The Blade Itself (The First Law Trilogy Book 1)

The tree is only as strong as its root, and knowledge is the root of power.”

“Life—the way it really is—is a battle not between good and bad, but between bad and worse.” —Joseph Brodsky

A friendship between a man and a woman was what you called it when one had been pursuing the other for a long time, and had never got anywhere. He had no interest in that arrangement.

The great wage secret wars for power and wealth, and they call it government.

The more you learn, the more you realise how little you know. Still, the struggle itself is worthwhile. Knowledge is the root of power, after all.”

the conversation of the drunk is only interesting to the drunk. A few glasses of wine can be the difference between finding a man a hilarious companion or an insufferable moron.

But that was civilisation, so far as Logen could tell. People with nothing better to do, dreaming up ways to make easy things difficult.

But some things have to be done. It’s better to do them, than to live with the fear of them.