Martin > Martin's Quotes

“People are stupid. They will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“If the road is easy, you're likely going the wrong way.”
― Terry Goodkind

“I often hear people say that they read to escape reality, but I believe that what they’re really doing is reading to find reason for hope, to find strength. While a bad book leaves readers with a sense of hopelessness and despair, a good novel, through stories of values realized, of wrongs righted, can bring to readers a connection to the wonder of life. A good novel shows how life can and ought to be lived. It not only entertains but energizes and uplifts readers.”
― Terry Goodkind

“I'm afraid that we all make mistakes. One of the things that defines our character is how we handle mistakes. If we lie about having made a mistake, then it can't be corrected and it festers. On the other hand, if we give up just because we made a mistake, even a big mistake, none of us would get far in life.”
― Terry Goodkind, Confessor

“I am who I am; no more, no less.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“Nothing gained without cost is valued. Freedom has a cost, and all will bear it so all will value and preserve it.”
― Terry Goodkind

“Wizard's First Rule: People are stupid”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“You can't argue with the fools in the world. It's better to let them have their way, then trick them when they're not paying attention.”
― Terry Goodkind

“Sometimes, making the wrong choice is better than making no choice. You have the courage to go forward, that is rare. A person who stands at the fork, unable to pick, will never get anywhere.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“no army has ever marched into battle thinking that the Creator had sided with their enemy.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“To exist in this vast universe for a speck of time is the great gift of life. Our tiny sliver of time is our gift of life. It is our only life. The universe will go on, indifferent to our brief existence, but while we are here we touch not just part of that vastness, but also the lives around us. Life is the gift each of us has been given. Each life is our own and no one else's. It is precious beyond all counting. It is the greatest value we can have. Cherish it for what it truly is..... Your life is yours alone. Rise up and live it.”
― Terry Goodkind

“Nothing is ever easy”
― Terry Goodkind

“The sun has already set on the days we made those choices. We must concentrate on what we can do tomorrow; we can't relive yesterday.”
― Terry Goodkind

“The first law of reason is that what exists, exists; what is, is, and that from this ineducible, bedrock principle, all knowledge is built...that is the foundation from which life is embraced... thinking is a choice...wishes and whims are not facts, nor are they a means to discover them... reason is our only way of grasping reality--it's our basic tool of survival. We are free to evade the effort of thinking--to reject reason--but we are not free to avoid the penalty of the abyss we refuse to see... Reason is the very substance of truth itself. The glory that is life is wholly embraced through reason. In rejecting reason one embraces death.”
― Terry Goodkind, Faith of the Fallen

“Charity, if you have the means, is a personal choice, but charity which is expected or compelled is simply a polite word for slavery.”
― Terry Goodkind, The Pillars of Creation

“We all can be only who we are, no more, no less.”
― Terry Goodkind, Stone of Tears

“Your life is your own. Rise up and live it.”
― Terry Goodkind, Faith of the Fallen

“Every person's life is theirs by right. An individual's life can and must belong only to to himself, not to any society or community, or he is then but a slave.”
― Terry Goodkind

“Once lucky, twice confident, and thrice dead.”
― Terry Goodkind, Blood of the Fold

“There is no such thing as pure good or pure evil, least of all in people. In the best of us there are thoughts or deeds that are wicked, and in the worst of us, at least some virtue. An adversary is not one who does loathsome acts for their own sake. He always has a reason that to him is justification. My cat eats mice. Does that make him bad? I don't think so, and the cat doesn't think so, but I would bet the mice have a different opinion.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“The light of a new day always chases the shadows of the night away, and shows us that the shape of our fears is only the ghost of our own minds.”
― Terry Goodkind, Wizard's First Rule

“Knowledge is a weapon. I intend to be formidably armed.”
― Terry Goodkind

“If you are unwilling to defend your right to your own lives,
then you are merely like mice trying to argue with owls.
You think their ways are wrong.
They think you are dinner.”
― Terry Goodkind, Naked Empire

“Deserve Victory”
― Terry Goodkind

“Not everyone is willing to embrace liberty; liberty requires not just effort, but risk. Some people choose to delude themselves and see their chains as protective armor.”
― Terry Goodkind, Chainfire

“Wrong doing must be punished. If not, it will proliferate until anarchy wears the robes of tolerance and understanding.”
― Terry Goodkind, Blood of the Fold

“Right and wrong are not the product of census.”
― Terry Goodkind, Naked Empire

“Think of the solution, not the problem”
― Terry Goodkind

“We reap a reward merely in the act of helping others. We never know how, or if, that reward will come back to us. Helping is the reward; none other is needed nor better.”
― Terry Goodkind

“History is rarely made by reasonable men.”
― Terry Goodkind