong Points. Genuine Anger Was One Of The World's Greatest Creative Forces. But You Had To Learn How To Control It. That Didn't Mean You Let It Trickle Away. It Meant You Dammed It, Carefully, Let It Develop A Working Head, Let It Drown Whole Valleys Of The Mind And Then, Just When The Whole Structure Was About To Collapse, Opened A Tiny Pipeline At The Base And Let The Iron-hard Stream Of Wrath Power The Turbines Of Revenge.

Geography Is Just Physics Slowed Down, With A Couple Of Trees Stuck In It.

The Iq Of A Mob Is The Iq Of Its Dumbest Member Divided By The Number Of Mobsters.

Things Have No Power That Humans Don't Put There.

I Don't Think About The End Game. I've Got Lots To Occupy My Mind. It's The Rage That Keeps Me Going.

Fantasy Is Escapism, But Wait... Why Is This Wrong? What Are You Escaping From, And Where Are You Escaping To? Is The Story Opening Windows Or Slamming Doors? The British Author G.k. Chesterton Summarized The Role Of Fantasy Very Well. He Said Its Purpose Was To Take The Everyday, Commonplace World And Lift It Up And Turn It Around And Show It To Us From A Different Perspective, So That Once Again We See It For The First Time And Realize How Marvelous It Is. Fantasy - The Ability To Envisage The World In Many Different Ways - Is One Of The Skills That Make Us Human.

I Meant," Said Ipslore Bitterly, "what Is There In This World That Truly Makes Living Worthwhile?" Death Thought About It. Cats, He Said Eventually. Cats Are Nice.

He Looked Up At Them, A Scruffy Napoleon With His Laces Trailing, Exiled To A Rose-trellised Elba.

‎no One Remembers The Singer. The Song Remains.

History Always Has A Few Tricks Up Its Frayed Sleeve. It's Been Around A Long Time.

Drinks Like This Tend To Get Called Traffic Lights Or Rainbow's Revenge Or, In Places Where Truth Is More Highly Valued, Hello And Good-bye, Mr. Brain Cell.

The Truth Is That Even Big Collections Of Ordinary Books Distort Space, As Can Readily Be Proved By Anyone Who Has Been Around A Really Old-fashioned Secondhand Bookshop, One That Looks As Though They Were Designed By M. Escher On A Bad Day And Has More Stairways Than Storeys And Those Rows Of Shelves Which End In Little Doors That Are Surely Too Small For A Full-sized Human To Enter. The Relevant Equation Is: Knowledge = Power = Energy = Matter = Mass; A Good Bookshop Is Just A Genteel Black Hole That Knows How To Read.

Poetic Simile Was Strictly Limited To Statements Like 'his Mighty Steed Was As Fleet As The Wind On A Fairly Calm Day, Say About Force Three,' And Any Loose Talk About A Beloved Having A Face That Launched A Thousand Ships Would Have To Be Backed By Evidence That The Object Of Desire Did Indeed Look Like A Bottle Of Champagne.

Assassins Did Have A Certain Code, After All. It Was Dishonorable To Kill Someone If You Weren't Being Paid.

I Dinna Trust Him," Said Slightly Mad Angus. "he Reads Books An' Such.

People Don't Like To Say Horror So They Say Dark Fantasy Because That's Horror Wearing A Collar And Tie.

As Far As Death Was Aware, The Sole Reason For Any Human Association With Pigs And Lambs Was As A Prelude To Chops And Sausages. Quite Why They Should Dress Up For Children’s Wallpaper As Well Was A Mystery. Hello, Little Folk, This Is What You’re Going To Eat… He Felt That If Only He Could Find The Key To It, He’d Know A Lot More About Human Beings.

...it Is Well Known That A Vital Ingredient Of Success Is Not Knowing That What You're Attempting Can't Be Done.

It Was Long After Midnight And The Stars Looked Damp And Chilly; The Air Was Full Of The Busy Silence Of The Night, Which Is Created By Hundreds Of Small Furry Things Treading Very Carefully In The Hope Of Finding Dinner While Avoiding Being The Main Course.

Goodness Is About What You Do. Not Who You Pray To.

People's Whole Lives Do Pass In Front Of Their Eye Before They Die. The Process Is Called "living".

He Was Certain He Was Anorectic, Because Every Time He Looked In A Mirror He Saw A Fat Man. It Was The Archchancellor, Standing Behind Him And Shouting At Him.

Things That Try To Look Like Things Often Do Look More Like Things Than Things.

I Should Have Learned This, She Thought. I Wanted To Learn Fire, And Pain, But I Should Have Learned People.

It’s Quite Easy To Accidentally Overhear People Talking Downstairs If You Hold An Upturned Glass To The Floorboards And Accidentally Put Your Ear To It.

Carpe Jugulum," Read Agnes Aloud. "that's... Well, Carpe Diem Is 'sieze The Day,' So This Means-" "go For The Throat

Ordinary Fortune-tellers Tell You What You Want To Happen; Witches Tell You What’s Going To Happen Whether You Want It To Or Not. Strangely Enough, Witches Tend To Be More Accurate But Less Popular.

Ridcully Was To Management What King Herod Was To The Bethlehem Playgroup Association.

Adventure! People Talked About The Idea As If It Were Something Worthwhile, Rather Than A Mess Of Bad Food, No Sleep And Strange People Inexplicably Trying To Stick Pointed Objects In Bits Of You.

Someone Got Killed Up Here.... It Was Outside. A Tall Man. He Had One Leg Longer’n The Other. And A Beard. He Was Probably A Hunter." "how’d You Know All That?" "i Just Trod On ‘im.

Insanity Is Catching.

You Fear To Die? "it's Not That I Don't Want... I Mean, I've Always...it's Just That Life Is A Habit That's Hard To Break.

Sometimes Glass Glitters More Than Diamonds Because It Has More To Prove.

It Was Raining In The Small, Mountainous Country Of Llamedos. It Was Always Raining In Llamedos. Rain Was The Country's Main Export. It Had Rain Mines.

Tragic Heroes Always Moan When The Gods Take An Interest In Them, But It's The People The Gods Ignore Who Get The Really Tough Deals

You Never Knew About People, Like You Never Knew How Deep A Pond Was Because All You Saw Was The Top.

The Universe Clearly Operates For The Benefit Of Humanity. This Can Be Readily Seen From The Convenient Way The Sun Comes Up In The Morning, When People Are Ready To Start The Day.

Do Not Act Incautiously When Confronting A Little Bald Wrinkly Smiling Man!

Blessings Be On This House," Granny Said, Perfunctorily. It Was Always A Good Opening Remark For A Witch. It Concentrated People's Minds On What Other Things Might Be On This House.

Some Humans Would Do Anything To See If It Was Possible To Do It. If You Put A Large Switch In Some Cave Somewhere, With A Sign On It Saying 'end-of-the-world Switch. Please Do Not Touch,' The Paint Wouldn't Even Have Time To Dry.

The Librarian Considered Matters For A While. So…a Dwarf And A Troll. He Preferred Both Species To Humans. For One Thing, Neither Of Them Were Great Readers. The Librarian Was, Of Course, Very Much In Favor Of Reading In General, But Readers In Particular Got On His Nerves. There Was Something, Well, Sacrilegious About The Way They Kept Taking Books Off The Shelves And Wearing Out The Words By Reading Them. He Liked People Who Loved And Respected Books, And The Best Way To Do That, In The Librarian’s Opinion, Was To Leave Them On The Shelves Where Nature Intended Them To Be.

The Landscape Was Snow And Green Ice On Broken Mountains. These Weren't Old Mountains, Worn Down By Time And Weather And Full Of Gentle Ski Slopes, But Young, Sulky, Adolescent Mountains. They Held Secret Ravines And Merciless Crevices. One Yodel Out Of Place Would Attract, Not The Jolly Echo Of A Lonely Goatherd, But Fifty Tons Of Express-delivery Snow.

I Don’t Think It's Weak To Admit You Made A Mistake. That Takes Strength, If You Ask Me.

You Know What I'd Really, Really Like? What I'd Pay Money For? A Zx81 With A Disc Drive. I Understood The Zx81. It Was So Easy To Interface Stuff To It.

As They Say In Discworld, We Are Trying To Unravel The Mighty Infinite Using A Language Which Was Designed To Tell One Another Where The Fresh Fruit Was.

He'd Been An Angel Once. He Hadn't Meant To Fall. He'd Just Hung Around With The Wrong People.

Sometimes I Feel That The World Is Made Up Of Sensible People Who Know The Plot And Bloody Idiots Who Don't.

Cats Will Amusingly Tolerate Humans Only Until Someone Comes Up With A Tin Opener That Can Be Operated With A Paw.

This Man Was So Absent-mindedly Clever That He Could Paint Pictures That Didn’t Just Follow You Around The Room But Went Home With You And Did The Washing-up.

Bill Door Was Impressed. Miss Flitworth Could Actually Give The Word "revenue", Which Had Two Vowels And One Diphthong, All The Peremptoriness Of The Word "scum.

No. Men Should Die For Lies. But The Truth Is Too Precious To Die For.

Anyway, Just Because You're Sworn Enemies Doesn't Mean You Can't Be Friends, Does It?

The Trouble With Thinking Was That, Once You Started, You Went On Doing It.

We Have Been So Successful In The Past Century At The Art Of Living Longer And Staying Alive That We Have Forgotten How To Die. Too Often We Learn The Hard Way. As Soon As The Baby Boomers Pass Pensionable Age, Their Lesson Will Be Harsher Still.

There Are Some People Who Hate My Guts. But That Goes With The Territory.

You Can't Remember The Plot Of The Dr Who Movie Because It Didn't Have One, Just A Lot Of Plot Holes Strung Together. It Did Have A Lot Of Flashing Lights, Though.

Many People, Meeting Aziraphale For The First Time, Formed Three Impressions: That He Was English, That He Was Intelligent, And That He Was Gayer Than A Treeful Of Monkeys On Nitrous Oxide.

Truly, He Thought, The Way Of Enlightenment Is Like Unto Half A Mile Of Broken Glass.

I Once Absent-mindedly Ordered Three Mile Island Dressing In A Restaurant And, With Great Presence Of Mind, They Brought Thousand Island Dressing And A Bottle Of Chili Sauce.

Presence Of Mind

There's No Such Thing As Writer's Block. That Was Invented By People In California Who Couldn't Write.

Vimes Had Got Around To A Clean Desk Policy. It Was A Clean Floor Strategy That Eluded Him At The Moment.

Haven't You Got Any Romance In Your Soul?" Said Magrat Plaintively. "no," Said Granny. "i Ain't. And Stars Don't Care What You Wish, And Magic Don't Make Things Better, And No One Doesn't Get Burned Who Sticks Their Hand In A Fire. If You Want To Amount To Anything As A Witch, Magrat Garlick, You Got To Learn Three Things. What's Real, What's Not Real, And What's The Difference.

All Holy Piety In Public, And All Peeled Grapes And Self-indulgence In Private.

Tiffany Has Been Apprenticing As A Witch By Visiting People In Need With Her Mentor. After Meeting With One Particularly Sad Case, She Tells Her Mentor, "it Shouldn't Be Like This." Her Mentor Replies, "there Isn't A Way Things Should Be. There's Just What Happens, And What We Do.

Who Knows What The Future Holds.

Chaos Is Found In Greatest Abundance Wherever Order Is Being Sought. It Always Defeats Order, Because It Is Better Organized.

But Then Science Is Nothing But A Series Of Questions That Lead To More Questions.

Granny Weatherwax Was Not Lost. She Wasn't The Kind Of Person Who Ever Became Lost. It Was Just That, At The Moment, While She Knew Exactly Where She Was, She Didn't Know The Position Of Anywhere Else.

"multiple Exclamation Marks," He Went On, Shaking His Head, "are A Sure Sign Of A Diseased Mind."

Exclamation Marks

It's Actually True That I Keep Myself Going By Constantly Promising Myself That In Response For The Hard Work I Will Be Allowed To Do Some More Hard Work Later On.

Evolution Was Far More Thrilling To Me Than The Biblical Account. Who Would Not Rather Be A Rising Ape Than A Falling Angel? To My Juvenile Eyes, Darwin Was Proved True Every Day. It Doesn't Take Much To Make Us Flip Back Into Monkeys Again.

The Universe Was Bad Enough Without People Poking It.

You Just Put That Sword Away, Sir, Please," Said The Voice Of Lance-constable Vimes. "you Will Not Shoot Me, You Young Idiot. That Would Be Murder," Said The Captain Calmly. "not Where I'm Aiming, Sir.

The Key To Winning, As Always, Was Looking As If You Had Every Right, Nay, Duty To Be Where You Were. It Helped If You Could Also Suggest In Every Line Of Your Body That No One Else Had Any Rights To Be Doing Anything, Anywhere, Whatsoever.

I Don't Want Unnecessary Violence, Sergeant," Said Blouse. "right You Are, Sir!" Said The Sergeant. "carborundum! First Man Comes Through That Door Runnin', I Want Him Nailed To The Wall!" He Caught The Lieutenant's Eye, And Added: "but Not Too Hard!

He'd Noticed That Sex Bore Some Resemblance To Cookery: It Fascinated People, They Sometimes Bought Books Full Of Complicated Recipes And Interesting Pictures, And Sometimes When They Were Really Hungry They Created Vast Banquets In Their Imagination - But At The End Of The Day They'd Settle Quite Happily For Egg And Chips. If It Was Well Done And Maybe Had A Slice Of Tomato.

You Can't Trust Folk Songs. They Always Sneak Up On You.

When You're All Singing Together, It Brings Things Together. I Know The Songs That My Grandfather And My Father Sang.

I Stroll Along, Talk, I Sign Books, People Buy Me Drinks, I Forget Where My Hotel Is, I Get Lost And Fall Into Some Local Body Of Water... Done It Hundreds Of Times.

Things Like Crowns Had A Troublesome Effect On Clever Folk; It Was Best To Leave All The Reigning To The Kind Of People Whose Eyebrows Met In The Middle When They Tried To Think. In A Funny Sort Of Way, They Were Much Better At It.

A Lot Hinges On The Fact That, In Most Circumstances, People Are Not Allowed To Hit You With A Mallet. They Put Up All Kinds Of Visible And Invisible Signs That Say, 'do Not Do This' In The Hope That It'll Work, But If It Doesn't, Then They Shrug, Because There Is, Really, No Real Mallet At All.

There Was A Man And He Had Eight Sons. Apart From That, He Was Nothing More Than A Comma On The Page Of History. It's Sad, But That's All You Can Say About Some People.

Veil, You See, If I Vas To Say Something Portentous Like "zer Dark Eyes Of Zer Mind" Back Home In Uberwald, Zer Would Be A Sudden Crash Of Thunder,' Said Otto. 'and If I Vas To Point At A Castle On A Towering Crag And Say "yonder Is . . . Zer Castle" A Volf Would Be Bound To Howl Mournfully.' He Sighed. 'in Zer Old Country, Zer Scenery Is Psychotropic And Knows Vot Is Expected Of It. Here, Alas, People Just Look At You In A Funny Vay.

It's The Expression On Their Little Faces I Like, Said The Hogfather. "you Mean Sort Of Fear And Awe And Not Knowing Whether To Laugh Or Cry Or Wet Their Pants?" Yes. Now That Is What I Call Belief.

Science: A Way Of Finding Things Out And Then Making Them Work. Science Explains What Is Happening Around Us The Whole Time. So Does Religion, But Science Is Better Because It Comes Up With More Understandable Excuses When It's Wrong.

See A Pin And Pick It Up, And, All Day Long, You'll Have A Pin.

One Of The Hardest Lessons In Young Sam's Life Had Been Finding Out That The People In Charge Weren't In Charge. It Had Been Finding Out That Governments Were Not, On The Whole, Staffed By People Who Had A Grip, And That Plans Were What People Made Instead Of Thinking.

No Matter What She Did With Her Hair It Took About Three Minutes For It To Tangle Itself Up Again, Like A Garden Hosepipe In A Shed [which, No Matter How Carefully Coiled, Will Always Uncoil Overnight And Tie The Lawnmower To The Bicycles].

The Gods Of The Disc Have Never Bothered Much About Judging The Souls Of The Dead, And So People Only Go To Hell If That's Where They Believe, In Their Deepest Heart, That They Deserve To Go. Which They Won't Do If They Don't Know About It. This Explains Why It Is So Important To Shoot Missionaries On Sight.

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